Commercial Video Production – Video Production Business Tips – Just How Profitable Are Real Estate Video Services?

by admin on Dec.23, 2010, under Uncategorized

To better understand whether or not you can make money shooting video tours for the real estate industry, you must first understand the customer. Real Estate agencies are comprised of multiple realtors who are nothing more than independent contractors.

The Realtors give up a small percentage of each sale to the agency in exchange for name brand recognition and administrative services such as office space, secretaries, sales seminars, technology training, etc. The individual realtors are responsible for funding their own marketing efforts. (i.e. virtual tours, newspaper listings, magazine listings, personal billboards, etc.)

After presenting our product to several Real Estate brokerage firms, the top executives all made it quite clear that the agency will not pay for virtual tours. Knowing that you will not be successful in marketing your product to the various agency executives, it is important that you learn more about the individual realtor.

The average realtor is a 43 year old woman who makes around $40,000 a year. Those stats tell you a lot about your prospective customer. First, how well does this demographic use technology? My experience has been that there are very few in the real estate industry that are techno literate.

You end up not only trying to market your product, but training the realtors on how use their computer as well. Not fun! Second, she only makes $40,000 per year. Now I’m sure that’s after all expenses, but you are still dealing with an individual/company that most likely grosses about $65,000 per year, if that.

How many companies do you work with or hear about that take advantage of professional video services if they can’t even break the 6 digit mark in gross income? The bottom line is that the average realtor can’t afford your services unless you want to charge them less than $100 per video tour. (That’s what IPIX used to charge and seems to be all realtors will pay for these services.)

Some of you might think that $100 per tour would be fine if you had enough volume. If that’s the case, let me break down how long it takes to produce a high quality video tour.

I’m first going to assume that you will not be adding a voiceover to the tour. (If you do, it will take about an hour between writing the script, getting it approved, and recording the voiceover. If you had a professional do the read, you would have to pay them as well.)

Okay, so you receive the order from Joe Realtor to produce a video tour of his lake side property in Anytown, USA. The first thing you have to do is schedule a time to meet the realtor at the home. It will usually take an average of 20 minutes to get to the property. Once on location, it takes about an hour to shoot the interior and exterior of the home.

After producing several tours, our team got it down to about 45 minutes. Add another 20 minutes to get back to your studio. If you are efficient with your non-linear editing system, the post process takes about 30 minutes. Once you have completed the edit and added music, it will take you about 10 minutes to encode the video to flash or windows media.

Then you’ll spend about 10 minutes uploading the files to your video host. Once the files are ready to be viewed on-line, you will want to test them to make sure they look okay. That will take about 10 minutes.

After you are satisfied with the quality, you will forward the “url link” to the realtor and their web designer, and I would recommend burning a copy of the tour to DVD for the realtor as well. That takes another 10 minutes or so.

So, to produce one video tour, encode to an internet video file and burn to a DVD, it took 2 hours and 35 minutes. If you divide that by $100, you’ve grossed roughly $40 per hour before expenses. Now let’s look at what you actually take home in profit.

Income per video tour: $100

Expenses per video tour:

tape stock – $3 (3 homes on one tape)

6 months Streaming – $20 (Assuming you pay competitive rates)

Postage for DVD – $2

Total expenses – $25

Net Income per Tour: $75

After all expenses, you take home about $75 dollars each tour. So, you produced the video tour for about $30 per hour. Is it worth it? Maybe so, but it’s hard to grow a successful corporate video production business on $30 per hour.

The times I gave above were what we were hitting after streamlining our shooting process, working out all the details with the web designers, trained our clients on the benefits of the product and how to use it, mastered the editing and streaming process, and found an affordable streaming provider. (Take into consideration a substantial learning curve if you are not familiar with the process of streaming video over the Internet.)

If your thinking about getting into real estate videography, my overall recommendation is to spend your time finding a more viable market. If you haven’t had the chance already, it will take you months just to figure out how the whole real estate process works and how you can best serve their needs. (It took us about 9 months of R&D and networking just to get in good enough shape to make our first sales presentation.)

If you still believe there is money to be made in real estate videography, my recommendation would be to forget about residential realtors and only focus on commercial realtors and major contractors. The best way to see if a company is a good candidate for an on-line video tour is to look at their website.

If they have a high quality website, they will probably have the budget for a video tour. If it looks like their site was put together by a high school kid, they probably don’t understand enough about web video to even consider your offer.

I have produced several video tours for commercial realtors and development groups. The average tour was priced at about $1000. It takes a little longer to produce commercial tours but the hourly works out to be about $100-$150.

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Kris Simmons is a successful video business entrepreneur and coach whose purpose is to help videographers around the world learn how to grow, manage and sustain highly profitable video production companies. To date, thousands of videographers internationally have taken advantage of the business-building resources found at http://www.mindyourvideobusiness.com.

Article Source:

http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Kris_Simmons

In my years as a video business entrepreneur, the months of November and December have always been slow. Clients are preparing for vacation and the last thing on their mind is executing a video production agreement. So, instead of worrying about why we aren’t busy, I channel that energy into marketing my company. Here’s a few ideas on what you can do to boost revenues during the slow part of the year.

