131-WGAN-TV eBook | HomeJab Pro Real Estate Photographer Survey Results

WE GET AROUND NETWORK WGAN-TV Live at 5

HomeJab Professional Real Estate Photographer Survey Results Thursday, January 20, 2022

WGAN-TV Guest HomeJab is a marketplace for real estate photography.

We deal with mostly real estate agents, but we’re essentially a platform for agents to connect with professional photographers and we’re nationwide.

Joe Jesuele Founder and Owner HomeJab

Joe Jesuele

Founder and Owner, HomeJab www.HomeJab.com

www.HomeJab.com

WGAN-TV | HomeJab Professional Real Estate Photographer Survey Results | Thursday, January 20, 2022

WGAN-TV | HomeJab Professional Real Estate Photographer Survey Results | Guest: HomeJab Founder and Owner Joe Jesuele | Episode: 131 | Aired: Thursday, 20 January 2022 www.HomeJab.com

[00:00:02] Dan Smigrod: Hi all. I’m Dan Smigrod, Founder of the We Get Around Network Forum. Today is Thursday, January 20th, 2022 and you’re watching WGAN-TV Live at 5. We have an awesome show for you today: HomeJab Professional Real Estate Photographer Survey Results. And here to talk to us about the results of the survey is Joe Jesuele. Joe is the Founder and CEO of HomeJab, based in Philadelphia. Hey Joe, good to see you again.

[00:00:33] Joe Jesuele:

Good to see you again, Dan. Thanks for having me.

[00:00:36] Dan Smigrod: Thanks for being back on the show. Joe, before we jump into this topic of the survey results, how about telling us about HomeJab? [00:00:46] Joe Jesuele: Sure, HomeJab is a marketplace for real estate photography. We deal with mostly real estate agents, but we’re essentially a platform for agents to connect with professional photographers and we’re nationwide.

If you’re a listing agent, a broker, or a property manager or any real estate professional, you’d come on the website, create an account, you’d fill out a form with the services that you need, the date and time of the shoot, you can order as soon as the next day. Then when you submit that order, the photographers that are in that particular area get assigned the job and then someone will confirm it with you.

HomeJab is a marketplace for real estate photography. We deal with mostly real estate agents, but we’re essentially a platform for agents to connect with professional photographers and we’re nationwide

Joe Jesuele

Founder and Owner, HomeJab www.HomeJab.com

This happens within seconds, usually, it’s a very fast process. If you’re a photographer and you want to get involved in the marketplace, you can go to our website and go to a link on the top that says “Photographer Jobs” and you’d fill out an application with your equipment, with samples, links to your website, and then we’ll get you approved.

It just takes usually about a day or two. We’ve been in business now for eight years. We do a few thousand shoots a month. We have over 1,200 photographers active on the platform. Like I said, we’re pretty much in all 50 states and we’re growing in Canada as well as parts of the Caribbean.

[00:02:18] Dan Smigrod:

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If you’re a real estate agent or you’re real estate photographer, go to: www.HomeJab.com

WGAN-TV | HomeJab Professional Real Estate Photographer Survey Results | Thursday, January 20, 2022

[00:02:27] Joe Jesuele:

Yeah. That’s right.

[00:02:28] Dan Smigrod:

Photography services that you offer are photos, video, aerial.

[00:02:35] Joe Jesuele: All of the above. Walkthrough videos; 3D virtual tours; floor plans; aerial drone, and we also shoot for neighborhood footage; neighborhood videos and photography, and we’ve also recently gotten involved in portraits as well, so if you’re a real estate agent, you need a professional portrait, we can come to you and do that as well.

[00:02:59] Dan Smigrod:

Awesome. Any other services?

[00:03:03] Joe Jesuele: Yeah. We’re developing right now a service for photographers to create NFTs of images that they have and then we’re creating a marketplace for them to sell these images as NFTs. It’s essentially an alternative to stock images so they would mint NFTs, these would be photos and videos of the towns and the cities that the photographers live in and then they would sell them on the marketplace. That’s going to be launching probably next month.

[00:03:41] Dan Smigrod:

Awesome. Can we have you back on the show to talk about the NFTs meets HomeJab?

[00:03:45] Joe Jesuele:

Sure, Absolutely.

[00:03:48] Dan Smigrod: Awesome. Joe, before we jump into the results, the results of the HomeJab Professional Real Estate Photographer Survey, can you fill us in about what kind of photographers participated in the survey?

[00:04:07] Joe Jesuele: Sure. We got over 300 professional photographers. These are all photographers that are approved and active on HomeJab’s platform.

Mostly a little bit older in age; over the age of 35, the average was like, I think in the early 40’s. They shoot about 100 to 200 homes a year on average. They’re pretty much in all different regions of the country so every state is represented. These are very active photographers and considered professional full-time photographers.

[00:04:49] Dan Smigrod: Cool. I’m going to ask you the question and tell me the highlights and then we’ll talk about it. “Which two new technologies related to real estate photography are you most excited about?” Now this question was for real estate photographers.

[00:05:08] Joe Jesuele: Number one was drones, of course. That’s been very popular for the past few years and then second was the 360 cameras. The 360/3D virtual tours and all that; that’s been the fastest-growing service that we’re doing especially if you look at the numbers after the pandemic versus before the pandemic, it’s really a lot more virtual tours.

I wasn’t too surprised that drones and 360 were the top choices there. NFTs did make the list and it was, I think, maybe like 20 percent, 30 percent selected that, which is just surprising in the sense that, maybe a couple of years ago it would be 0 percent.

No one even knew what NFTs were. I think the drone and the 360 have been a great combination for photographers to add those services, make more money, and the demand for those two things have really grown just because of the fact that everyone’s online and searching for homes remotely and probably a little bit due to the pandemic, but also just the nature of the consumer these days.

