Back9 Creative Logo

What are the benefits of using drones for filming real estate and commercial buildings

Posted on by Phil

The introduction of drones are breathing new life into photography and videography marketing. Drones are able to open up angles and perspectives that are otherwise unachievable. They’re able to capture sweeping shots with ease and are excellent for filming real estate and commercial buildings.

Drone filming for real estate listings

A very popular use of drones is for real estate or selling commercial properties. And for good reasons. According to some calculations done by RISMedia, real estate agents who use a drone or hire a photographer with a drone could see an increase in listings as high as 73% and deal closing increases as high as 68%. Sold by Air states that, “83% of home sellers prefer to work with an agent using drones.” With these kinds of numbers, real estate agents can potentially see returns that add up to tens of thousands of dollars per year.

Drones are particularly effective for large lifestyle blocks. They can show how large and expansive the property is and how much of the land at once. Drones can also show off property features like hills, fields, and natural landscape features.

Drone technology makes aerial shots accessible

Aerial photos & videos used to only be taken using planes or helicopters which requires hiring a helicopter, a pilot, and an aerial camera operator. The barriers to that type of imagery are typically out of reach for most companies. Not only that, drones don’t take much prep and their small size makes them more versatile than manned aircraft ever was. Drone technology now provides a safer, quieter, faster, and of course much cheaper solution.

How much does a drone cost?

While the cost of purchasing a good drone is not entirely prohibitive–starting around $1000 and going up from there–flying a drone does require a good amount of skill in not only piloting the drone but also in the technical setting needed to operate the camera correctly. And that’s not even mentioning the know-how of what permits you need and how to apply for them. Permits are complicated, especially near airports. Most drones won’t take off at all without authorisation, which can be challenging to obtain.

As is the case for most endeavours, while you could do it yourself, it’s always best to hire a certified, and well educated professional drone pilot. At Back9 we have a licensed drone pilot who happens to be a professional videographer.

Drone shots vs ground shots

Using a drone isn’t always better. But there are some shots that are impossible to get without using one. Take a look at some of our comparison and unique shots below.

Commercial building

The first shot below is a view of the building from ground level. This view is the traditional photo and does not tell much of the story.

Here is the same building taken from the air. You can see much more context of shape, layout and design of the building. It also gives a sense of the surrounding of the building.

 

Two-storey house

Shooting a building from the ground level using a wide-angle lens can often introduce unwanted distortion to the property. By elevating the camera the building will have a much more true to life appearance. Here is a shot with a wide lens from the ground.

Drone Footage - Ground Shot

 

This is the same house but with a slightly elevated angle from a drone.

Drone Footage - Elevated House Shot

 

 

Using drones to give a sense of location

Using the drone to capture an image of the building from a distance away can give a sense of location that helps with navigation using surrounding roads or landmarks. They can also create images that clearly delineate fixtures on the ground, such as boundary lines.

Drone Footage -- Commercial Building

Top-down drone shots will show a sense of scale to your commercial building/yard, as well as references of key locations to one another. This will also clearly document the condition of rooftops etc. And there’s no ladder required.

Drone Footage -- Commercial Building Top-down

 

So you can now see the benefits of hiring a drone photographer to take your property images. If you are considering purchasing a drone yourself, that is great. But it’s not a matter of picking it up from the shops and then sending it up in the air and pressing a few buttons. There are many legal requirements that you have to be aware of before your drone even leaves the ground.

Legal requirements for operating a drone

Below is a basic outline of what you need to consider when flying a drone in New Zealand, but for a much more detailed explanation, visit this website.

In New Zealand, there is no distinction between personal and commercial drone users. This means that real estate agents do not need to be licensed operators to use small drones. In saying this, there are specific rules that must be followed to allow for the safe use of drones.

CAA aircraft rules

The Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) governs the use of drones as they are considered aircraft. The use of small drones is regulated under Part 101 Rules. These are reproduced below.

