PropMedia Podcast

Beyond the Photo: Building Emotional Connections with Virtual Tours w/ Chris White

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0:00 | 45:54

This episode features Chris White, a product manager with iGuide, discussing how to scale a real estate media business through virtual tours and floor plans.


In this episode, we cover:

  • The iGuide Experience: Discover how iGuide combines a floor plan with 3D virtual tours to provide a simple, information-focused property representation.
  • Efficiency in Capture: Chris explains iGuide's obsession with a fast and "transparent" capture process, allowing photographers to scan a space in as little as three seconds.
  • The Hardware: Get a look at the latest Planix R1 camera, which integrates a 360 camera with LiDAR technology for one-button measurement and photography.
  • Driving Emotional Connections: Learn why providing more digital information actually helps buyers build emotional connections to a property, potentially increasing showings and offer values.
  • The State of the Industry: Chris shares his take on the "controversy" surrounding 3D tour syndication on platforms like Zillow and the growing trend toward property measurement standardization.

Whether you are looking for your next high-value upsell or are curious about the future of property data, this conversation provides practical insights into the evolving world of 3D media.

SPEAKER_00

Hey, I'm Moses Nickerson, co-founder of Pixel Mob and propmedia.com. This is Maddie Fisher, same, same deal right there. And welcome to the Prop Media Podcast, where we talk about all things property media.

SPEAKER_02

Today we've got an interesting conversation with Chris White. And Chris is a product manager with iGuide, which I think a lot of people have heard of, but we're going to get into a little bit about the technology and specifically how you can use floor plans to grow and scale your real estate media business.

SPEAKER_00

And maybe a little of the controversy of what's happening in the 3D tour space. Afternoon, Chris. How are you doing? Pretty good. How are you? Pretty good. Pretty good. Where are you hailing from today?

SPEAKER_03

Ontario. So I'm I'm sort of near Toronto, um uh maybe an hour or two east.

SPEAKER_00

Well, welcome. It's almost 80 here. Uh so it's that's just mean. I don't think it's like 80 below there, right?

SPEAKER_03

We're all rocking pretty epic beards right now.

SPEAKER_00

So it's it's looking pretty good. All right. So, Chris, you are you work with uh Planetar, which I think a lot of people maybe don't know that name, but Planetar produces the iGuide product. Am I getting that right? You got it. That's correct. Yeah, and you've been working with them for a good while. Like an eternity, 10 years.

SPEAKER_03

In tech terms, that is an eternity.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, that is a good while. All right. So we I I personally don't have a lot of experience with iGuide, and I know that it's I think it might be interesting just at the outset here to hear a little of what that product is for other people in my boat.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_00

Um, so if you want to give us a little explanation of like what is that product, I I know it's extremely popular up in Canada. I see it down in the United States as well, and probably other places, but give us a little lowdown and then we'll talk about some of some of your company and how it can benefit photographers.

SPEAKER_03

iGuide is uh best represented as uh like a virtual tour, 3D tour solution. You know, it's its main value proposition is about like accurate measurement and accurate representations of property. So um iGuide represents actually a bunch of different experiences, but they all do the same thing. Take a physical space, turn it into a digital one, and then share it. Um, you know, and it varies depending on like the reason you want it for what industry you're in. So for real estate, it's like you know, it's more aesthetic than it is for say insurance or for architecture, engineering, and construction. So generally speaking, you think of it as a sort of 3D tour solutions with accurate floor plans natively built in, you're pretty much good.

SPEAKER_00

All right. So, like in my mind right now, you've got a floor plan, and that's pinned into some kind of a 3D space where you can select a space on the floor plan and that zooms you over to you can actually see the 3D space based on like a node. Is that pretty close?

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, yeah. Actually, so we've had like years to watch people use the experience, and what we found is that um users, regardless of industry, they they use the iGuide experience, which is a floor plan on the left and sort of 360s on the right, uh, in this very specific way that like um is very revealing about the sort of human mind. You know, they look at the 360s and they look at stuff, you know, they look at what's that window look like, or light fixtures. People are obsessed with light fixtures. I don't know why.

SPEAKER_00

Because we're drawn to light, like moths to flame. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

That's probably it. You're probably right there. Um so they look around and then often they'll see the floor plan, and they're they're always labeled, right? So they'll see, oh, kitchen, and they'll click on the kitchen, and they sort of instantly transport to the kitchen. Uh and and they like this this experience, this sort of flip-flopping between sort of visual navigation um and uh sort of floor plan navigation. And it makes sense, right? Like when you're looking at homes, um uh that's you know, that's how your brain works. When you're looking at photos, for example, you'll you'll kind of go through the photos, you know, in in a normal sequence, end-to-end. You know, typical real estate photography is you know, exteriors and then sort of a almost like a mini or a small walkthrough of the house in order. But um, you know, you'll you'll look until you get bored, and then you'll go scroll real fast and look for things that are important to you, like you know, the bedrooms or you know, whatever is relevant.

SPEAKER_00

100%.

