You've made the investment in a piece of technology that will help you as an office manager or as an agent to increase your productivity. The digital camera is an excellent tool to not only improve your listing presentations, but your on-line exposure for your listings. It is a tool that is only limited by the imagination.

Allen Hainge, productivity/technology/Web trainer and president of Allen F. Hainge Seminars, says that he is often asked how to make the digital camera earn its keep. One REALTOR, before investing in a digital camera, asked," I need to make my investment pay off and impress customers as well as my associates. How can I best do that?"

Allen replied, "Top agents use the digital camera for one reason only: to make money!" He followed up with a brief list of some of the ways top sales associates use their digital cameras:

• Take a photo of the home in front of the sellers when you inspect their property prior to a marketing presentation. Use the photo on the front page of your printed marketing presentation (done in PREP Presentations, of course!).
• Take photos of the sellers' home during your inspection appointment. Have color flyers featuring the photos ready for them during your marketing presentation. Ask them which one they want you to distribute first.
• Using your digital camera, you can immediately put photos on your Web site. Take the photos during your inspection appointment and create a "Featured Home" page on your site featuring the sellers' home. Show it to them during your marketing presentation.
• Download photos from your digital camera directly into PhotoShare. Play the PhotoShare multimedia presentation for the sellers as part of your marketing presentation. Give them some disks with the presentation on them and ask them to give them to folks who might be interested in a new home.
• Take a photo of the sellers' home, use it in a NetCard from PictureWorks, and e-mail them a multimedia NetCard prior to your marketing presentation.
• If you use a Sony Mavica, take the disk of photos you took during your property tour directly from the Mavica and give it to the buyers. If you don't use the Mavica, just take the extra moment to transfer the photos from the pcm card in your camera to a disk and give them the disk.
• Using PhotoShare, give buyers a multimedia slide show of homes they've toured. They don't need to have PhotoShare on their computer to run the show, just the disk you give them.
• Take photos of open houses when buyers tour them. If they have e-mail have the photos waiting for them when they get home. If they don't have e-mail put the photos on a disk and give them the disk.
• Use photos from your digital camera in a PhotoShare multimedia slide show. Put the slide show on the seller's home computer. Have it running in an endless loop so that anyone touring the home sees it. Have disks containing the PhotoShare presentation available at the home for prospects to take with them. They don't need to have PhotoShare on their computer to run it.

Allen also advises, "Take advantage of the "Wow Effect" digital cameras give you by taking photos in front of buyers and sellers. Could you use photos from a regular camera for all of the above? Sure, but you'd lose the "Wow Effect" and you'd spend more money on film and developing in a year than a good digital camera costs you..plus, if you want to e-mail photos, no scanner is needed!"

For more tips on digital cameras, check out Allen's site at http://www.afhseminars.com/news.htm.

Published: September 3, 1998

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