By Ian Grace

As we established in my last column, photos and headlines should work together. Choosing a photo that is not the front of the house as the main photograph in your ad, is a paradigm shift for most Realtors, as the industry has been doing the same old thing, for so long.

However, once we make that bold step, then we can take photographs that will complement and work with the headlines and the results can be quite amazing – very often, just like clicking on a light switch, from bad, dull, boring ads to great ads that instantly produce fabulous results for your sellers.

So now we take the next bold step by putting people and/or pets in your photos – it’s a great way to show people what they will be able to DO when they live there.

When I sold my home, my ad included a photo of my wife and I enjoying our hot tub. That made it easy for the prospective buyer to project themselves into that picture, visualising themselves relaxing after a hard day.

When the buyer (who lived a two-hour plane flight away) phoned me on the fourth day of our advertising campaign, he only had two questions for me –  “Do you get any noise from the highway” (which he saw from Google Earth, was about one km away) and “Is that you and your wife in the spa?”

As you can see, I practise what I preach.

Another example of the main photo not being the front of the property and showing people, is when we worked with a local Realtor to sell an investment property of ours.

Watch the waves... and the $$$’s roll in!

The caption on this photo was, “Watch the waves… and the $$$’s roll in!”

Once again, see how the photo complements the headline and specifically targets the investor market? We wanted an investor to buy it as a going concern, including all furniture and that was exactly who we attracted, achieving $6,000 more than the price in the ad after the campaign had only been running for six days.

John McKenna is a Pennsylvania Realtor who hasn’t missed a listing for over 22 months since he began putting this advertising system into place. To demonstrate how a great ad campaign can make an immediate dramatic difference in results, John picked up the listing for a property that had been on the market almost three years. The previous Realtor couldn’t sell the home for $259,000. With a very different ad campaign, John had the property sold in just a few weeks, for a staggering $289,000 – $30,000 more than the previous Realtor couldn’t sell it for. How is that for results?

The headline on the main photo was Ron and Janet recall the many family barbecues and get-togethers enjoyed on this patio.

The photo?  I’m sure you’ve guessed it – a photo of a smiling Ron and Janet on their patio, next to the barbecue. Imagine how that ad stood out among all the other usual boring real estate ads showing nothing but fronts of houses.

Photos like these give life to the properties for sale and the prospective buyers can match it to the picture they already have in their own minds, of what it will be like to live in their new home.

Known internationally as “Mr. Real Estate Advertising”, Australian born Ian Grace is acknowledged as one of the world’s leading authorities on real estate advertising. Since 1994, he has delivered his programs throughout Australia, New Zealand, U.S.A, Canada and the U.K. His articles about real estate advertising have been published around the world. www.iangrace.com