TourBuzz Virtual Tour Community
Tour View statistics request
Hey all,
Preface: I did a presentation this morning, in front of ~170 agents at their office's monthly meeting. After the Q&A session following my presentation of my images, I quickly realized that I needed even more information available for these large presentations than I've gathered for ones to teams or individual agents. I also realized after some research that there isn't a facts based, study backed report specifically designed for marketing independent photographers and virtual tour providers.
Solution:
So, I've started work on a full blown presentation that will include information from various articles, summaries on what those statistics mean to an agent, and finally a section that will talk about effective web marketing. Part of the web marketing section will include information on how long a viewer spends on our tours. I've already gathered from surveying people I know shopping for homes, that they spend between 20 and 45 seconds on each virtual tour and move on if they don't immediately fall in love. That means, with a time of 5 seconds per image in a slideshow, they will see between 4 and 9 images.
I've recently upped my prices, to match the different package levels of Obeo here, however I deliver fewer images. One of my marketing claims is that even though my image counts are slightly smaller, each image is a much higher quality than any of my competitors deliver. I'm trying to correlate the higher quality images to delivering a better representation in that short amount of time. I already have several clients that see the logic- if you only have 6 images to peak someone's interest, it better be that best damn 6 images money can buy (and not put them in the poor house). I have had some resistance however. One client read the claim from some study (I forget which) that said more images result in fewer days on market, but when I read that survey it some time ago, I don't remember it saying anything about the quality of those images. I'm gathering statistics on image views of tours to help reinforce that the number of images secondary to the importance of the image quality.
-What I will do:
If I get stats on at least 50 tours or the information below from 10 providers- whichever comes first- I'll compile all of this data into one report, most likely with some pie charts or bar graphs, and publish it back here in a few days. I already have my stats from my old RTV tours, my Tourbuzz tours, and stats forwarded to me from self service tours some of my clients published, but I want to be able to say that this data isn't just region specific. In exchange for taking the time to do this, I'll make the report using this information such that you can take it into Photoshop and put your own logo on it.
What I need:
If people could take 10 minutes and go to their last 5 tours and do some quick calculations, it would help to reinforce this. I need pretty much all the tour statistics plus a couple:
- Number of Images on the tour
- Number of weeks the tour has been published
- Average Number of total views
- Average Number of unique visitors
- Average Number of images viewed by visitors
- Total views of 1st, 5th, 10th, 15th, 20th, 25th and 30th images (only as high as the total)
- Average Number of image views in 5 image increments (eg: First 5 images get average 407 views, second 5 images get average 320 views, third 5 images get average 215 views, fourth set gets 130 views
- First, second, third, fourth and fifth week total number of views
-Top 4 referring sites
*If you think it would be faster to just take screen shots of the stats and send them to me, I don't mind recording the data off the screen shots. If you don't know how to take a screen shot, visit the following links for tutorials (first for Windows, second for Mac):
http://www.wikihow.com/Take-a-Screenshot-in-Microsoft-Windows
http://www.wikihow.com/Take-a-Screenshot-in-Mac-OS-X
You can either email/message me the statistics or post them here.
I will also be creating a boilerplate presentation that an independent photographer/virtual tour provider can use when going into offices. It will most likely be in the form of a Powerpoint presentation, PDF document, and/or a Word document. Because of the time it's going to take to build this turnkey/boilerplate presentation, including graphic aides provided by me or you on request, this full presentation will be for purchase only, but the individual report on image views I'll post for free here in exchange for sending me some statistics.
Preface: I did a presentation this morning, in front of ~170 agents at their office's monthly meeting. After the Q&A session following my presentation of my images, I quickly realized that I needed even more information available for these large presentations than I've gathered for ones to teams or individual agents. I also realized after some research that there isn't a facts based, study backed report specifically designed for marketing independent photographers and virtual tour providers.
Solution:
So, I've started work on a full blown presentation that will include information from various articles, summaries on what those statistics mean to an agent, and finally a section that will talk about effective web marketing. Part of the web marketing section will include information on how long a viewer spends on our tours. I've already gathered from surveying people I know shopping for homes, that they spend between 20 and 45 seconds on each virtual tour and move on if they don't immediately fall in love. That means, with a time of 5 seconds per image in a slideshow, they will see between 4 and 9 images.