[00:06:27] Dan Smigrod: HomeJab is a unique position to actually know what the demand is, so you’re doing a few thousand jobs a month. Are virtual tours, are they 100 percent of the jobs? 50 percent of the jobs? A good chunk of the jobs? Or, are 3D or 360 virtual tours -[00:06:50] Joe Jesuele: I’d say less than that. The most popular thing is still the video, walkthrough video, I think that’s just type of media is most popular, people are most comfortable with it. The photos and video combination is really still the most popular thing that we do. I think the virtual tours are certainly the fastest growing but it’s still 25 percent, 20 percent, something like that.

Video is still more popular.

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WGAN-TV | HomeJab Professional Real Estate Photographer Survey Results | Thursday, January 20, 2022

[00:07:19] Dan Smigrod: The interesting thing is since many We Get Around Network Forum community members may be new to photography because they began with a Matterport camera.

This is almost a golden piece of information to say, “hey, if you’re new to real estate and you’re starting with Matterport, the first thing that Joe has said is photos; then video. So you really got to figure out how to offer photos and video because that’s the majority of the jobs that you’re getting asked to shoot.

[00:07:56] Joe Jesuele: That’s right. HomeJab, we might be in a little bit of a different position just because video is how we started, that was our bread and butter for many years. We were known for doing the walkthrough video so a lot of our customers, that’s how they got started with us. But more and more are trying 3D and certainly new customers are coming on and trying 3D and it’s become a little bit more even.

But I just think the homeowner, the consumer are still a little bit more comfortable with video. They just deal with it all the time on social media and streaming video and everything so it’s just a little bit more of a known entity, whereas with virtual 3D stuff, you need to be more of an active user obviously, and it’s a little bit more of a new experience but certainly growing very quickly.

[00:08:51] Dan Smigrod: The question was, “What two new technologies related to real estate photography are most excited about?” And the photographers indicated two; drone, 16 percent; 360 cameras, 54 percent. A significant portion of the HomeJab jobs, drone/aerial, photo, video as well, or is that still a small percentage, but the photographers are excited about it because it is growing?

HomeJab is a marketplace for real estate photography. We deal with mostly real estate agents, but we’re essentially a platform for agents to connect with professional photographers and we’re nationwide

Joe Jesuele

Founder and Owner, HomeJab www.HomeJab.com

[00:09:22] Joe Jesuele: To be honest, we’ve seen demand for aerial plateau or go down a little bit, especially after the start of the pandemic. What we saw was more people adding in 3D virtual tours and video so that you can see, get an interior view of the home and tour the inside, and less people opting for aerials.

Before the pandemic, more people were doing aerials and I think one of the reasons is that they’re just investing more in that interior tour because the fact that people aren’t just more willing to go out and tour properties in person.

We’ve seen demand for aerials go down a little bit. I think what’s cool though, from the photographer’s standpoint is just the change of the technology has changed and there’s so many new drones out there and the drones that you can fly point of view, and I’ve seen videos where the drones are flying through the house and it’s just really new stuff like that, I think it’s the most exciting.

But from the demand side, the agent side, we’re seeing more people opting for the video and virtual, a little less in aerial right now.

[00:10:41] Dan Smigrod: You mentioned automated drones flying through the house. Do you think at some point we might see 3D depth-data capture by drone?

[00:10:53] Joe Jesuele: It’s possible. It’s very difficult to do and very risky. I only know a handful of photographers that even try it and you have to be really good and it’s not something that many photographers are doing right now, so it’s not going to really get that widespread adoption.

[00:11:14] Dan Smigrod:

Unless it’s automated?

[00:11:17] Joe Jesuele: Right, and not quite there yet. I haven’t seen anything like that to the point where the drone could fly through the house, but I guess that’s possible.

[00:11:27] Dan Smigrod:

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Cool. NFTs. “What is your interest in NFTs of digital assets like photography?”

WGAN-TV | HomeJab Professional Real Estate Photographer Survey Results | Thursday, January 20, 2022

[00:11:43] Joe Jesuele: I think they solve a couple of issues. One being that the question of who owns the photos. This is an issue that you see on a photographer and on the real estate agent side of things.

The real estate agents have started getting their attorneys involved and now they’re making photographers sign these contracts that basically just have them handing overall ownership rights to the agent and the broker.

The NFT, I think, replaces the need to have those legal documents because it’s a very transparent to a deliberate transfer of usage rights from the seller to the buyer. I think it’s a really cool way for photographers to transfer usage rights of digital photos to buyers. They may be real estate agents, they may be businesses, journalists.

Then, if you’re a buyer of that image, you have a very publicly, verifiable, transparent right to use that image. It’s just an ideal way, I think, to convey those usage rights to someone.

[00:13:01] Dan Smigrod: I was out for a walk at lunchtime with my wife. She’s asking me about who is going to be the guest on WGANTV Live at 5 and I explained that you were coming back as a repeat guest, and one of the topics was NFTs. We have that little conversation.

My wife is pretty geeky. She was following this, and I said, “Well, the photographers, if they own the images and it gets uploaded to a platform for the purpose of selling the house, and if that’s what the terms are, that the photographer provided to the agent that bought it, then it seems like this may be a way to keep people from using intellectual property beyond the term of the license.”

I’m looking forward to another show with you on this topic of NFTs and how photographers can easily and seamlessly use HomeJab -- coming soon -- to create NFTs and to have the contract attached to the imagery.

[00:14:14] Joe Jesuele: Yeah. I look forward to that conversation also. Just to touch on a little bit more, it’s like a certificate of authenticity or a watermark that in the old days where photographers put on their images.

This watermark is digital and lives on a blockchain, which is essentially just a big network of computers that all have a ledger system and can really track ownership of these assets.

All these ledgers and all these computers have to be in sync and validate each other. It’s really hard to hack into, and it’s a really good system, a really secure form of a database. I think when you have the potential of transferring ownership of these digital files from one person to another, the blockchain is a really good way of managing all of that.