SPEAKER_03

I got exactly the same, it's exactly how people use it. Um, and uh, you know, that combination of uh visual, and then you can kind of flip over to the floor plan, um, is I think one of the reasons why I got has been that experience has been so successful over time is that it just like it works, it's good, it makes sense.

SPEAKER_00

Good way to process like what's in a house from afar. Like even pedagogically, you're kind of linking hallway, kitchen, whatever, into what you're seeing. Whereas like in a th in a other 3D tours, it's I don't know, I don't know, they're not that hard, but you do kind of get lost in them, or you're clicking like seven nodes to get up the stairs or something because you want to see another room. Like I could see the simplicity, even if it's a less technical experience, that simplicity kind of making sense for the actual digesting of a house.

SPEAKER_03

It is definitely one of the things that we uh try to bring up when people ask about the advantages, and that's that it's simple to use and easy to understand, and is focused on getting you, as in the user, the information you need rather than making you have a feeling. So it is very cool to like fly into a full 3D experience and have full WASD navigation. That's a thrilling experience. But does that give you the information that you need? It might. But you know, having a floor plan that you can just click on and then instantly be um, you know, uh used for to transport you to the visuals that you need um is for the most part what people are are asking for for uh for online experiences.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, it's that's kind of interesting because like a lot of times we just assume like uh I don't know a more technical tech is better for the sake of being better, but sometimes uh backing up into simplicity is a better choice in all kinds of products. I love that you said that. Okay, so I'm just gonna point my see you see those guitars over there?

SPEAKER_03

Yeah. How much has a Fender Stratocaster changed in uh 70 years?

unknown

Zero.

SPEAKER_03

That's not true. They have fancy ball bearings, and you know, there's all those sorts of doodas. But if you look at that thing up close, uh like a uh an electric guitar, it that's nonsense. It's a bunch of screws and wood, and like, what is that? But like in reality, it's kind of great because it does exactly what it needs to do. Um, and uh you can try to make better versions of it, but you're gonna get pretty much the same thing at the end of the day anyway, just with more rounded corners. Um, there is something really you know natively human and approachable about wandering around with a map. People just get it, and so that means that people feel more comfortable, they don't get lost, they uh they like it. Nice.

SPEAKER_02

It was pretty interesting. Maybe you can help us back up a little bit and think through what does it look like to create an eye guide? What is that process like?

SPEAKER_03

I'm so glad you asked that. You're just setting me up with all these good questions.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, we are we're we're teaming, you're a product guy, we're teaming up pretty easy. We should have it. It was a softball, I will admit, but some harder questions.

SPEAKER_03

Um, but you save those for later. Is that how this works? You see that. Well, I mean, I'm gonna have a false sense of security, right?

SPEAKER_00

Exactly. Business questions about how to how to integrate this, how people grow their business. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

So okay, so the cool thing about iGuide, generally speaking, is that we're kind of obsessed with the capture process. So what I mean by that is that like companies always have these weird quirks, right? Like, and you don't really necessarily know them until you kind of get into the system and you start using it, and then you know, um, because on the surface, a lot of things look the same. Like they sell floor plans, they sell virtual tours, like what's the difference, right?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

Um, so the problem that iGuide solves is that uh we create digital versions of physical spaces. That's the problem that gets solved. And so that's that's floor plans and virtual tours. But there is also a capture problem that we solve, and it's the kind of the one that we like the most to solve. So I'll give you an example. When I was young, um had less gray hair anyway, uh, I used to measure houses manually on pencil and paper. It's kind of why I started working for our guide. And there'd be this thing that would happen where I'd rock up to a house, you know, in my compact car, and I'd I'd look over at the house and I'd be like, please be easy, please be easy. And I'd look over and it'd be like a single floor, like a bungalow, like hip roof, like just one level rectangle, and I'd be like, Yes! I'd be so excited because that was like five minutes for the work. But then the other houses were like, oh, game bay windows, and yeah. It just goes on and on, and you're thinking, okay, I'm gonna be here for a while. Um, and so that problem is essentially solved extremely well by um the eye-guide uh camera system or capture process in general. And the reason for that is um there's a bunch of reasons, they're all very cool. We could talk about it forever, so just interrupt me at any point if I keep going on. But um, it's comprehensive, you don't have to overthink it. You push a button, it just measures everything. So it's not like you're doing take measures or you know, um, it's recording everything automatically. There's no like handwritten notes, you know. So if we're comparing it to pen and paper, it's like light years ahead. Um, but that comprehensiveness is very useful because obviously on the uh at the on the back end, then you get access to that as a as a user or as a person creating an experience, and then people can see more than they would if you were to curate very specific photos. Um, so just in comparison to regular photos. But anyway, the capture process, we're obsessed with making it fast. So you can scan a space in three seconds, and we're constantly working on that. We had conversations this morning about how to get that down like three seconds.

SPEAKER_02

They're spending too much time sitting around waiting for the three.