I've recently upped my prices, to match the different package levels of Obeo here, however I deliver fewer images. One of my marketing claims is that even though my image counts are slightly smaller, each image is a much higher quality than any of my competitors deliver. I'm trying to correlate the higher quality images to delivering a better representation in that short amount of time. I already have several clients that see the logic- if you only have 6 images to peak someone's interest, it better be that best damn 6 images money can buy (and not put them in the poor house). I have had some resistance however. One client read the claim from some study (I forget which) that said more images result in fewer days on market, but when I read that survey it some time ago, I don't remember it saying anything about the quality of those images. I'm gathering statistics on image views of tours to help reinforce that the number of images secondary to the importance of the image quality.
-What I will do:
If I get stats on at least 50 tours or the information below from 10 providers- whichever comes first- I'll compile all of this data into one report, most likely with some pie charts or bar graphs, and publish it back here in a few days. I already have my stats from my old RTV tours, my Tourbuzz tours, and stats forwarded to me from self service tours some of my clients published, but I want to be able to say that this data isn't just region specific. In exchange for taking the time to do this, I'll make the report using this information such that you can take it into Photoshop and put your own logo on it.
What I need:
If people could take 10 minutes and go to their last 5 tours and do some quick calculations, it would help to reinforce this. I need pretty much all the tour statistics plus a couple:
- Number of Images on the tour
- Number of weeks the tour has been published
- Average Number of total views
- Average Number of unique visitors
- Average Number of images viewed by visitors
- Total views of 1st, 5th, 10th, 15th, 20th, 25th and 30th images (only as high as the total)
- Average Number of image views in 5 image increments (eg: First 5 images get average 407 views, second 5 images get average 320 views, third 5 images get average 215 views, fourth set gets 130 views
- First, second, third, fourth and fifth week total number of views
-Top 4 referring sites
*If you think it would be faster to just take screen shots of the stats and send them to me, I don't mind recording the data off the screen shots. If you don't know how to take a screen shot, visit the following links for tutorials (first for Windows, second for Mac):
http://www.wikihow.com/Take-a-Screenshot-in-Microsoft-Windows
http://www.wikihow.com/Take-a-Screenshot-in-Mac-OS-X
You can either email/message me the statistics or post them here.
I will also be creating a boilerplate presentation that an independent photographer/virtual tour provider can use when going into offices. It will most likely be in the form of a Powerpoint presentation, PDF document, and/or a Word document. Because of the time it's going to take to build this turnkey/boilerplate presentation, including graphic aides provided by me or you on request, this full presentation will be for purchase only, but the individual report on image views I'll post for free here in exchange for sending me some statistics.
Views: 27
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Alan Pinstein on -
Cool idea! I don't have time to at the moment, but in the future we might be able to anonymize our tour stats and let you play with bulk data.
Alan
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Permalink Reply by Jerry R Bridges on -
As usual, another great idea. Unfortunately the program I have been using does not give stats so I can't provide any for your study. Have not posted any as of yet using Tourbuzz, even though I have credits, still waiting for a more professional looking skin. Hint Hint.
But I can offer this link http://www.wisdom-soft.com/ for a free version of a great screen capture system. May have to copy and paste the link as my links are not appearing as hotlinks in Vista as they did in XP Pro. If anyone knows of a solution please let me know.
EDIT: I see after posting the link it hot. But I do have that problem with outlook and Vista.
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Permalink Reply by Alan Pinstein on
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Jerry-
Have you tried the new "full browser" experience? It isn't branded, but it is slick in that none of the old skin design is there...
We are also working on some new skin stuff, but it'll be a bit longer before that's available. A few things are ahead of it in the queue.
Alan
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Permalink Reply by Chris Thomas on -
Just an update: I only have about 20 tour stats right now. I really need at least about 50 to give this report a foot to stand on.
Don't forget, I'm going to compile this together into something you can put your logo on and circulate- for free.
If you're wondering why I'm wanting to do this, I'm hoping to have factual data showing that the first 10 images, or first 30 seconds, are the most important in hooking a viewer. After 10 images, or 30 seconds, shoppers move on to the next one. If you have discount photographers in your area offering to do a house for much less than you could foresee, or you have Obeo or Tourfactory in your area- who try to push huge (30+) image packages- this report could help to show that your 10 stellar images are much more powerful than 30 average or below average quality images.
Yes, there are lots of you who have several hundred tours and with some extra time you could do the same thing, but this is a "you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours" type of thing. In exchange for the data, you get a report with visual aides (charts), either in a single PDF or PSD, that you can put your logo on and circulate around to clients- and yes, for free.