[00:15:06] Dan Smigrod: I think one of the questions that I will ask you on the next show will be around how the house has now been sold, but the platform still has the images.

How might NFT and this blockchain change the equation so that platform stop using photographers’ images when the license is expired? Not going to ask you to talk about that today, but I think that’s an interesting topic of using content past the terms of original use.

[00:15:51] Joe Jesuele:

Yeah, exactly.

[00:15:54] Dan Smigrod: Can I stop you there though? I really want our audience to really get a taste of NFT, but to come back because we’re going to do an entire show when you’re ready to launch.

[00:16:07] Joe Jesuele:

Sure.

[00:16:08] Dan Smigrod: I think that that’s part of that conversation. “How often are homeowners not prepared for a real estate photographer shoot a virtual tour shoot?”

[00:16:20] Joe Jesuele: Well, our photographers said that more than half the time, actually. It’s quite a significant number. It’s definitely something that creates some inefficiencies in the routine of a photographer and the day-to-day and on the agent side as well.

I think it does need to be something that people talk about, agents talk about because there’s some easy fixes and easy solutions for it. But when you show up for a shoot and the home isn’t ready, and there’s a lot of time that has to be wasted.

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WGAN-TV | HomeJab Professional Real Estate Photographer Survey Results | Thursday, January 20, 2022

You can see how that has someone to get really aggravated about that. We should talk about it and come up with ways to solve it. I think one of the main things is just communication and telling the homeowner ways that they can prepare their house and get everything ready. If we can make some incremental changes and cut that number down, it’s just going to make everyone’s life a lot easier.

[00:17:28] Dan Smigrod: Well, you mentioned that you have some easy fixes. What are the easy fixes from the perspective of the photographer? I’m going to ask the question in two ways. One is, what do you do when you show up? What do you advise HomeJab photographers to do when they show up and the homeowner is not ready for the shoot?

[00:17:48] Joe Jesuele: Well, it happens a lot. Many times they end up waiting and it’s aggravating and it sometimes makes you late for your next appointment.

You have to draw the line somewhere, but taking 10, 15 minutes, although it’s not ideal, sometimes the homeowners just need that extra time. I think everyone has to understand also, someone’s selling a house. It could be very emotional. You don’t know what just happened in their life.

Make them having to sell their house. I think we all should recognize that there’s a lot going on. They’re stressed out. We don’t need to blame people or come down on people hard. I just think that you show up and they’re not ready.

You just act nice and professional. If it seems like it’s going to take a long time, you’ll just say, “Okay. Why don’t we reschedule” and you come back another time. It’s that simple.

I just think one of the main things is just before you get there, you notice is if you’re a photographer is to send your customer, the real estate agent, just a list of things to do that they can then send to the homeowner.

HomeJab has a lot of blog articles on this, how to prep your home. We have a PDF that we send to agents. We have a short little blog post and then we have a really long article about exterior, interior. We have a lot of tips.

HomeJab is a marketplace for real estate photography. We deal with mostly real estate agents, but we’re essentially a platform for agents to connect with professional photographers and we’re nationwide

Joe Jesuele

Founder and Owner, HomeJab www.HomeJab.com

A lot of them are obvious things like declutter stuff and remove cars from the driveway, and garbage cans and all this. But again, when you’re a seller and you’re about to sell your house, maybe you’re not thinking about all these things and even if it’s obvious.

[00:19:34] Dan Smigrod: I think what I’m hearing is HomeJab does have resources for real estate agents. Is there any way to get a better cooperation of the agent talking to the homeowner ahead of time? Should the photographer be talking to the homeowner ahead of time? Should the photographer be reminding the real estate agent? Over half of homeowners not being ready for shoot seems high.

[00:20:03] Joe Jesuele:

Yeah.

[00:20:04] Dan Smigrod:

Are there other ways to mitigate that?

[00:20:07] Joe Jesuele: our client.

Well, I think as photographers, we have to be careful about just reaching out to the homeowner that’s not really

Our client is the real estate agent. Now, the agent wants us to contact the homeowner, then yeah, we’re happy to email them these materials and the blog articles and the PDF that we have of how to prep their house and all of that stuff.

But I think the photographer’s job is really to send material to the real estate agent and just give them the the assets that they need to send to their client, and they’ll do that, I mean, they wanted to go efficiently too, I mean, the agents they don’t want to be wasting their time, they want to get the shoot done and move on with their day also.

I think we’re all on the same page that, if we send them the materials, then it will most likely end up with the homeowner.

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WGAN-TV | HomeJab Professional Real Estate Photographer Survey Results | Thursday, January 20, 2022

[00:20:58] Dan Smigrod: I’ll add another resource. We Get Around Network Forum - www.WGAN.com -- We maintain the WGAN Sample Forms Library; which is free to any We Get Around Network Forum Member, and it’s free to join the Forum.

We do ask for -- give us a form in order to get access to the WGAN Sample Forms Library, but for any of our viewers, if you go to www.WGANForum.com and just use the search box for Sample Forms Library and you’ll see the process to get free access to that.

I don’t shoot that often, but gosh, I think most of the clients that I shot for, we’re not ready. I’d be moving boxes. I’d be moving surfboards. I know we had times where we’re in a small condo where there wasn’t any place to hide stuff.

We literally would have to move stuff from one room to the other, shoot the room and then move the stuff back.

We’re trying to do a virtual tour, but anyway, I just rolled with it. Let’s just help move stuff, pack stuff. I don’t know what level pain point others have on that topic about whether to even touch anything or just sit there waiting for it -- the agent or the homeowner or both -- to take care of it.

[00:22:27] Joe Jesuele: It’s a touchy subject. Yeah. There’s never going to be a total fix for this because there’s always going to be situations like that, that maybe the home is vacant and it’s no one’s fault. You’re going to have to deal with that as part of the job.

