So far 2020 is shaping up to be a year like no other before. Covid-19 has thrown the world for a loop and most industries – including real estate – have been severely impacted. Real estate agents – identified as essential in many regions and non-essential in NC in many county stay-at-home orders – are scrambling to reinvent themselves as "virtual" in order to facilitate listings and showings while obeying social/physical distancing rules as much as possible.

A near-decade old technology called Matterport (when I say Matterport I am referring to all 3D tour companies because Kleenex is to tissue paper as Matterport is to 3D tours) has suddenly re-emerged on the scene, by positioning itself as the miracle solution for real estate during the Covid-19 crisis, and many agents and brokerages are embracing it.

But is Matterport really the right choice for selling homes right now (or ever)? Real estate professionals should carefully consider their marketing options while the real estate market is so uncertain and budgets are being stretched thinner than ever before. Let's also not forget the current millennium's real estate marketing trends (pre-Covid-19) and the fragility of buyer attention spans (indeed, people in general).

In 2019 I put in a few month's worth of research into Matterport. I also surveyed My Home Viewer's clients and what I discovered was that most real agents were not interested in it. Most clients said they like the way Matterport looks at a glance but admitted that they hate actually using and viewing properties on it. So if agents hate using Matterport, what about the general public – the people that actually matter when it comes to making a sale as a realtor?

My research showed that cinematic video tours gain considerably more views when compared to a 3D tour product like Matterport, which requires “work” from the viewer. Unless the (buyer) is already heavily invested in a specific property on Matterport, they will most likely be too lazy to click and drag around a property manually as is required to see a property fully from front to back on Matterport.

 WHY A CINEMATIC VIDEO ATTRACTS MORE VIEWS VS. MATTERPORT

When it comes to the specifics of marketing a property online, when you share a video or run paid advertising on a video it will have much greater reach and engagement in comparison to a Matterport tour. Why does this matter? Well, more eyeballs on the property = more opportunity for the right buyer to see or hear about it from someone who has.

 How does a video attract more views vs. Matterport?

1. Watching a cinematic video online doesn't require any inputs from the viewer other than 1 click – the play button – if that (more on this below). They click the play button and away the video goes; they sit back and watch it. They can also replay and/or pause it – if they want to – with very little effort. It's overall very easy to consume video marketing online. The same cannot be said for the Matterport experience. Matterport is extremely heavy on the end user-input side of things, forcing end-users to navigate a property manually by clicking and dragging to travel between rooms. This can be both annoying and confusing. A user might lose their direction/orientation, or their computer/device might glitch. These and other technical issues lead to a negative end-user experience. In other words: buyer lost.
2. When you upload a video to a social media platform the video becomes directly playable on Facebook, requiring almost zero effort from the end-user to watch it. Moreover, the end-user doesn't need to leave Facebook to watch it – the video plays directly within their newsfeed or timeline. What could go wrong with 1 click? What's even more beneficial here is that someone can click on your profile and seamlessly contact you, all within Facebook. This cannot be achieved with Matterport.
3. The video experience on Instagram is similar to Facebook, but Instagram kicks this convenience up a notch and boosts the end-user engagement even further because a video will automatically play on Instagram when someone comes across it in their feed.
4. There are also a plethora of advantages to utilizing video on other social platforms including Youtube, Twitter, LinkedIn, and more.
5. Video is universally playable on all mobile and desktop devices regardless of the operating system.
6. Video can be narrated, which attracts views from the visually impaired.
7. Narrations can be captioned to allow hearing-impaired users to fully enjoy the video. Captions also allow any user to watch the video on mute (a growing trend) and still receive the same information.
8. Videos are generally more beautifully captured, and therefore more eye-catching.
9. Video is a growing marketing trend in all industries, and a priority for expansion on social media platforms (think: IGTV by Instagram).

 PAID ADVERTISEMENTS ARE MORE SUCCESSFUL WITH A CINEMATIC VIDEO VS. MATTERPORT

Imagine running a paid advertisement on Facebook: an ad with a cinematic video you uploaded directly to Facebook or an external link to a Matterport tour. The engagement on the video you uploaded is 9 times out of 10 going to win. There is no competition. Here's why: 

1. In order to view the property on a Matterport website, a user needs to click and leave the platform they are already using/comfortable with (in this example, Facebook). The Matterport ad cannot be directly interacted with within the Facebook ecosystem. For this reason, it is more likely a Matterport ad will not be clicked on vs. a video ad.
2. Any person that does click on a Matterport ad will need to put work in once they arrive at the tour. This will involve clicking and dragging around the property manually, and they will more than likely exit before seeing the property fully. They might not even get past the front foyer! What if there is a special feature on the second floor you know will turn this property into SOLD? For this reason, it is more likely a Matterport ad will not be as successful in terms of sales/leads vs. a video ad.
3. Social media companies (like Facebook) always prioritize the engagement on their own platform's native content – ie. the content uploaded directly to their website – not the content linked externally taking users away from it. This would include a site like Matterport.  For this reason, it is more likely a Matterport ad will not be seen by as many people. You would need to spend considerably more money on the advertising, to achieve the same results/views seen on a video ad.
4. Cinematic video packs a double whammy benefit for real estate agents: there is the opportunity to not only advertise a property itself really effectively but also an agent's own brand as well by facilitating on-screen appearance, personality, nuance, and branding.

 ANYTHING A MATTERPORT CAN DO, CINEMATIC VIDEO CAN DO BETTER

Don't get me wrong. I understand the push Matterport (and photographers who are stuck paying high monthly fees in order to offer it) are doing right now in order to win agents and sellers over. The Matterport experience is flashy and enticing and it does seem cutting edge (though in reality, it has been around for almost 10 years now) and as a photographer, I would do the same thing if I was paying monthly for it.

On the realtor side, one of the major driving forces behind the decision to use Matterport to sell a property is the concept that a buyer could really take their time viewing the property to examine all angles of a room. And a Matterport could (if the photographer provides this extra service) have hotspots labeled like appliance brand names, hidden features, etc. (but let's not forget that the user needs to navigate themselves to those hotspots in order to learn of them).

 A really good video knocks real estate marketing out of the park, especially during Covid-19.  It just requires proper effort and planning to do it properly, to do it well, and to highlight all the special features, upgrades, and brand names. A home can be presented through video in any sequence order. This means that the best and most attractive features can be shown right from the very start; a strategy that is sure to grab the attention of prospective buyers' attention.

 CONCLUSION

Matterport does not replace the cinematic video tour as the most effective marketing option for real estate during Covid-19, though it might make for a nice secondary (or tertiary) add-on for those realtors who still have the budget to spend on extras.

To remain relevant, video tour creators only need to adapt their video production planning and shooting techniques in order to cater to video tours to the current needs of real estate agents amidst a global pandemic.

Matterport may seem appealing and a convenient solution in these times, but when you look at the big picture, a well planned, strategically captured video will always outperform Matterport in the end.