SPEAKER_03

Wow, yeah, you could what do you just check in your text? It's funny because when you maybe mount it on a rainbow. We have tried. It's not high enough. And the point of view is it feel okay. So if you shoot a tour too low, this happens with any virtual tour technology, it makes you feel like you're a toddler. You're like, whoa, you feel like a three-year-old. Um, but the reason that we want people to be able to shoot fast and have a really, really great capture experience is that directly affects the quality of the final output in a bunch of weird, funny ways that people don't really think about. So imagine for a moment that I'm working against the technology, it's slow, it's unpleasant, there's lots of options. Um, I'm gonna create fewer scans, and they're not gonna necessarily be uh the ones that I want. Viewer nodes focused on getting to get exactly finished. So the goal with our capture process is to make it as fast and as transparent as possible so that you can't. You want it transparent? I mean, that's a weird experience. Yeah, yeah. I'm using terms that um maybe don't make sense the context, but I wouldn't have to do that.

SPEAKER_00

I'm just imagining a dollhouse with clear walls right now. Well, interesting user experience.

SPEAKER_03

The reason that I say transparent is that when you're capturing with technology that's good, you shouldn't think about it. You don't think about taking a picture with your phone, you just do it. And so we want our technology to be like that. Just don't worry about the technology, worry about what you're making with it. Like it's 3D printing just went through this thing. I don't know if you guys are into that, where 3D printers just kind of got good. And so 3D printers used to be for people who were into 3D printing, right? And now they're for people who want a 3D print. And that's like massive. It's a big jump. Yeah, it changes the whole game. Thank you, uh Bamboo Labs. But uh the um iGuide technology, we want it to be like that, where you're not worried about like fiddling with the technology, you're worried about the final thing that you're making, the floor plans and the the virtual tour experience. And so the capture process, we want to slim it down to the fastest and easiest it can be, so that you can essentially it's it's a B2B thing, grow your business, but that means making an experience that's so good that the someone says, I would like more, please, and they'll they'll you know they'll come back. Yeah, um, and so the more time, more free time you have to do that, the better normal likely that is. But also, um, this these technologies exist in context. Like, no one just orders a 3D tour, not in real estate yet, anyway. So that means that like there's other stuff you gotta do when you're there. You gotta shoot photos, you're gonna do a video. Your agent's gonna ask you something ridiculous, like, hey, do you have a mic? Can we do like uh like an on-camera thing like now? And you're like, what? So, you know, um if you're not fussing over the virtual tour because you you you're really confident that you can bang it out in 15 minutes, leaves all that extra time for you to um, you know, work around challenges at the property, like the RV in the driveway, and no one has the keys, or like, you know, um uh the old lady who's like, Can you help me move this air conditioner? And you're like, Why? Okay. Um, so the um, you know, the the the technology should get out of your way, not get in your way. And we know that we've been working with real estate media professionals for so many years that when you see someone work, um, to get the most out of one shoot, you you need to maximize the time you have on site. And so capture time, you know, it doesn't sound like much, three seconds, ten seconds, but it's actually like a big deal. Uh, because that's if it's taking a long time to create the virtual tour, that's time away from the the video that you could have shot. Or take that extra time, you know, and go for lunch early.

SPEAKER_02

Even better. Do you, you know? What does the device look like? What do what is involved in this capture process?

SPEAKER_03

We have uh a few different generations of cameras. Our most recent one is called the Planx R1, and it is essentially a uh two-lens 360 camera mounted on top of a LIDAR scanner, a laser scanner. And what you get from that is something kind of magical, which is the ability to measure a space and photograph it all at once with one button. Um, no, no movement, no rotation, uh, nothing mechanical. Um, so it's very stable, it's you know, obviously very stable images. Uh, and um when you do that, the images and the lidar are they're not separate, they're connected. And what that means is that someone uh like a drafts person uh can look at that data and say, okay, this is this is a wall. So you can look at the lidar, it's like you know, an outline of the space. That's a wall. And then if they have any question about any of the other data, they can look at the image and say, Oh, okay, that's a cabinet, that's a potted plant, that's a dog. Um, so it allows for extremely rapid capture, but that's also really, really good for creating accurate floor plans um in spaces like normal, you know, like regular, everyday spaces. Um, it's also extremely, I think I mentioned before comprehensive. And so what I mean by that is it just kind of captures everything. If that makes sense. So it's not it's not like a process where you have to think about what you're capturing. You you just push a button and it just does it. Um and you can see it in real time on your phone. It's pretty neat. Um, so that's good from a workflow perspective of what you see is what you get. And so if you if you look at it and you don't like it, it's digital photography. Just do it again. You can do as many or as few scans as you want. Um, the actual camera system itself, you know, it's about Yay big. I have one, I'll grab it later, but about Yay big. It's got a big cap on it. You know, it's um compatible with any tripod, any accessories you've got, any bags you've got. Our previous generation camera was a bit um unwieldy. It's called the Planx Pro. And we specifically redesigned the most recent one to be as compatible as possible, for example, with every quick release plate system known to man. You you're using Arca Swiss, Manfroto Move, I don't know, like you know, anything you can imagine, you can use it. So that means if you are going out on site and you just want to carry one tripod, and for some reason that is a very large video tripod with the big Manfroto, you know, the big juicy plate, I forget what it's called, but the long one, fine, it's perfectly acceptable. Um if you run a run light with a little, a little tiny, you know, 30 millimeter arca Swiss and like a travel tripod that weighs you know almost nothing, yep, that's fine too. Um uh very, very uh um accessible and compatible with any gear you might you know already have.