I think the point is, it’s a high number, it’s over 50 percent.

[00:22:45] Dan Smigrod:

Yeah.

[00:22:45] Joe Jesuele: Maybe cut that down a little bit. Can we get it down to one out of four; one out of five. It would make everyone’s day. It was just a little bit more efficient and it’d be a win-win for everyone.

[00:22:57] Dan Smigrod: Yeah. I know even in some of the shoots, the kids are still sleeping. It was, “Okay, we’re going to start on a different floor than we were planning to, so that they can sleep a little bit longer because they’re a little bit cranky if you wake them up right now.” That’s okay, we’ll start on a different floor while mom is... or Dad is...

[00:23:16] Joe Jesuele: Yeah, I think a lot of photographers will tell you the best shoot is just a vacant house. They can just get the lockbox, open the door and they’re the only ones in the house, they can get it done in 20 minutes or something without anyone causing any problems.

[00:23:35] Dan Smigrod: Violating the MLS terms that the agent has to be present during the shoot perhaps, but certainly I’ve had enough shoots with the agents; The trust level is high enough. The door is open. Go take care of the shoot.

I can think of one client that I just loved shooting for it because it is always camera-ready right down to the light bulbs are all working. I guess that’s a whole nother topic, about whether you carry light bulbs in your car. “Have you ever been harassed by someone flying a drone?”

[00:24:10] Joe Jesuele: This number -- I think it was around a quarter of them have said this. And, I’ve heard stories from the photographers that have called in and said that your neighbors have come out, started yelling at them, and, one guy said to a photographer, as far as I know.

He thought he was spying on his wife. He was very upset about this and caused a big problem. There are people like that, it seems like more these days than in the past that people are just really uptight about privacy. I guess you can understand it. If you look up in the sky and you see a drone flying around, a lot of people would have an issue with that.

[00:24:54] Dan Smigrod: Tips for the photographers that are flying drones in order to avoid -- the number was 32 percent reported a hassle when flying a drone. Any tips for the photographers?

[00:25:10] Joe Jesuele: Well, I think one thing if they had the time and they see the neighbors outside and they can just tell them, what’s going on, I’m here for a shoot. We are flying a drone. It’s really just for marketing purposes. We are just taking images of this house. We’re not taking images of your property. Maybe just communicating, if you have that opportunity, if you see the neighbors outside, just saying, “Hey, I’m a professional photographer, I’m here because I was hired to shoot this house professionally because it’s being listed for sale.”

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WGAN-TV | HomeJab Professional Real Estate Photographer Survey Results | Thursday, January 20, 2022

Just being upfront and honest about what you’re doing, I think would ease tensions because -- It’s when someone doesn’t know the purpose of why you’re flying that drone is why they get upset.

[00:25:55] Dan Smigrod:

We want to help increase the value of the property in your community. ;-)

[00:25:59] Joe Jesuele:

There we go!

[00:26:01] Dan Smigrod: I don’t fly drones, but I do use a 360 video camera from time-to-time, and one of the things that I do to avoid a hassle because it tends to attract attention when you’re out with this gear shooting 360 video -- I wear a workman’s -- a yellow vest, construction worker’s vest. Sometimes I wear a construction hat.

Sometimes I carry a clipboard. I just looked like I belonged there. I’m doing something official; whether that level of officialdom or not, but I find that it just works by wearing a yellow vest, got a hard hat on, carrying a clipboard and “he’s carrying his camera.”

“Okay, must have some official authority that needs to be doing this, I’m going to stay way and not ask questions.”

[00:26:50] Joe Jesuele:

HomeJab is a marketplace for real estate photography. We deal with mostly real estate agents, but we’re essentially a platform for agents to connect with professional photographers and we’re nationwide

That’s a good strategy, Dan.

[00:26:51] Dan Smigrod: Selling yellow vests at www.WGANForum.con ;-) No, I just find it’s one of those things, it’s just always worked for me.

Joe Jesuele

Founder and Owner, HomeJab www.HomeJab.com

You asked the photographer, “How professional is the typical real estate agent who hires you?” What was the result?

[00:27:09] Joe Jesuele: It was better than I thought, to be honest. We said score between a zero and 10 and I think they did around a seven, so it was pretty solid B minus, you could say, it was a good score. I think that I was hoping for a high score, but I was thinking actually expecting it to be a little lower.

But yeah, it’s nice to know that the photographers that are going out there meeting real estate agents that are acting professional, and more times than not, just a nice interaction, I mean, we hear about the times that don’t go great.

But most of the time, things are going very efficiently and people are getting on time, are arriving on time and you’re getting the shoots done quickly and efficiently and there’s no issue. I think that’s a pretty decent score.

[00:28:06] Dan Smigrod: I thought it was high, 76 percent. On the other hand, I also saw the piece that I just don’t understand. If you’re a real estate photographer and you’re working with many real estate agents, you have a sense of -- well, who are you going to refer business to?

Because people ask you, “Dan, I don’t know any real estate agents, obviously you have come into contact with a lot of real estate agents, which one do you recommend?”

[00:28:33] Joe Jesuele:

Yeah.

[00:28:34] Dan Smigrod: I’m surprised that every agent is not operating at 110 percent; interacting with the photographer because they represent a source of referrals.

[00:28:44] Joe Jesuele: Yeah, it’s an excellent point. You’re right. I mean, I have several friends of mine that are photographers and I’ll ask them, who’s your favorite agent to work with and that they have all these stories and they’ve so many interactions, they meet so many agents and it’s very obvious to them, who were the ones that they enjoy working with, who are the ones that are really good at their job and who are the ones that are just, I don’t know how to say it, but just not at the top of their game, I guess.

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WGAN-TV | HomeJab Professional Real Estate Photographer Survey Results | Thursday, January 20, 2022

Yeah, I think a real estate photographer who’s out there meeting 3-4 a day, shooting houses and meeting those agents. I mean, that’d be a great resource for someone who’s looking for a referral.