You should:
1. Not operate an aircraft that is more than 25kg and always ensure it is safe to operate

2. At all times, take all practicable steps to minimise hazards to persons, property and other aircraft

3. Fly only in daylight

4. Give way to crewed aircraft, for example any planes, helicopters, hang gliders and paragliders. You should land your drone immediately if another aircraft approaches

5. Always make sure you have visual contact of your drone (with your own eyes, don’t rely on using binoculars or other visual aids). This is called your visual line of sight

6. Not fly your aircraft higher than 120 metres (equivalent to 400 feet) above ground level (unless certain conditions apply)

7. Have knowledge of airspace restrictions that apply in the area you operate. This means you want to check any airspace restrictions before you fly

8. Not fly closer than 4 kilometres to any aerodrome (unless certain conditions apply) so this includes airports and helipads at hospitals

9. When flying in controlled airspace, obtain an air traffic control clearance from Airways Corporation of New Zealand. AirShare is a website that allows you to log requests with air traffic control to fly in controlled airspace and provides information on where you can fly and on airspace. It also has information on the rules for flying a drone, tips for safe flying and short quizzes on the rules

10. Not fly in special-use airspace (e.g. restricted operating areas) without permission from that area’s administering authority

11. Have consent from anyone you want to fly above

12. Have consent from the property owner or person in charge of the area you want to fly above.

Upgrade your video with drones

Keen to know more about video? Read our article Intro to Advertising with Video. Or if you’re ready to get some videos off the ground now, come have a chat with our videographer. You can book a meeting right now by choosing a time on the meeting calendar below.

The Sun Has Set on the Yellow Pages NZ

Posted on by Phil

Goodbye Yellow Pages NZ…

Who remembers flipping through Yellow Pages to find a local business and its contact information? We do, but only just.

As Bob Dylan once sang (way back when the Yellow Pages were still popular and effective) The times they are a-changin’.

Yellow pages is simply no longer a smart or viable option for businesses in New Zealand. The cost of advertising with yellow pages NZ far outweighs any potential value that it might offer. So what now?

In the age of digital media, such as Google Ads and Search Engine Optimisation (SEO),  it’s become clear that New Zealand businesses need to look elsewhere for effective marketing and advertising. As the sun sets on the era of Yellow Pages NZ, let’s take a look at a few reasons why local businesses should support their Kiwi peers when it comes to advertising and marketing.

Supporting Local Businesses

The number one reason why local businesses should support locally-owned New Zealand companies for services like Google Ads, is that they are helping to keep money in the local economy. This is especially important considering the impact that Covid-19 has had on our economy. Every dollar that’s spent on a local business goes back into our community, creating jobs and stimulating economic growth. Plus, by supporting local businesses you’re encouraging competition which can only be beneficial for everyone involved.

Targeted Marketing

Another key benefit of working with locally owned companies is that they are better able to provide targeted marketing solutions tailored specifically to your needs. Unlike large multinational firms, smaller companies are often much more willing to work closely with their clients. This is in order to ensure maximum results from their marketing efforts. Furthermore, these smaller firms tend to have lower overhead costs. which in turn means they can offer their services at a lower rate. And a lower rate than larger firms would be probably be able to do.

Personalised Service

When you work with a local company, you get access to personalised services that larger firms just can’t provide. Working with small locally-owned NZ companies gives you access to real people. Real people who have an understanding of your business and its needs. This is something larger corporations just can’t provide. Especially if they outsource overseas. This level of personalisation helps ensure maximum ROI from your marketing budget. And that’s because you know that your message is getting through directly to your target audience. And, in exactly the right way.

Better Connections with Your Audience

Finally, working with locally-owned New Zealand businesses allows you to better connect with your audience. They understand the culture and language better than an outsider would be able to do so easily! This can help make sure that your message is received by your target market effectively while also reinforcing positive feelings toward your brand amongst locals in New Zealand – not bad!

As we say goodbye to the era of relying solely on Yellow Pages NZ for advertising and marketing there are many benefits associated with supporting local businesses here in Southland or New Zealand instead. From helping stimulate local economies through keeping money within our own regions, as well as having access to targeted marketing strategies tailored specifically towards our own needs while being able to take advantage of flexible payment options if needed!

So next time you think about putting out an ad or running a campaign consider using a locally-owned, New Zealand company instead!

 

 

How much time should I spend on Admin for my business?

