The Challenge to Virtual Imaging
Video is the Competition
In recent conversations and e-mails, some feel that Video on the Web will replace Virtual Imaging. One of the conversations was even with an IVRPA member.
The reason Video has made huge inroads into the Internet is more bandwidth. Video display size has grown from postage-stamp size 160x120 pixels to 320x240 in most cases. The compression algorithms have gotten better, producing sharper images too.
Then came all the hype about YouTube. Google and Yahoo got on board with their Video Search capabilities.
One response I got from the Online Property Tour article was from a company that specializes in Search Engine Optimization for hotel websites. His comment was “is it safe to say Video and Film is 100% better than an old school virtual tour?” He used Google buying YouTube as evidence that in all 3 e-mails he sent me. Some how he’d come to the conclusion more of Paris Hilton’s topless video diary will sell more homes, book more hotel rooms, register more students, etc. And that more computer cam clips of co-eds walking around their bedrooms ala One Tree Hill were taking over the Internet
What is forgotten by many of us is that with the growing bandwidth and more powerful computers, virtual images can get bigger. They can be bigger even on Dial-Up, the web surfer just has to be patient while the image downloads
We do a Poor Job of Marketing
A big reason I think Virtual Imaging hasn’t done better is the VR Photographers are good at VR Photography and pretty bad at marketing and selling what we do. Many of us get all tied up in the “technology” when talking to a potential customer instead of demonstrating how Virtual Imaging can benefit them. Think about how much effort went into the anti-iPIX campaign and what it could have produced promoting virtual imaging
If you want to sell to a hotel, we need to get inside their head and learn their lexicon. Showing a convention planner a hotel is a Property Tour, I describe a Virtual Tour as an Online Property Tour. They get it! In Real Estate I promote Virtual Tours as “the Online Open House” on the sign rider I add to the real estate.
And we need a sound bite/catch phrase that gets across what Virtual Imaging is; Virtual Imaging “simulates the experience of human vision” in a way Video can’t. (I’ve been working on that “human vision” phase a lot)
And a sound bite about that explains what Videos are in the industries Virtual Imaging competes with them; Essentially, Video used in the Real Estate and Hotel/Resort Industries are “Online TV Commercials.” Just what the world needs, more commercials?!?!
I have the impression some of the IVRPA members produce Full-Screen images so routinely that they don’t think about marketing them as an advantage over the traditional size of 320x240.
Along with Interactivity and non-Linear Viewing, a Virtual Image serves the purpose of showing a single location much better than Video. If the customer wants an Online TV Commercial, then by all means encourage them to use video.
If you want to sell more Virtual Tours please feel free to use these phrases in your pitches
Online Property Tour (Hotels)
Online Open House (Real Estate)
Virtual Model Home (New Home Builders)
Online TV Commercial (Video for RE & Hotels)
Simulates the Experience of Human Vision
Full Screen Virtual Images
Super-Size Virtual Images
Doug Aurand
Albuquerque, NM
Re: The Challenge to Virtual Imaging
Aldo
The shitty quality of the video on the Web is my point.
If you're promoting a home for sale, a hotel, a museum, an assisted living center, a restaurant, etc., is that shitty what you want?
I've read a couple posts here complaining about how little Realtors want to pay for virtual tours, but no mention about how that VR photographer tried to point out the better quality they produce compared to the cheap VR photographer. Or the Full Screen size of the his images compared to the cheap VR Tour
I have an iPIX Protographer that I compete with here in Albuquerque. He charges $150 for 10 scenes, I charge $110 for 4. If our quality was the same, he's a better value.
But our quality is not the same! Mines much better
He includes still photos at no extra cost, I charge $50 for stills. If our quality was the same, he's a better value.
But our quality is not the same! Mines much better
I struggle to keep up with my work load now, this is the very early part of the home selling season, and I plan to raise my prices a little further into the season because my work is simply better.
And I market to the Realtors who sell high-priced homes.