[00:29:27] Dan Smigrod: Yeah, I think I’d mentioned even three things on that. First, if your real estate agent watching this show, a tip, take good care of your real estate photographers, because they’re potential source of referrals for you.

Two, just anecdotally, if I’m saying that correctly, my wife and I needed to sell a family member’s property and we reached out to a member of the We Get Around Network in a market, a real estate photographer who instantly knew who he wanted to recommend to us.

There wasn’t any doubt, and yet he’s a very busy, successful professional photographer who’s shooting for multiple agents. If you’re a real estate agent and you’re watching this and you’re in that market, you may have missed getting a job because you weren’t operating at 110 percent with this photographer.

[00:30:20] Joe Jesuele: Yeah. You have the more analytical perspective of how many shoots you’re doing for someone, meaning how many listings, how much business they’re doing.

There’s that aspect, and then there’s also the aspect of just how nice are they to engage with, how nice are they to the photographer, but also other contractors that are in the house, the homeowner, the clients themselves. You do get that perspective of, this person is really busy doing a lot of business and they’re also a really nice person to deal with it.

[00:30:51] Dan Smigrod: Yeah. I could understand someone say, “hey, I don’t care about polite. I want to know that they’re going get the most offers for the most money with the least amount of hassle, and I don’t care how they’re treating you as a photographer.”

But the photographer still knows, aside from who’s treating you nicely, who is really a busy, successful professional agent, and it’s just immediately apparent who you want to refer.

I would just add one thought here; what I would encourage photographers: work your network of people that know, like, and trust you, and let them know that you’re happy to recommend and refer real estate agents when they’re ready to sell property.

Because when you develop a relationship with an agent and they see you as a source of leads, you’re going to be able to charge full rack rate of what you want to charge, and you’re just going to be elevated in the minds of your agents because you’re not just a vendor, you’re someone who’s actually developing business for them through your trusted network.

[00:32:02] Joe Jesuele:

Absolutely. Great point.

[00:32:04] Dan Smigrod: I’m going to switch gears here because HomeJab also did a survey of real estate agents and you reported the results at the end of 2021.

I thought it would be super-helpful if we went through the results of what did real estate agents had to say when they were surveyed.

Because these answers are, in my opinion, super-helpful for photographers if you know these answers. First tell us a little bit about the HomeJab Survey of Real Estate Agents. Maybe it would start with, how many agents did you survey?

[00:32:43] Joe Jesuele: There are 289 agents that submitted responses. A portion of these were customers of ours, but about a little bit more than half were non-customer; people that have no affiliation with HomeJab at all.

But they did have one thing in common, they are active listing agents. These aren’t buy-side agents, they’re active agents and they were agents that had listed the properties within the last six months, so they were doing business and at top listing agent.

[00:33:17] Dan Smigrod:

Perfect. Let’s jump into the questions. “Do you hire a professional photographer for every listing?”

[00:33:25] Joe Jesuele: Yeah, I was happy to see that 72% that do that pretty much every time. I mean, that was nice to hear. I think the answers that we’ve heard that are cringe-worthy was, “it depends on the house,” that kind of thing, which of course is not a great look; if you’re a real estate professional.

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WGAN-TV | HomeJab Professional Real Estate Photographer Survey Results | Thursday, January 20, 2022

You want to put your best presentation out there no matter what the house is, no matter what the situation, even if you think it’s going to sell in a day, you’re going to have 10 offers the first day, because it might not be about selling that house, it might be about selling yourself to the next potential customers.

So always use a professional because you don’t know who’s going to see that, even if the house doesn’t need it per se or it’s going to sell right away, someone’s going to see that and know that, “Hey, why didn’t you use professional photos on this house?”

It’s about having a real professional presence I think more than anything else.

[00:34:27] Dan Smigrod: Joe, this may be a hard statistic. 72% sounded super-high to me, and maybe if half the real estate agents that participated in the survey are HomeJab customers, then it seems the bias would be, well, yes, of course, because they’re HomeJab customers, they engage professional photographers.

I just feel that that number might’ve been high if half the respondents were actually already buying photography services from HomeJab. Am I off-base on that?

[00:35:01] Joe Jesuele: Well, they do buy from us, but I mean, it doesn’t mean that they have to buy every time. I think the question being, do you do it on every single listing?

The number came in a little bit high, so not only are they hiring us for certain properties, but they’re doing it pretty much for every property, which was nice to hear.

HomeJab is a marketplace for real estate photography. We deal with mostly real estate agents, but we’re essentially a platform for agents to connect with professional photographers and we’re nationwide

Joe Jesuele

Founder and Owner, HomeJab www.HomeJab.com

We’ve also surveyed a lot of agents that we did not work with. We had an ad going on Facebook and Instagram that was targeted to real estate agents. I think we got a pretty good sampling of different kinds of agents.

[00:35:44] Dan Smigrod: Let me ask a question a different way about, “do you hire a professional photographer for every listing?” Today, Thursday, January 20, 2022, Zillow put out a media release saying inventory is down 40%.

Earlier in the week, Redfin announced, three in five houses, they’d get multiple offers. It almost seems if you put the house on the market, it’s going to sell regardless of whether you have professional photos, video, aerial, virtual tour, floor plans, painted rocks.

How do you help guide photographers through this time where the supply of inventory is incredibly low historically?

[00:36:48] Joe Jesuele: Well, I feel like we’ve been operating in that environment for a while, and people were talking about inventory shortages last year, and then you had the start of the pandemic the year before that, people were talking about it, so I mean, it’s really been going on, I feel like, for a while.

We can’t really control that aspect of it. I mean, the inventory is what it is. We just control our relationships with the agents and our amount of our contact with them, staying in front of them and that kind of thing because, I mean, even though maybe inventory is low, there’s still a lot of properties that are moving.

