TAP 121. Real Estate’s Ultimate Image Enhancing Service. An Interview with Box Brownie Co-Founder, Brad Filliponi. A Podcast For Real Estate Agents
This Aussie start-up is going global quickly. And when you take a look under the hood, it’s not hard to see why!
I got a call from a property seller this week.
She’s not an agent but somehow came across my podcast and reached out for some help.
She’s been on the market for more than a year and on her third agent.
Now, I know what you’re thinking… she wants too much money, the market is falling and she refuses to come to terms with reality and work with her agent to at least get an offer.
But there are always two sides to a story.
Perhaps her agent is asleep at the wheel and totally in over his head when it comes to working in a post-boom property market.
Perhaps he doesn’t have the skill to sit down and have a real conversation with his seller and discover her real motivation and successfully communicate the action required to help her achieve the real estate solution she’s looking for.
In these situations, I focus on the motivation. Does she need to sell? Does she need to sell soon? Why? and when I say why I need all the details. By way of example, moving to be closer to her grandkids is not the whole story.
So I took a look at the listing. The photos are professional and the home is nicely furnished. But what’s that I see outside the living room window in 3 shots? Is that 2 feet of snow? It’s the height of summer here in Toronto. The only way there could be snow is if this property has been on the market for 5 or 6 months… and was that last winter or the winter before.
Then I see the definition of marketing stupidity. Days on Market is proudly promoted front and centre on the listing at 234 days.
If I’m a buyer, what does that tell me? It tells me this listing is not fresh and new and something I should check out. It tells me that this is a home nobody wants so why should I invest time and effort checking it out?
Any good agent knows that presentation is everything and when it comes to marketing, great images are your best friend and secret weapon.
A few years ago, real estate photographer Brad Filliponi came to the same conclusion and saw an opportunity.
Why not create a service that helps agents make their marketing images look awesome? What about turning that dark photo into a bright attractive marketing image that says “hey. I’m a gorgeous home, come and check me out”
And why not replace those grey clouds with a beautiful blue sky and replace doubt with optimism and vibrancy?
And while you’re at it, let’s virtually furnish this empty room with a great looking sofa, a nice rug, some flowers and a colorful print or three that totally transforms the room from cold and boring to warm and inviting.
Apparently, less than 10% of people can actually visualize, so agents need to help their seller’s attract buyers with better images. And that’s the business that Brad co-founded. A service where you can send that okay photo and for a few bucks, get something attractive back that takes your marketing to the next level.
This weekend, I’m heading to Inman Connect in SanFrancisco. Inman is a company that promotes events and media around real estate and technology and the company I co-founded, Jigglar, is a finalist for the real estate technology innovation award. Co-incidently, Brad’s company Box Brownie is also nominated for the same award which is exciting for all of us.
My takeaway from this interview is that there is now a very affordable solution to make every image look great. And I believe that if the images look great, the agent looks great too.