SPEAKER_00

Nice, cool. You you don't have one with you, do you? I do, yeah.

SPEAKER_03

I was just hold on, I'll get it. Is that okay? Can I yeah, absolutely, yeah.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, sure, grab it. So, yeah, before you get into it, make sure, yeah. Some people will be listening in and won't be able to see it. So, yeah, so different to talk us through play by play the okay.

SPEAKER_03

I'll describe it. It's uh yeah, about a foot tall, uh, you know, under half a meter for anyone in Europe. Um, it has a giant cover on it, which is very cool. Um, because if you're thirsty and you're desperate, you know, you can that one's for people who are watching.

SPEAKER_00

Uh hidden feature, hydration mechanisms.

SPEAKER_03

The cover is quite interesting though, because um we know that um most people, almost in every industry, whether you're a real estate photographer, an insurance adjuster, or a contractor, have their own bags and boxes and bins, and this can go in any of them because all of the vital bits, LIDAR, and the lenses are all covered by this giant uh mega cover that I'm taking on and off. And so that means that this is attempting to be the camera that you take with you everywhere.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, you can just throw it.

SPEAKER_03

The best camera is the one you have with you, you know. So any bag you want, um, it'll be protected. But in general, what you're gonna see here is you're gonna see a uh a two-lens 360 camera on top, and then directly beneath it is a LiDAR scanner that measures you know everything in a 360. Uh, and then beneath that is some extra control dudes with a removable battery, which is quite cool.

SPEAKER_02

Very helpful, yeah.

SPEAKER_03

Uh super useful. Um honestly, it's sort of funny. These batteries last like a month to Sundays. You can shoot like eight hours straight um with one of these. Uh, so it's more for if you forgot to charge it more than like needing to swap mid-shoot, but that's nice. Um, people like having an extra battery. I I do. You can you can run like two batteries, all you can alternate and then they last twice as long as well. It's just kind of you know, nice. Um the way this works is that um once you have the camera turned on, you connect via uh, you know, your like our app. Um, and uh there's this really cool trick it has that it's gonna show you in a second. Um, I can see myself twice there. But I've never had again, we're kind of obsessed with the capture process more than we really need to be. And it's evidenced by what will happen here. So we wanted to make it easy to connect to the camera. So I don't know if you guys can see the QR code.

SPEAKER_02

Is that nice, yeah?

SPEAKER_03

So in order to connect the camera, you just scan the QR code and does it. It's so awesome. So I've had I've had every Rico Theta that you know that has had existed, the V and the X and the Z one or whatever. And you know, I've had a bunch of Instys 360 cameras, and I have the the DGI one, I forget what it's called. And connecting to cameras with Bluetooth sucks. It's weird and it still isn't that great. And um, this is via Wi-Fi, and you just take the app, you scan it, you're in. It's so easy. Smart.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

And so that's for I mean, existing users are you know, don't have as tough a time, but new users tend to struggle with that. So we wanted to make that easy. Uh but generally speaking, you get the app, you take this, and you uh you push a button in the app and it scans, and then you see immediately the 360 um that you've captured and the LiDAR data associated with it. And um you follow a pretty you know sort of typical process that you would um for any type of uh real estate media creation, and that you kind of go from room to room and you you capture everything sort of in the whatever order you want. Um some key differences in case someone hasn't ever captured a virtual tour before, is that with this system, because you're you're measuring the space, you're gonna go to spaces that uh like you wouldn't really photograph, like hallways and you know, like in between spaces and things like that, in order to create that connective tissue for navigation, so you can go from one space to another, but also so it can be like made into a floor plan. The real world um sucks. When you go to a property, like I know everybody's like, oh no, my agents, they keep my houses perfectly clean. I show up, lockbox, I'm in and out, and it's easy. That's not that's not true. So, what people typically do is they will curate the visuals uh for uh to make a you know an appropriately aesthetic tour for their region, whatever that may be. So um often people will err on the side of caution. So I'll give you an example. There are two types of conversations that you're gonna have with an agent when they when they have a question about the visuals of the tour. One one is, hey, I was looking at the tour and I didn't see the laundry room, like I can't see in there. And so I like that type of conversation because the other type is, oh my god, you have to turn that off. The the homeowner's underwear is on there and everyone in the internet can see it and they're freaking out.

SPEAKER_00

We had one in the master bedroom, there were like boudoir photos all over the walls, and they're like, Can you like blur these out?

SPEAKER_02

And we're like, No, they didn't actually want to blur them out. We were asking, can we blur them out, please? Um, but yes.

SPEAKER_03

Hey, you know, if you're proud of it.

SPEAKER_02

Yep.

SPEAKER_00

And they work, yeah. But in another platform, you couldn't just turn off that room or like more granularly address that. Like you'd have to pull down the whole thing and then have a new continuity of how to do that.