Just a raw number. There’s still a lot of transactions, so plenty of business out there. I don’t think there’s a shortage of properties to shoot.

[00:37:41] Dan Smigrod: Let me see if I can ask the question a little bit differently. You’ve been HomeJab, your company, Founder, CEO for nine plus years now.

Your previous life, you were a real estate agent. I’m going to make a statement and tell me that if this is fair, either thinking it from a HomeJab perspective or your previous life as a real estate agent.

Half the reason, 75 percent of the reason to do photos, video, virtual tools, aerial, professional floor plans, whatever it might be, is all about winning the next listing. It’s not about selling the house because the house is going to sell anyway. Is that a fair statement?

Is that a photographer really needs to emphasize that we can help you win more and bigger premium listings more often by engaging a professional photographer to shoot your property?

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WGAN-TV | HomeJab Professional Real Estate Photographer Survey Results | Thursday, January 20, 2022

[00:38:41] Joe Jesuele:

Absolutely. I think when you have a listing presentation and you’re presenting and trying to win that listing.

That’s a big part of it, hiring a professional, getting photos, video, getting that all done quickly right away, giving back the next day, get it listed right away.

It’s not only the quality of the images, I think it’s just the ability to get it done quickly, is a big asset for a listing agent and just a way to get more listings.

I agree 100 percent, even though you think that the house is going to sell and you’re going to get 10 offers in a day. Just to get that listing to begin with, you have to sell the homeowner on why they need to choose you and it’s because of the high-quality media and how quickly you can get everything done. I think it’s a big selling point for a homeowner.

[00:39:36] Dan Smigrod: Excuse me. Has HomeJab done any studies along the lines of professional photography helps increase the price of the sale of the property sufficiently to have covered the cost of the shoot itself.

Meaning real estate agents self-employed, asking to spend X number of dollars on professional photography, virtual tour, aerial drone, whatever it might be, is to be able to justify, sure the house is going to sell, but we can help you sell it for more.

That means your commission is going to not only cover the expense of the photography, but likely result in yet more higher commission with happier clients who are super- excited about recommending and referring you to their friends and colleagues.

[00:40:39] Joe Jesuele: We haven’t done a scientific survey, but anecdotally, I’ve heard that from a lot of agents and I think these days... the homeowner is just expecting it.

I don’t think it’s really a question. I think they expect the best photos. I think they expect a video. I don’t think they’re surprised by doing virtual tours or aerials, I think this is just mainstream now.

[00:41:04] Dan Smigrod: On the other hand, I think when we talked earlier in the show, we talked about the 3D, 360 tours may only be 20 percent of the order, and therefore, maybe it’s not a given, maybe photos are given and maybe the next thing is video.

But when do you think we get to the point where homeowners are sophisticated enough to expect and demand that their real estate agent provide these additional visual storytelling assets at no additional expense to them?

[00:41:38] Joe Jesuele: I don’t know if the 3D stuff is something that they’ll expect at any point. I don’t know. I’m just saying they expect really high-quality images and they’re not in video and they wouldn’t be surprised if someone took aerial or 3D. I don’t know if they expect that necessarily. I just think that they expect a professional marketing plan and part of that marketing plan is to have a professional photographer and high-quality images in different forms. Whether it be just still images, video, aerial, 3D, floor plan, everything.

I don’t know if they necessarily demand 3D specifically, but I think the homeowners just assume that there’s going to be professional content that is produced and their presence online. When they go online, they’re going to see beautiful images. I think that’s what they expect.

[00:42:36] Dan Smigrod: Speaking of virtual tours, one of your questions for real estate agents is, “Which virtual tours do you prefer to use with your listing?” One of the categories was 3D/360, that was bucket together, like them both the same.

Another category was video walk-through, which maybe our audience doesn’t think of as virtual tours, but is thought of as walkthrough, or don’t use any. Now that I’ve totally confused that question, “What virtual tours do you prefer to use with your listings?

[00:43:16] Joe Jesuele: The respondents for our survey did indicate that video is a little bit more popular, not by a ton, but it was more popular than 360. Then the second most popular response was they can do both. They can go either way and I think a lot of them just maybe they asked the homeowner, what do you prefer?

I think they’re becoming more interchangeable, but video is still most popular. I think it’s mostly just because of the fact that most agents feel more comfortable with that type of media.

They deal with it every day on social media, they deal with it to streaming video from their homes, it’s on their phone. They’re just more comfortable with it. Virtual tools although it’s a high percentage in growing, it’s still just not as popular as video.

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WGAN-TV | HomeJab Professional Real Estate Photographer Survey Results | Thursday, January 20, 2022

[00:44:06] Dan Smigrod: listings?”

Just for clarification, the results were for the question, “Which virtual tours do you prefer to use with your

Real estate agents responded, for the category of 3D/360 tours; 21% for video walkthroughs 35%, so more like both the same meaning, six or half a dozen or the other, whether it’s 3D/360, or video walkthrough.

I think my takeaway from what you just described was since the preference for real estate agents -- given a choice between 3D/ 360 -- and video walkthroughs being higher. If again, you’ve entered this space as a Matterport Service Provider or a provider of any 3D, 360 tools and real estate is new for you, then you better figure out how to master photos first, video second, and then note that virtual tours -- 3D, 360 -- is probably the next in line or possibly aerial, depending on the property.

Does that sound like a fair statement, if you’re a virtual tour photographer and you’re not offering video walkthroughs, you better figure out how to offer video walkthroughs?

[00:45:27] Joe Jesuele: I think so, especially just because video is accepted on so many different platforms and just so widely used. I really think that if you’re a photographer, being able to do a professional walk-through video, have the right gimbal and be able to just stabilize your camera and do it in a professional way.

I think it’s just very popular. You’re just going to get more business, let’s put it that way. You’re going to make more money and you’re going to be able to upsell that. The agents, they might not care exactly if it’s 3D or video or aerial, but they do, for the most part, want to do something in addition to photos. I think they’d get that at least.