The VR Photographer who complained about cheap Realtors bought into the "comodity approach" to their product instead of the "quality approach". The Realtor hit him with price and the photog folded.
That's what we have to stop doing!!
I have. And my average invoice is going up AND I'm getting work that quality is what the customer wants, not the lowest price.
The response to the cheap Realtor should have been; 1. What price range homes to you list and sell? 2. Have you compared my work to the low priced VR Photographer?
What I'm finding the Realtors who sell high-end homes like are my Super-Sized Images. They stand out from my competition, so the Realtor stands out from his. The Realtor benefits by paying more
The same applies to budget hotels vs luxury resorts, one will buy "price" the other "quality".
The quality, clarity and resolution of your virtual images is much better than that of any video I've seen on the 'Net. Even professionally produced video. Why do you (figuratively) find it hard to point that out to a potential customer?
Douglas Aurand
Albuquerque, NM
Re: The Challenge to Virtual Imaging
Aldo
The point I didn't make...is that we know about our particular technology by not much about our competition.
What we need to do is know our competition and have the talking points to show why our product is better.
I've taken non-real estate projects from some one here in Albuquerque that does QuickTime VR twice by pointing about that to watch the QTVR requires downloading and installing the QuickTime Player. During my pitch to the customer I sat there and spent almost 20 minutes going through the process with them
We then viewed my iPIX Images using a Java Viewer without downloading or installing anything. Game over, I got the job.
I used video on my Virtual Golf Course Tour and Virtual Ski Area Tour because it was the better media to use. Where "motion" is important, like skiing, virtual images are at a distinct advantage. Where the "place" has more than one location like the Tee, Fairway and Green of a Golf Hole, video can put it in one clip. Virtual Imaging would have take 2 or 3 scenes for each of 18 holes. Also video was the media most people have seen golf played in the the form of television coverage of tournaments.
But showing a living room in a house or hotel room, virtual imaging can offer a 1024x768 images for the same file size as a 1 minute video at 320x240. That's a distinct advantage.
I got the idea of Knowing my Competition from 2 books by the same authors, Positioning: the Battle for your Mind and Marketing Warfare. And from Sun Tzu's the Art of War
Winning is very much about knowing your enemy (oops, competition)
The more you know about them, the more likely you can defeat them
Douglas Aurand
Albuquerque, NM
Re: The Challenge to Virtual Imaging
Another weakness of streaming video is its dependence on Broadband.
While the Nielsen/Net Ratings "Net Speed" survey (how I trust surveys)reports broadband has reached 72% of home Internet users the last time I looked it up.
The problem I have with "surveys" is by their nature they have an affect on on the results.
What I'm seeing on my website is 180° the other way. When given a choice of Dial-Up, Midband and Broadband to view the video clips on www.VirtualAlbuquerque.com, Dial-Up wins 2-4 to 1. My most popular clip is the "The Ride Up" about the Sandia Peak Aerial Tramway. For all of February visitors to my site selected Dial-Up 211 times, Broadband 74 times. That's 2.9 to 1. Or just 26% Broadband usage. This kind of usage is consistant since we added video to the site.
I can't reconcile the difference between NetSpeed survey and the statistics generated by my websote, but I can't ignore them either.
Without Broadband, Videos on the Web are the size of postage stamps or take 30 seconds of buffering to play 5 seconds of video.
360° Imaging is ususally 320x240 on Dial-Up and 640x480 or larger on Broadband.
That's an advantage we have and need to use as Virtual Photographers competing with Video on the Net
Douglas Aurand
Albuquerque, NM
Re: The Challenge to Virtual Imaging
I don't want to play down the intricacies of good, high quality video production (shooting, editing), but it is just a lot easier to create and publish shitty video than it is to publish shitty panoramas.
'Everybody' can put video online, every phone on the market today will let you make video clips. And we can say how easy it is to make panoramas all day long, but it requires more specialised equipment, and simply more effort...