SPEAKER_03

In some cases, yeah, it depends. But yeah.

SPEAKER_00

All right, is that time? This episode's brought to you by Zillow 3D Tours and Matterport. Uh totally kidding. Um, as always, sponsored by Pixel Mob and just that's why I like it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Anyway, also not sponsored by iGuide. We're genuinely interested in this space and how it works for uh real estate photographers as they grow their businesses because there's usually two. Different channels that photographers add. So you start with photography, you start with your HDR blends and all of the normal stuff that's the baseline of photography. And then you come to a fork in the road of what do you add next to raise your order value? And you're usually looking at 3D tours and video. So 3D tours, you got some, I think, a great dialogue and discussion of some options with iGuide, and you got other options in the market as well. But for video, Pixel Mob's an awesome solution that if you're doing post-production, inside of Pixel Mob, you have the well, what keeps people from doing video typically is they're not very confident in the post-production of the video. They might be confident to use their Canon to shoot this stuff on site, but then it's kind of daunting to do the actual editing, compile it all, and get it delivered by the next day. Pixel Mob makes that stuff easy. So if that's something you're looking to add on, you're looking at 3D tours, you're looking at video, add them both. You got great post-production resources to be able to add those, grow your average order value, and grow your business. So check out video resources on Pixel Mob, and you will not be disappointed that you did. Let's move into like how does this actually integrate into a photographer's workflow? Because I mean that's that's great. If somebody's not familiar with iGuide, I mean, I hope that's a great snapshot of like what is this tech and how you could use it. And like, we don't need to pull punches in terms of like you have competitors and you have much bigger competitors in the United States with Matterport, Zillow 3D, Kubicasa that do some of the functions that you guys do. So I'd love to kind of dive into like let's we can take the the softer approach first of just like why would a photographer choose y'all? And then I would love to go toward like okay, so there's been some big moves in this space with Zillow blocking non-uh Zillow 3D tours with Redfin kind of hitting back with all kinds of stuff. So I think those are kind of really interesting questions as to pros and cons of using a third-party tool like you guys. So anyway, let's dive in. First up, what is what are the most compelling reasons somebody's gonna, this is gonna benefit somebody's business as opposed to a different platform?

SPEAKER_03

Usually it goes like this you're a real estate photographer, and either you you've you got your still photos down, you've got some clients, you're like, all right, we're you're good there, and you're looking for the next thing to add to your business.

SPEAKER_00

So like an upsell.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, I mean, you know, you're like, okay, I want to make more like at each shoot. And this is often driven by like just asking you, like, hey, do you do virtual tours or floor plans? I need them for this house. And so of course you're like, oh, of course we're gonna be able to do it.

SPEAKER_00

Retaining a client, like if if this guy can do them both in one shoot, and you don't even offer it, like that could be.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, well, I yeah, I can definitely um speak to that aspect as well. But the other option is that you've got you've got something, you know, and it's like it's mostly there, but you're looking for an alternative. And so maybe you're using other technologies and you're thinking, is there a better way? So in the first instance, when you're looking to expand your business, you know, you're you're in terms of where you are, you're you're maybe a single owner operator, you're not like you're not running a giant operation yet. Um often the decision comes down to should I should I do, you know, I've got still, should I do video or drone, or where should I invest um sort of my my next, you know, sort of um growth investment for my business. And iGuide, uh, because it's a virtual tool in floor plans, covers a lot of bases. It's two good potential upsells, it's a double whammy, so it's not just floor plans. Um and uh it's a really good choice um for someone who's just starting out, because if you take the combo of really good still images, which are a very curated um type of experience, this is exactly what I want to show you. And you know, you can make them very pretty and glamorous and eye-catching and exciting, uh, and then you pair that with a sort of more off-the-rails type of exploration, um, and then have a floor plan on top of that. It's it's just a really good combination of information for agents to market with, because it answers a lot of questions for that makes your lives easy, but then also users to to digest. It it does most of the heavy lifting in terms of um understanding of property. And of course, there are like all sorts of exceptions, like if it's rural and you know, you it's hard to see the you know the property in its entirety because it's so big, or if it's like um, you know, a property that's like you know, in an area of Los Angeles where you have to have that, you know, uh movie JJ Abrams level level video, like you know, okay, but in terms of like the best combination of property information you can get to market a property, photos, uh virtual tour, uh, and floor plan is absolutely um it's a banger.

SPEAKER_00

All right, so let's dig into that banger for a second. So one of the things, so I come from a real estate background, and when I'm when I was selling directly to agents, one of the big objections they would have around 3D tours in general, yeah, was it keeps people from actually coming to see the property. And then there's a it because they've already seen enough, so they don't actually want the personal tour where they might be sold. So there's this reticence to adopt because it might keep the right buyer from actually coming to see it. And then there was a general skepticism of like, does this actually add like reach to the property or not? So I'm curious, like with you guys' data set, can you speak to those? Is that real? Like does it have thoughts? Um, yes, does it lower showings? Does it raise SEO? What's the impact of having any 3D tour?