So, who's up for another piece of marketing material?
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Permalink Reply by Steve Knievel on -
Chris
Taking a listing tomorrow that wll go active on 27th. I'll send link to stats page to you.
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Permalink Reply by Nathan Strauch on -
Chris,
I'll get you my stats within the next couple of days. I think that I have a few for you with a good deal of viewing numbers.
Talk with you soon.
Nathan Strauch
Hot Shots Digital
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Permalink Reply by Michael Basch on -
Hey there Chris
Do you need the stats only for real estate tours or will your report go over the stats of a commercial account as well (ie. restaurantes)
Mike
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Permalink Reply by Chris Thomas on
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Sorry I didn't reply sooner Michael, I didn't notice your post. The idea I had in mind was centered around residential real estate more than commercial, but any information helps too. If you have the time, send some over my way and I'll see if it'll support my other findings.
Update: I still have stats on less than 30 tours, but I am getting some definite information. I can't post screen shots of the Tourfactory stats that were forwarded to me, but it's really humorous. They must have some kind of a bot built into their system because within hours of posting one their tours get a few hundred views, but 2 weeks later they get 1-2 a day. I've noticed on mine and everyone elses Tourbuzz tours, the viewing has been fairly consistent, only a small drop after the first week.
So far, the consistent trend is that on still image only tours, by the 10th image almost half of viewers have left: and by the 20th image that almost 80% of viewers have left. On tours with a panoramic as the first image, half of viewers drop by the second or third image. Tours that have 2 or more panos in the first 10 images have closer to a 70% drop at the 10th image. In two cases where the first 4 images were all panos, they showed an average 82% drop by the 5th image. One of my tours that is no longer active had a 75% drop in the first 5 images with 3 panos in there. Another one of mine has 3 panos in the first 10 and had a 65% drop on number 10.
Informal Data:
Total 1st Image Views Recorded: 4593
Total 10th Image Views Recorded: 2174
Total 20th Image Views Recorded: 1586
*The tours included in the data that had no panos at all average 10% higher retention by the 10th Image.
It would be good to compare commercial tours to residential. I think it's possible people looking at a commercial tour are more interested than residential viewers who want to see as many as possible and hope one grabs their attention. I certainly won't be stopping 360's completely, but it's interesting to see what I though of as a big marketing tool is almost working against the cause. Of course, none of this data can explain why it's happening, it's only showing trends. It would be nice to have a mini survey included in tours to survey visitors to find out what they think. The retention difference may be that the pano helped them decide sooner if the house was what they were looking for, or we may find they don't want to wait on a pano to load and spin around. It'd be good if there was a study comparing the two.
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Permalink Reply by Alan Pinstein on
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Very interesting stats!
A few notes.
1. We try very hard to make our stats "correct". For instance, we exclude:
- Views by a logged-in photogapher (ie you looking at your own tours)
- Multiple views by the same person within a single "session" (~20 minutes)
- Views by "robots" like Google, MSN, Yahoo, etc.
2. It's interesting that the panos were correlated with a higher drop-off. Several possible explanations come to mind:
- People can more easily determine from the pano that they don't like the house (whereas it takes a few image views to decide the same)
- People don't like panos
- Panos take longer to load and thus people leave more quickly
- anything else?
We have in our database over 2.5 million tour views and about 20 million image views. We will probably do some further statistical analysis in the future as well.
Thanks!
Alan
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Permalink Reply by Michael Basch on
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Hi Alan
I think I can explain the high drop off rate with the panos. When I researched my clients and observed how they interacted with the tours, most people watched the tour like it was a movie. They do not realize that they can interact with the spin and move things along quicker. If the spin setting is 120, they'll sit there patiently for 2 full minutes, anticipating a scene change.
Originally, a message popped up, letting the viewer know that they can place their cursor in the screen and drag right or left to view things quicker.
One suggestion - if the viewer interacts with a spin and then is ready for the next scene, they should not have to wait until your timer hits the prescribed time. I suggest that if the software detects that the full spin has been viewed, it should move on to the next scene within a few seconds.
Regards
Mike
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Permalink Reply by Alan Pinstein on
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Interesting ideas! I'll think about those and see what we can do.
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Permalink Reply by Steve Knievel on
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Chris
The stats that I sent you for the latest listing will now drop rapidly. Sold in 7 days!
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