Even the ones starting out. They get the fact that they’re doing new photos, that’s the most important, but then they should add in something else as well. I think that message has been received.

HomeJab is a marketplace for real estate photography. We deal with mostly real estate agents, but we’re essentially a platform for agents to connect with professional photographers and we’re nationwide

Joe Jesuele

Founder and Owner, HomeJab www.HomeJab.com

[00:46:22] Dan Smigrod: Add-Ons. Add-Ons. Add-Ons. I think of video walkthroughs as three different things. Let me describe what I think a video walkthrough is and maybe you can respond. One would be shooting a video walk-through with a DSLR camera and a gimbal.

Second would be shooting with a smartphone and a gimbal doing video. The third would be taking a 3D tour or a 360 tour and turning that into a video. Can you comment on those three buckets?

[00:47:03] Joe Jesuele: Yeah. We only do number one. We only do the DSLR with a gimbal and that’s been the HomeJab service that we’ve been doing for close to eight years now. We do have a couple of photographers in certain markets that had gotten the newest iPhone and they put together a sample and it looks pretty good. But just as at a company level, we always use DSLR with a gimbal and that’s how we shoot our videos.

[00:47:34] Dan Smigrod: If you’re a real estate photographer and you join HomeJab and now it’s a choice between sending out photographer A or B, and the real estate agent is offered three services including a video walk-through. If you don’t offer video walk-through with the DSLR plus shot with a gimbal, then you’re not getting that job?

[00:47:58] Joe Jesuele: Most likely, yes. Now, when you get out to the shoot, we don’t verify exactly what you’re using, so there are certainly photographers that they can get it done and they produce great footage. That’s fine.

But I just think in order to get approval to do video with us, we need the professional equipment, professional gimbal and that’s what’s worked for us for many years.

But we always have an eye on new technology and there’s different types of cameras and if you have a nice stabilizer with the iPhone Pro, it’s going to look pretty decent.

[00:48:42] Dan Smigrod:

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“How many photos do you upload to the MLS for an average sized home?”

WGAN-TV | HomeJab Professional Real Estate Photographer Survey Results | Thursday, January 20, 2022

[00:48:50] Joe Jesuele: 30 seems to be the magic number. It’s been that way for a while. We have a few options, you can get 15, you can get 30, or you can get 50, and 30 is just by far the most popular and most common.

[00:49:06] Dan Smigrod: Looking at a bar chart in the survey results; 80 percent uploaded at least 30 photos for a listing, and when you look at the bar chart, 51 percent for 30 photos, so that seems like it’s the sweet spot.

[00:49:22] Joe Jesuele:

Definitely. It’s not too little, not too many.

[00:49:27] Dan Smigrod:

Why do you offer less then?

[00:49:32] Joe Jesuele:

Well, for condos and apartments that will be one use case.

[00:49:37] Dan Smigrod:

You’ll shoot Airbnb?

[00:49:41] Joe Jesuele: Yeah. Actually sometimes with vacation rentals they want more photos because they want to shoot what’s in the linen closet and things like that, the accessories that are included in that vacation rental.

It’s actually more photos might makes more sense. I guess I was talking more about just urban apartments, condos, two bedrooms, smaller properties that may not need it. Also, if we’re just doing exteriors, you don’t need more than 15.

[00:50:14] Dan Smigrod: Let me ask the question differently. Do you sometimes put in a price point of 15 images because you want a reference price so that somebody still feels they have a choice; fewer and lower dollar price point, but they look at the price point of the 30 and say I’ll get 30?

[00:50:37] Joe Jesuele: Yeah, we do offer -- It’s always nice to have more than intro-level deal that’s priced a little bit more lower than the typical. But it’s still hiring a professional to go out to the property. There’s not a huge difference in the price there.

You do save a little bit of money, but ultimately I think you’re right. When people see the prices and you can go from 15 to 30 just by increasing a little bit, I think they usually go for 30. It’s really just the smaller properties, or exterior-only type of shoots that 15 makes sense.

[00:51:16] Dan Smigrod:

“If the property is vacant with no furniture, what staging do you prefer?”

[00:51:25] Joe Jesuele: You have real staging, the real deal and then you have virtual staging. Our survey said that people prefer virtual.

I think that might be a first because when we first started this business, just regular staging, actually moving in furniture was pretty common.

But now virtual staging, I just think because of the price point and how easy it is, that’s why more agents are just opting to do that.

[00:51:53] Dan Smigrod: Statistically on your survey, a little over 30 percent said they prefer virtual staging, 29 percent prefer traditional staging with real furniture, 40 just said, I just don’t do any staging.

[00:52:10] Joe Jesuele:

That is number 1, right. Exactly.

[00:52:13] Dan Smigrod: I was surprised and not surprised on the virtual staging. I imagine virtual staging is far less from a cost standpoint and is probably far better if everybody’s looking at properties on the first go-around online. Even though I thought it was high, then I think, wow, it seems low. Who are these people with a third almost spending for real staging?

Help me understand why a real estate agent chooses to do real staging even if 95 percent of all house hunting begins online or 93, over 90 percent, whatever the statistic is. If you’re searching online, why shouldn’t you do virtual staging if it’s costing you a fraction of what it costs to do real staging?

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WGAN-TV | HomeJab Professional Real Estate Photographer Survey Results | Thursday, January 20, 2022

[00:53:04] Joe Jesuele: I think a lot of agents will agree with you, but I do think that there are some agents that may have been doing this for many years and they just have their ways about doing it. Maybe that’s part of their pitches, they’re dealing with investors and builders and they say, “Yeah, I work with the staging company.”

That helps them to get the listing. I think it could be beneficial if you’re doing a lot of open houses and a lot of people are walking through the property and things like that. Because if you see the images online and you actually go to see the property and it’s totally vacant it throws you off a little bit I think.