SPEAKER_03

In direct response to um that, because yeah, we've heard that for ages, you know. Well, I know I need them to come to the property, you know. It's like, okay, well, you're not wrong. Um, but what they need them to come to the property for isn't necessarily to help them make a decision about that property. Sometimes it's lead generation. You know what I mean? You want people in because you want to talk to them, you want to sell their house, and you know, so okay. So generally speaking, there is no proof that giving people more information prevents them from coming to the home. But it does make sense logically that if you're if you're giving people information that's pre-qualifying them, that's telling them whether or not they actually want to see a house or not, that if they don't see the information they want, like that they're not gonna visit it. That checks out logically. But what we found is that having an experience that gives you the ability to spend a lot of time looking at a home helps people build an emotional connection. And people can't stop themselves from visiting a property once they've developed an emotional connection. So that would mean that logically, by that reasoning, virtual tours bring more people to a home than less because they give them the ability to explore and to look at the things that they want. Now, if you're a perfect real estate photographer and you exactly show in your photos exactly everything that people want to build that emotional connection, sure. But that's not really um how this works. People build emotional connections to the weirdest stuff, like the strangest things that you wouldn't think met, like a nook beside the window or the way the sink is placed, just strange things you wouldn't be able to predict. So having a virtual tour helps people um get attached emotionally to a property and makes them more likely to visit. But wait, there's more. Not only does it do that, it also makes them far more likely to overlook flaws when they get there. Um, because they they they dismiss them because it's you know it's sort of like uh uh their dream property. But then also it makes them more likely to compete on that property because they want it more, and also it makes them more likely to to offer more. So giving people more information can um actually significantly help in the process of selling that exact home. And there's an expectation, you know, for uh reasons that more information is the trend. And so people just have an expectation that there should be this extra information in some ways, not necessarily virtual tours, but kind of you know across the board. Um, and that's probably because of you know, the last five, six years you've been limited in sort of ways you could go to a property. And so digital representations became much more common, and then people kind of, you know, uh that expectation grew and um it's now sort of firmly seated. But the idea that it would uh prevent you from uh meeting people and talking with people um uh sometimes means you have to look for an alternative. So i guides have something built in to specifically to uh address that. And it is um called lead magnet. Basically, it's a pop-up form in the iGuide that says, hey, if you want more information, contact the agent. Because I think I mentioned this before. You can decide how much of the tour you want to show. You don't need to show the whole thing. So don't just the teaser, yeah. Parts that matter. Uh so I'll give you a funny example.

SPEAKER_00

It doesn't have to be or maybe choose not to show a junk room or something because that's an objection that I hear is essentially like the some of what you're describing is a double-edged sword, because yeah, you can form an emotional connection with a lovely kitchen, but you can also form an emotional uh rejection based on the fact that you hate pedestal sinks and you hate whatever.

SPEAKER_03

Like uh visualization is the uh perpetual challenge of all real estate media. How do you show the property in a way that gives users the ability to understand what it would be like if they lived there with their furniture and their decorating choices, you know? So that's kind of yeah, that's a challenge that everyone's working on right now. Um, so I'll give you an interesting example. Any iGuide can be split into multiple versions um at any time, it's just baked in. And so when I sold my house um a few years ago, I cut it into two versions. One version where everything's aesthetic, all the nice stuff that we staged, and the other version was the like the contractor version that shows like the haunted basement and like all the gross closets and like weird stuff that's like you know, nasty. And there was um a desire because of the there's like out-of-town pressure, people they could come, but they could only stay for like a little bit and then they'd have to you know leave. And so they wanted to show it to like other people who weren't concerned with aesthetics, and so curating that information for different people makes sense because obviously an agent wants to have a conversation about some of those things in context. They don't want people to just see it because yes, that can turn off the emotional connection, right? Um, so the our suggestion is you show the things that you know they can see out of context, and then you hold back the things that they need to see in context, and then so they can form that emotional connection, and then obviously visit the property to have the best of both. Uh an off-the-rails exploration of the property where they feel like they're getting what they want, but then also you can you know zhuzh them up and chat with them if you need to, um, because uh you're gonna talk about the stuff that's not in the tour by acknowledging it. It's a funny thing with real estate. We don't talk about like all the spaces you don't show. We only try to show the nice stuff, and that's like accepted as an okay way to market a property. But it's like when I'm looking at houses, I'm like, show me the gross garage. Like, I'm gonna spend a lot of time in there. Show me the dirty basement. I'm gonna hide for my kids down there. I want to see all that stuff, but I'm a bit weird, so it's no, it it's a it's a fair point.

SPEAKER_00

I mean, it's it's both the challenge and a deep reality of real estate, is the realtor's job is to show your house in the best possible light. But if that's if it's a bait and switch, it backfires. It's like it's a weird balance. So yeah.

SPEAKER_03

Can I can I say something that's uh it's like a bold prediction?

SPEAKER_00

Of course, man, and then I'm gonna ask you about syndication.

