Here’s a professional photo taken by a photographer…

Notice the difference?

Please tell me that home sellers really do want to have the most expensive possession they will ever own marketed with blurry, crooked, dark, discoloured, or oddly composed photos showing windows that look like a nuclear explosion went off outside. And then, convince me that homebuyers really appreciate viewing these photos when searching for the most expensive possession they will ever buy. Tell me that Relators actually believe these lousy photos will entice a potential buyer into viewing their listing. With so many MLS listings being marketed using bad photos, why would I be convinced otherwise?

Consumers are used to high quality images in advertising and expect to be impressed visually. Buying a home is an emotional experience and using quality listing photos with proper lighting and composition will visually and emotionally attract buyers. Take a look at any auto or jewellery ad and you’ll see what I mean, the images are just dripping with appeal.

Photos are the first, and sometimes only chance agents get to make a good impression. Poor photography wastes an agent’s time by not giving the buyer a true representation of the layout before seeing it first hand.

Most real estate photos are taken either with a point and shoot type camera or in worse case scenarios, with a smartphone. These devices by themselves cannot capture wide enough of an angle to show the entire room nor light the scene effectively.

Professional photographers use expensive DSLR type cameras with wide-angle lenses that capture the entire scene which is ideal when showing a prospective buyer the true layout of the home. Multiple flash units are used to light the entire area, show the true colour of the space, and most important to create a mood that says, “buy me!”

This is what you want…

If you’re one of those agents that absolutely insist on taking their own photos, using a combination of technique, additional hardware and software can make a difference in the quality of your photos.

1. The best place to shoot a room, in most cases, is from the corners. Living rooms and kitchens should be photographed from several corners. Bedrooms and bathrooms are best shot from right inside the doorways, and exteriors should always be shot at an angle that includes the best view of one of the sides.

2. The height of the camera should always be at the level that the room is mostly used in. Typically this is at sitting height except in kitchens and bathrooms where you need to view the tops of the counters. Doing so will show more of the floor and less of the ceilings. This gives a more natural look to the room and is more inviting to the viewer.

3. Always use the widest possible angle that your camera is capable of taking. Some cameras will have the ability to add a wide-angle lens or adaptor such as the olloclip for the iPhone. Further enhance the image with software to give a better overall view of the room. Be sure to hold your camera perfectly level to the scene for straight verticals. An image with crooked walls will look visually wrong and disturbing to the viewer.

4. Turn off the flash on your camera. Cameras other than DSLR types do not have the ability to light more than a few feet away and the result is often very poor. The “auto everything” setting on point and shoot cameras will often give you a better image without the flash. Turn on all room lights and open up the curtains and blinds to bring as much light into the room as possible. Use a third party app for your smartphone camera to capture a far better image.

5. On the iPhone there are two must have photo apps, 1) Pro HDR which allows you to capture detail in bright windows while maintaining detail in the darkest part of the scene and 2) Perfectly Clear which allows you to adjust lighting, saturation, detail, and sharpness after the image is taken.

6. Whether you have a MAC or PC, software such as Photoshop Elements, Photoshop or the open source equivalent Gimp are good choices for final image manipulation. They can crop and resize images for uploading to the MLS, fix bad lighting, straighten vertical lines, and remove unsightly objects that were overlooked such as fridge magnets, garden hoses across the lawn, pet toys left under the sofa, or your own reflection in mirrors.

If you don’t believe you have the skills nor the equipment and software to truly give your sellers the best marketing material for their dollar then consider hiring a professional photographer to get the best results.

Carsten Arnold is the owner and principal photographer at Total 360 Photography, one of Metro Vancouver’s premier real estate photography services.

Enter to win a premium listing photography package worth $270 by liking our Facebook page at facebook.com/total360. Draw date is August 30th, 2013 and the winner’s name will be posted on our Facebook page.

Here are 5 things you should do when you add a listing:

1) Always make sure you have the complete address, the complete neighbourhood and city. If you import the listing from your MLS change the street name from CAPS to Sentence case and always add the neighbourhood so when people search for a home on the “Glenmore Heights” area your listing will be found.

2) After you create the listing go back and click on the SEO Address and Enhance it. If you need a hand activating this feature, connect with Ubertor’s Live Help. They’ll be happy to turn it on for you.

3) Click on the Enable for the Custom Page Title (the blue line on a Google search result) and add up to 64 characters that accurately describe the home with the most important details. Use keywords like “West Vancouver Home For Sale”

4) Click on the Enable for the Custom Meta Description (the two black lines in a Google search result) and add up to 160 characters that “romance” the home with the most important details. Make it compelling.

5) When you add a listing the website “auto-blogs” the listings. STOP! Change the auto-blogged post title to something more interesting for search engines i.e. Port Coquitlam Family Home For Sale. 4 Bedrooms 2300 sq ft  Also add the same keywords to the body of the blog post.

The most important thing you can do is add the listing to your website before it goes live on your MLS and all of the IDX feeds and “scrapers” add it to their websites. Google will see the address on your website, typically rank you on page 1 and then all of the other websites should be below yours.

If you prefer to delegate listing optimization I offer a Basic service which covers the above and 6 other steps including uploading photos and we have a Premium service which includes syndicating the listing, adding open houses and statistics you can provide your clients.

You can reach my team if you have any questions for Ubertor, feel free to connect with their Live Help.

Ubertor is really excited to introduce Mike Blaney (aka ‘The Marketing Guy’) as a guest blogger for our blog. If you don’t already know who Mike Blaney is, you can check out his website here. Mike has been an Ubertor Approved vendor for years, and is a master at helping Ubertor users design and market their brand using the Ubertor system. He has also developed considerable expertise optimizing Ubertor websites to improve search engine results.

Mike and his team come on board to give Ubertor users insight on how to fully utilize the Ubertor control panel to its full potential. You can check out a few sample websites he has designed and created on his Pinterest board. Mike also has his own blog that covers all his latest completed projects on the Ubertor platform.

Don’t forget to pop back this week to read Mike’s first blog post or follow us on Twitter or Facebook to keep up to date with all things Ubertor.

Parketing, which is parking branded vehicles at high traffic locations has been around forever yet many companies still don’t leverage its power.

My dad used to have his company logos and lists of the products he sold on our family car! It served as a rolling billboard, and he parked it strategically: no matter where we went, he found the spot that would garner the most views from passing pedestrians and other drivers.

Later, with College Pro Painters, many of us painted our old, used vehicles in a bright yellow color with our huge red and white company logos. These “big bird” vans, as they were called, attracted attention and got us clients. Some franchisees even “bartered” with gas stations: in exchange for parking their vans at the stations overnight, College Pro Painters would buy gas from the proprietor all summer long. The arrangement benefitted all those involved, and put College Pro Painters front and center at all times of the day.

To this day 1-800-GOT-JUNK? branded trucks and wrapped cars are a huge percentage of how people first heard about the company. And even if you have to park your vehicle in a questionable area, potential repair costs due to vandalism are far outweighed by the free marketing exposure you’ll get.

Last time I checked, your prospects aren’t walking around your parking lot. They are driving down the streets in the areas near their homes and offices. Where are your company cars & trucks parking tonight? This is one great and effective way of getting you FREE PR!