[00:53:42] Dan Smigrod: I think I’m tracking in the We Get Around Network Forum (www.WGANForum.com) at least 15 different companies that offer virtual open houses within 3D or 360 tours. I think there’s almost 10 that actually offer open houses within Matterport tours.

If open houses are the reason to have physical staging, but people are moving to virtual open houses, I can’t imagine. Again, I wouldn’t want to be a physical stager knowing that the world’s moving digital. It just seems like that -[00:54:20] Joe Jesuele: I’m with you there. I don’t think I’m going to be getting involved in the traditional staging business either. You don’t sound like you are either. ;-) Personally, I prefer virtual staging. It’s just that I think there are a lot of agents still out there that have been doing this that way and they’re not changing and it’s been working for them.

But that 29 percent, that number that you mentioned, I think it’s going down for sure. I don’t think there’s any question about that.

[00:54:53] Dan Smigrod: photography?”

HomeJab is a marketplace for real estate photography. We deal with mostly real estate agents, but we’re essentially a platform for agents to connect with professional photographers and we’re nationwide

Joe Jesuele

Founder and Owner, HomeJab www.HomeJab.com

Last question on the surveys. “Have you ever tried twilight

[00:55:00] Joe Jesuele: Yeah. A lot of people said that they love it. What was interesting was that very few people said they tried it and they don’t like it.

That was in single digits. Most people were saying absolutely, yes. All they said, “no, but I’m interested in trying it.” Definitely, most people said those two things.

[00:55:26] Dan Smigrod: When we say twilight topography, are we talking about a photographer truly showing up at twilight or are we talking about just enhanced images that’s turned into twilight?

[00:55:40] Joe Jesuele:

Yeah. It could be both, but twilight photography to me is when you’re going out and shooting at night.

You could still edit in the correct sky if you feel you need that if at the end of the day, weather didn’t cooperate.

But yeah, to me twilight is what we’re referring to here. We actually put it in the survey, do you use virtual twilight only and a very few said that that’s what they use. Virtual twilight I think it would be the term there, but this was referring to actual twilight.

[00:56:11] Dan Smigrod: I think my takeaway from this category is there’s a lot of interest in whether there’s a lot of real estate agents using it or not. There’s a lot more interest in it. Actually, I did have one more question from your survey. “Do you typically use aerial photography?”

Again, this is asked to real estate agents, “do you typically use aerial photography?” Fifty five percent said yes, but it depends on the property, and 12 percent said yes on every listing. If I add that up that’s 60, almost 70 percent.

Now I’m confused because I’m hearing 70 percent of the real estate agents say they use aerial photography, but I think I heard earlier that it’s only a smaller percentage of Add-Ons. Is there a disconnect between what people are telling you and what they’re actually doing?

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WGAN-TV | HomeJab Professional Real Estate Photographer Survey Results | Thursday, January 20, 2022

[00:57:03] Joe Jesuele: Yeah. This question here, what they said here was that they have used it, they do use it but it depends on the property. I think what a lot of agents have decided is that many properties don’t require it, which is discouraging because how do you determine what property needs it or it doesn’t need it, it’s just more information and more dated activity.

[00:57:28] Dan Smigrod: I don’t know. Is it going to help me win the listing or not? I see that is a straightforward answer. “This client: I need to add it because that’s what it’s going to take me to win that listing.”

[00:57:41] Joe Jesuele: Yeah. Maybe that’s the way they look at it. I was looking at it more from a standpoint as there are certain features in that neighborhood that you want to highlight, and if there aren’t, then don’t do aerials, but if there are then do it.

But I just think that more today people are interested in not just the property itself but the community, the neighborhood, and what’s around that property. I think it’s important to highlight what’s around there even if there’s nothing. It’s just more data, more information to be given to the consumer and I think that’s a good thing, it’s just being more transparent.

I think that they’re interested, they do it, but they don’t do it enough. I guess that’s the conclusion there.

[00:58:23] Dan Smigrod: Any parting thoughts? The surveys: either for real estate photographers or real estate agents? I know we covered that ground. I just don’t want to give you an open-ended question. If there’s something else that just jumps to mind is the result of these surveys.

[00:58:40] Joe Jesuele: Well, one thing just going back to the NFTs that we touched on in the beginning, we asked a question on one of the surveys. “What are you most excited about?” NFTs were on the list but it wasn’t one of the higher ones.

But then we got to the question right after that. “If there was a tool that you can use online to create NFTs and a tool to help you sell them online, would you be interested?” Over 70 percent of the photographers said, “Yes, we’d be really interested.”

[00:59:12] Dan Smigrod: Awesome. I’m going to leave it there -- To our viewers; stay tuned because Joe will be back on WGAN-TV Live at 5 as soon as HomeJab offers their service; coming in at the end of the first quarter, beginning of the second quarter. Stay tuned.

We’ll have Joe back on the show talking about the HomeJab tool to make it easy, fast, and seamless to offer your photography as an NFT. Is good?

[00:59:55] Joe Jesuele:

Absolutely. Yeah.

[00:59:56] Dan Smigrod:

Awesome. Joe, thanks for being my guest on WGAN-TV Live at 5.

[01:00:01] Joe Jesuele:

Thank you, Dan. I appreciate it.

[01:00:03] Dan Smigrod: Thank you, Joe. We’ve been visiting with Joe Jesuele. Joe is Founder and CEO of HomeJab. You can check out the website: www.HomeJab.com If you’re a real estate agent, you can sign up for HomeJab there.

If you’re a photographer, there’s a link for you to sign up and if you really want to do a deep-dive into the pie charts and bar charts and statistics, they’re also available at HomeJab, just look for the tab for “Industry Research” for Joe in Philadelphia.

I’m Dan Smigrod, Founder of the We Get Around Network Forum and you’ve been watching WGAN-TV Live at 5.

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