SPEAKER_03

So we're we're in a weird place right now with regards to like um any kind of digital anything because you can fake things so easily that the um the trend or the desire for genuineness has now become a thing. It was before, but now it's like real because you know, um, what is real? I don't know anymore. So the idea that you would show the less attractive parts of the house to make it more like authentic and genuine is now it's like a thing now. It's really cool. So that's becoming more of a possibility.

SPEAKER_00

Um and little known fact, Chris White doesn't actually exist, he's actually a nano banana avatar. That's it.

SPEAKER_03

Oh man, if I could, I'd be sleeping over there, and this would all be AI and fake. Yeah, I would. In a second.

SPEAKER_00

Uh not not serious. Chris White is the genuine article, he has not been edited in any way. He naturally looks like Mark Hamill.

SPEAKER_03

And I haven't slept in like three weeks. This is all genuine. I reek of genuineness. I'm having to try very hard. I have five kids, so yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Oh, yeah, me too. There you go. All right. Well, before we run out of time, I do really want to know. Uh, like, I have a genuine curiosity. Like, you've got huge heavyweights uh rooted in America between Zillow and CoStar. Um, CoStar owning Matterport, and Zillow, of course, pushing its own proprietary tool to take 3D tours or obvious competitors for you. Uh they have taken huge swings at each other in the last six months, uh denying each other syndication and all kinds of things which are I mean, pretty obviously maybe not great for consumers at first blush. But I'm curious, like, where does that leave iGuide? Like, what did those swings end up hitting you? Is that keeping you from syndicating on Zillow or CoStar? And then, like, how does that help position you and what are some of the challenges there?

SPEAKER_03

This has always been a problem. Um, it's just you know, it's come up more often recently, but the idea that people would sort of lock down systems to favor their own content. Yeah, it makes I mean Apple App Store, but you know, it makes sense.

SPEAKER_00

So um it makes sense, but we also kind of hate it, right? So I'm curious how like you guys are uh maybe the more indie take on this in that sense. You're having a hip and cool uh player, right? Sure, yeah. This podcast screams hip and cool. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_03

So so I will I will say this. Um I don't think we're done with this. This trying to favor one type of various platform as it's unpleasant.

SPEAKER_00

In fact, I think it's about to get a lot worse with uh Redfin and Rocket and Compass moves. And so anyway, I'm very curious.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, so I think that the opportunity to have um uh our tours very specifically featured on multiple platforms still exists. It's not being taken like the idea that you would have agnostic um sort of uh platforms um that can offer uh all types of content. It's still like realtor.com and you know in Canada, realtor.c and things like that, um still exists. It's not it's not all locked down, you know, yet. Um but the quality of experience that you can get um is uh very much affected um by that type of content and then the platform. So if you want a different type of experience, you then go to a different platform. I don't know if this makes any sense, but that's that's a that's a not having it for platforms. Their whole bread and butter is traffic and eyeballs uh in their system. And so if people find another experience they like better and they're going elsewhere, then that just opens things back up again. So I'm not super concerned about it, but yeah, it's not done.

SPEAKER_00

Well, you give me the granular there of like what is the reality? Does does Zillow still syndicate it, or is like the the scuttle butt that they're completely favoring their own? Um I I feel like I've seen independent links still in Zillow, but then I've seen people whining about it on Inmin. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

You you still well to the best of my knowledge, you still can, yeah. Um I was my understanding, you still can uh share. You can still share our guys on Zillow. Uh the Zillow has always favored their experience um through the platform advantage of having better visibility, and it's like absolutely but it the here's the funny thing about Zillow. So I I don't have any problem with Zillow and the content they make, it makes a ton of sense. But um the actual uh maybe this is just because I'm a big floor plan nerd, but the actual content they're creating, the floor plans they're creating, are like really simple.

SPEAKER_00

It's like okay. It's entertaining, but it isn't the same precision, I would agree. Like it's not the same data footprint.

SPEAKER_03

It's really much very much a layout, it's very approximate, and that does a good job of giving a user a sense of um the space. Like how does the living room connect with the diamond?

SPEAKER_00

Okay, which is what a lot of people want. Like it's a popular tool.

SPEAKER_03

Absolutely, and that's why people use iGuide a lot of the time. They're not super concerned about having you know uh very accurate square footage, but um that is only um uh you know a subset of users, and so there's lots of other people who want more than that. And so when they want more, they look elsewhere.

