I got my first virtual tour client from a lead that RTV gave me back in January of this year, having personalized and printed out most of the virtual tour marketing materials available from Rock Point Marketing.  He purchased one of my 360 Virtual tour packages and paid an extra $25 for the “Exposure Engine”.   All you gotta do is put the Virtual Tour on Realtor.com and presto, it goes out to 93 other websites. 

Here is my problem. oops, I mean, opportunity for growth…
My first client was a property management company with 44 properties, none of which were for sale.  I found out that a property must be for sale, with an MLS# to be on Realtor.com.  I really didn’t understand the difference in the 3 distribution options.  I created Postlets (and later used Vflyer.com) and put them on Craigslist.  The client still didn’t get the results that he desired (he was expecting distribution to 93 websites), until I wrote a rather long email to each of the onsite property managers, explaining how they were to use and keep the postlet/ vfler distributed on Craigslist and any other website they could find that wasn’t already a part of the syndication list.

This one of my virtual tours that I’m particularly proud of.  (The 3rd picture of the entry fountain was replaced by a photo that the manager took, so it’s not in HD)  Check out the hit stats, the manager of this complex (Ambassador Inn) is really on top of keeping the ad distributed.  http://rtvpix.com/BU-3909-JX4DV5-01.  Some of the other apartments that I did a tour for are only getting less that 5 hits a week, while this one is consistently getting over 100, peaking at over 400 hits in the week that I sent the email that I mentioned in the previous paragraph..

I called Realtor.com last week and they verified what I was told a few months ago.  Then, while I was revising my contract and price list to include RTV’s awesome new HD Slideshow and Broker/ Agent websites, I noticed that BlueLaVaMedia was a “Realtor.com Approved Vendor”.  I called back to ask what this meant and was told that BlueLaVaMedia simply used RTV’s Picture Path portal to allow us RTV providers easy pushing to Realtor.com.  I began to think that maybe I could just become a Certified Picture Path provider too and gain additional exposure for my company. You can post photos and tours to a property thats on the site.  You will need the five documents that are in a ZIPPED file on www.rockpointemarketing.com to become a vendor. It’s really that simple!  If you give them your credit card, they will charge you $20 per tour that you posted in the previous month, on the 15th of each month.  This is why you’re charging the client $25 to offset this minimal charge.

Realtor.com does have an affiliate program to promote rental properties at Move.com.  If an apartment building has less than 75 units,  they charge a flat monthly fee of $30/mo. per floor plan for the showcase listing (ex. 2 floor plans at one address = $60/mo.) with unlimited pictures.  If an apartment building has more than 75 units,  then they do an unlimited floor plan showcase listing for $100/mo. for the first 4 months (until 12/1/2010 -50% off our normal rate) with unlimited photos and floor plans.  Both include: Link to your virtual tour, Link to your website, and a Toll free call source number for tracking, with NO contract, 30 day notice to cancel at anytime

Make sure you understand the adversting guidlines.  The 3rd one is directly related to our affiliate ads and single property websites.  Any affiliate ads have to be requested and or approved by the realtor and cannot be for services competing with what Realtor.com provides. 

—
Duane Williams, President
Urban Design Studios, LLC
LA Virtual Tours
Real Estate Marketing, Virtual Tours & Renderings,
Building Information Modeling & Construction Documents
urban.design.studios.llc@gmail.com
www.urbandesignstudios-llc.com