1. Attend business networking events so you can meet other business professionals in your area.

Check with your local chamber of commerce, ad federation and PRSA to see what’s available. Do your best to meet a lot of people and hand out plenty of business cards. You can follow up with those you meet with a personal letter, a copy of your demo reel and a meeting request.

2. Offer to videotape a high-profile non-profit fundraising events in exchange for sponsorship exposure.

Get a banner printed that you can hang in the room and a few small signs to put on your tripod that have your logo, phone number and website address. Then, put a copy of your demo and a business card at every seat in the room prior to the event. You can also ask the event organizers to publicly thank you at the beginning and end of the event so that everyone hears your company name.

After the event, collect all the cards and demos that didn’t get picked up so you can use them the next time. Make sure that the edited video includes a commercial about you at the beginning/end and make sure your logo/phone number/website is prominently displayed on the disc face. Take it a step further and post the video on your website and ask the non-profit to link to it via their newsletter and website.

3. Call website design firms and commercial printers in your area and invite them to lunch or coffee

The purpose of these meetings are to find great vendors that you can recommend to your clients as well as to introduce them to a great video production company that they can recommend. Website designers get plenty of requests for video on their clients’ websites and printers often get requests for CD/DVD duplication services. Getting to know these professionals in your area will expand your network and will result in new leads relatively soon.

Article Source:

http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Kris_Simmons

Video Production is a broad definition which covers taping, editing and distributing a video product. Videos can be for commercial use, television, corporate and other events such as weddings, birthday parties and anniversaries. With the advent of YouTube.com, and the ever increasing popularity of Social Networking, many people are making videos of themselves, their families, their pets, their garage bands and so on, and uploading them to the web. Sometimes these videos go viral, and become huge hits all over the world. You Tube.com channels are set up to make money, and with the web, almost anyone can have their 15 minutes of fame – so there is a lot of incentive for people everywhere to learn about Video Production, HD video in Lafayette, LA. A garage band in Lafayette, LA with good equipment and some know how can make a video of one of their songs, preferably in HD Video (High Definition Video), add it to You Tube.com, and have the potential for international exposure.

In order for Video Production, HD video in Lafayette, LA to be successful, and to produce a polished product, it is best to follow the tried and tested formula used by professionals everywhere. Our garage band in Lafayette, LA should break up their shoot into Pre-production, Production and Post-production phases. Pre-production is where you plan your shoot, before the camera starts rolling. This is where you decide whether you are going to use HD Video, which is any video system which uses a higher resolution than standard definition video. The reasons for doing this are not only visual. HD Video Production will improve sound quality as well.

In this phase of Video Production, the person who is going to be in charge of directing the shoot of the Lafayette, LA garage band should be looking at locations, props, figuring out the budget, and working out a storyboard, so that the finished product is makes sense. That way, by the time production begins, and the camera starts rolling, everyone knows what to do, and the shoot can proceed smoothly. After the shoot, comes the Post Production phase. This is where you capture all footage, organize it and edit it. With good video editing software, you can add in all manner of special effects, text, music, and color, screen transitions and so on. Post Production is an art in itself, and a critical factor in the success of a video.

As mentioned previously, Video Production, HD video in Lafayette, LA is also used for events. While you have to plan the shoot by scouting the location, and checking the lighting, setting up equipment and deciding on angles, you don’t have the luxury of reshooting footage over and again to conform to a storyboard. And if a couple has hire you to do the HD Video Production for their romantic Lafayette, LA wedding, they will not be amused if you have a camera malfunction or other disaster just as they say their ‘I do’s’. There is immense scope for Video Production of events – Proms, High School Graduations, first day of school, corporate events – the list goes on and on. As with planned shoots, Post Production is very important. Whether or not you use effects, and what type effects you use will very much follow the theme of the event you have been asked to capture. If you are looking for someone to do Video Production of an event for you, make sure you see their portfolio, and check out a couple of references. You don’t want your once-in-a-lifetime event ruined by incompetence.

Obviously the quality of Video Production is going to depend greatly on the training and experience of those doing it, but you don’t have to be a professional to produce a great product. There are many talented amateurs, and learning Video Production can be a stimulating hobby. Budget plays a huge role – equipment for Video Production, HD video in Lafayette, LA can vary from run of the mill cell phone video cameras, to extremely expensive, top of the range items. HD Video – high definition video will produce a superior quality product, but it will require more expensive equipment, and it uses more bandwidth on the web. Not all videos are uploaded to the web – the final product can be burned onto a DVD or CD and distributed in that way. The Garage Band from Lafayette, LA could upload the final product to the web, and hand out a couple of DVD’s to friends, family and local fans. Video Production, whether HD or not, is something anyone can do!

For more information on Video Production in Lafayette, LA visit us at http://numawebdesign.com/.

Article Submitted by:

Chuck Pawson
Numa Web Design
4400 Ambassador Cafferey, Ste. A
Lafayette, LA. 70508

337-230-9891

Article Source:

http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Chuck_Pawson

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