SPEAKER_00

Right. Okay, hot take. So you mentioned realtor.com. Like that is that like the platform that seems to be the most uh balanced in presenting different methods of those kinds of 3D tours. Are there other ones that you think are doing a good job for consumers? You could you can be positive if you want, if you need to be political, but like yeah, I mean I'm gonna be careful.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, I would yeah, we've had a good relationship with um uh all of the platforms, to be honest. We're not we're very we're Canadian, we're very friendly, like you know, nobody gives us a hard time. They're like, ah, it's cold out there. They'll be all right. Um, so uh yeah, what we what we're kind of obsessed with is um creating an experience that is elevated. So you know, we talk about virtual tours and floor plans and stuff all the time, but they don't represent the majority of listings. Like I haven't looked at the numbers recently, but virtual tours is like 20, sub-30%, I can't remember what it is. Floor plans is sort of similar, you know. Um, like let's worry when they were like 80%. Like we're still we're still working on getting the market to just transition to making the data. Any of them, you know, so any any um debate about this uh uh elevated content like virtual tours is is good. It gets it in the news and it creates that expectation that you should have that. Um I think uh it's probably a long way to go. Um so and we know what it could look like. So in Australia, for example, um floor plans are really common. Like expect every market. Yeah, it's kind of you know understood. Like I like if they're not there, it's like, well, where are the floor plans? Um so that's the kind of place that we would like to get to um across North America, um, where that is uh and that's a common goal. Like if I'm gonna, you know, um call out other technologies, I have to give them a little bit credit for pushing floor plans and virtual tour experiences, like you know, digital twins, whatever you want to call it, um uh uh and opening that up for everyone. Um so that's kind of a positive thing. I'm allowed to say positive things, right? I'm Canadian, I can't help it.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, no, the growth of the market for everyone is great. I mean, it's just the adoption of the technology and better data for consumers across any platform. It's it's such so early in a sense for that industry, even though it's somewhat older. I mean, I can definitely see that. Rising tide lifts all the ships if more realtors actually create um any kind of 3D tour.

SPEAKER_03

We have also noticed, I don't know if you guys have um got wind of any of these things, but over the years there have been lots of um opportunities for essentially consumer protection. So the reference that I made earlier about buying a car, how they're so fussy about the odometer. Yeah, it's like a it's a big deal, right? But houses, eh, it's kind of hit or miss, right? It's a little wild west in some cases. So that doesn't sound right. It's a very expensive purchase. These things should be documented, and so other people think like this as well, right? And so you can kind of see the trend across North America because it's happened in other countries and and in Canada as well, actually, to a certain degree, um, where measurement standards and documentation standards are becoming um like mandatory essentially, or or at least defined. And um, and so we like that because uh at IGED we're we think it's very important to have um standards by which you measure homes and document homes. And so mostly I'm talking about measurement standards in terms of reporting square footage, because every square foot has a dollar amount attached to it, and misrepresenting a home can have pretty huge consequences, but we're in a weird time, so AI's made everything unpleasant, and now it's kind of about just made everything just weird. So now it's like any image you make, you have to disclose immediately suspect. You know what I mean? So it's it's not just the measurements, now it's actually the images are a little bit less um um, a little bit less artistic license by default, and now it's a little bit more about you know, standards and and caveats and disclaimers and things like that with those. And so that's right on brand for I because we're all about essentially accurate documentation, whether it be visuals or or the measurement. Um, so we have no problem with this this trend toward um you know uh standardization, essentially.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, no, I'm I'm right there with you. I mean, I I I think I mean I haven't heard any news or hints at like national legislation or anything that would require something like an accurate floor plan or 3D tour, but there are there's a part of me that's like that that would actually be pretty helpful in terms of having a just a snapshot of the house, just like you have an odometer. You have all kinds of rules and lemon laws and stuff about cars, but you have nothing like that for houses. You have to pay for your own inspection, all kinds of things. And there's so much data that gets gathered around these sales that it would be lovely to actually be able to see the history. It's interesting.

SPEAKER_03

For example, most people will take a builder's plan, like the you know, the floor plan for building the house, as truth. It's oh, there's that's what it is. But that's the build the plan existed before the house did. It's a recipe for the house, not a documentation of the house. So um, they follow far different rules for uh how they report that information because they're they're not representing something that exists, they're representing that will. Um, but like most people don't know that. Tax assessments are a big one. Often square footage will be used to determine your taxes. And people think, oh, of course that's accurate, but they're not even comfortable.

SPEAKER_00

No, those are often close. Back when I was practicing real estate, that was the most common thing we would find that was like a$30,000,$50,000,$100,000 swing were discrepancies in tax records and people's expectations of a house versus what it could actually be marketed at versus what the appraiser found when they actually measured it. So it's crazy stuff. It's it's great as that grows and more and more of the industry actually has that transparency of the square footage. So anyway, we're we're a little low on time, but uh Chris, tell us where can people follow you? Like what is what is the best channel if people are interested in iGuide and following along with you guys' journey? What does that look like?

SPEAKER_03

Uh so that'd be our website, which is go eiguide.com. Um, when you go there, uh it's it's gonna it's a lot. Uh, but what we typically do is we give people the ability to choose what they're interested in. Um and so that's gonna lead to a whole bunch of different options in terms of experiences. So, you know, real estate probably in this context, but um, there is uh information about all sorts of adjacent industries which are open to people capturing real estate. And so that's architecture, engineering, construction, insurance, facility management. Um, and uh when you go there, you're gonna see uh, you know, obviously pictures of the hardware and and store, but lots of examples of you know high guides and floor plans and um, you know, um maybe even my picture on a few of those pages.

SPEAKER_00

Nice. All right. Well, we hope you see the sun within the next six months, and we really appreciate you coming in our podcast. Thank you for that. It's nice to be here. I appreciate it as well. Thanks, Chris.

SPEAKER_02

Thanks, Chris.

SPEAKER_00

See ya.