Listing Photos - Importance of the Main Thumbnail

Everyone knows that listing photos are among the most important aspect of an agent's online marketing of a home. Statistics show that listings with several images get a much higher click rate than listings without, but what about the difference between an image that catches your eye as opposed to just another picture of a house that looks like every other picture on the list.

It's just like curb appeal. Everyone knows how important curb appeal is. Most people still generally judge every book by it's cover, and a home buyer will often not give a home a chance when it doesn't get their attention from the outside. The same is true online, if your home doesn't have "thumbnail appeal" (I just made that up as far as I know) you are likely to have the same results.

Nowadays, every MLS or 3rd party IDX vendor uses a similiar approach when displaying a list of properties in the search results. Just like the image above, with a small thumbnail of the property, and some of the information highlights as a summary. So when the average consumer is scrolling through the list of homes, they will quickly scan the thumbnails and prices and the difference between a property view and a scroll by is often the quality of image in the thumbnail.

For this reason, our team strives to have our listings stand out from the rest by having that extra degree of pop necessary to catch a buyer's attention. We have all of our listings professionally photographed, and make sure we always have several exterior options to choose from.

Obviously this isn't the most important aspect of selling a home, there is no quality of image that can sell a badly overpriced home, but it can make the difference in the amount of exposure a home receives, which is your duty as an agent, and can possibly result in a sell in a situation where the buyer would have never even viewed the home otherwise.

Article by: Jacob Hebert - Director of Technology
The Marion Franke Team - Lake Conroe Real Estate and Homes for Sale