Posted on by Phil

Admin is a necessary evil for any business. A company simply can’t be viable without record-keeping, contacting customers, and of course, a way to accept and send payments! Many business owners, however, feel like they are drowning in paperwork and admin duties. Yet admin is essential. So how much time should you spend on admin for your business?

There are a lot of variables, and the short answer: the minimum time necessary! It makes sense; the less time you spend on admin, the more time you can spend on your core, money-making tasks. Polls from business owners around the world show that small businesses spend about 40% of their time on admin. Some polls put that even higher, over 50% even.

Ideally, you’d be doing extremely well as a business if you can spend less than 20% of your time on admin and necessary but non-income-generating tasks. If you could cut down your admin time significantly, would you do it? That sounds easier said than done. Where do you even start?

There are a few ways that you can reduce time spent on administrative tasks–some that might take very little effort but can provide significant results!

Use software for record-keeping

Filing by hand is difficult, takes time, and physical space. Software can cut down this time substantially. A common argument against using software for things like records is something like “But what if my hard drive malfunctions? I could lose everything all at once.” True point. But a counter to that is “What if you have an office fire or earthquake and your records are destroyed? You could lose everything at once.” As a backup, ideally you’d make copies and keep them in separate places.

Fortunately, you can do the same thing digitally these days. Depending on how important the files are, you can make virtually infinite copies and store them all over the internet. Cloud Services like Google Drive, OneDrive, Dropbox, and pCloud can all store files, and all have a free plan that includes at least 5 GB of storage. That’s a decent amount of space if you’re only storing things like records such as client and employee data. While it’s true that the data could be at risk if one of these services goes out of business, Google’s only likely to go out of business if the internet itself dies, and old records probably won’t be a concern if that happens!

If you want to go a step further, you can always back up your files on an external hard drive or USB storage stick that only you have access to. There are several programs that can schedule certain files to be uploaded to external storage that you have plugged in. So if you wanted your Client Records file backed up, you’d simply say you want Client Records backed up at 6:00 PM every day and it would copy only that file and back it up for you.

Make use of automation

If you find yourself doing the exact same thing over and over, chances are, automation can do it for you. When combined with a tool like Zapier, you can find that a lot of repetitive tasks can be done on their own with no input from you. While automation can significantly cut down times for some tasks (or even make it take not time at all!), some of the software does require a little bit of learning on your end. But there are options that are simple to use–just keep in mind that typically the less you have to understand for the tool to work, the more permissions it requires, and the more it costs to use. So it’s important to find the balance between learning a new program and the price not to have to learn it.

Find out more about automation in our blog, How can automation save you time and money?

Electronic forms are faster and can be automated

Nowadays, you should move as many processes as possible to be done digitally if you haven’t already. Digital forms are easier and faster to fill in and can be saved where they need to automatically. Plus you don’t have to try to decipher handwriting that doesn’t look like any known language. You can even opt for digital signatures, which are legally binding in many countries, including New Zealand.

Turnaround time is significantly faster when digital signatures are an option–some experts claim as much as 25x faster turnaround! These are ideal when someone isn’t going to sign the document right away. It’s much easier for someone to sign something electronically and have it be finished than to sign it and find a way to post or deliver it in person.

Iron out core processes

Sometimes a rule exists just because it always exists. If you have a drawn-out process because “It’s the way it’s always been done”, it might be time to take a look and see if it needs to exist–or if it can be improved. One popular business philosophy says that it’s important to work ON the business, not just IN the business. Essentially this means that instead of doing work as it comes in the way you always have, improving the processes and fundamentals can save time and money in the long run. It may seem a bit counterintuitive to delegate a chunk of time to activities that don’t make money, but streamlining your processes can save you big in the long run.

Since admin is such a big part of every business, it’s usually one of the places with the most potential for improvement. At times this could mean more steps for a process, but if that saves time when you have to come back to it later, it may well be worth it.

Have a strong file management system

File management is one of the most important parts of a business. It’s also one that many businesses don’t take the time to develop. According to Business.com, document challenges account for over 20% of wasted time. This includes professionals who collaborate on projects. Many still rely solely on email for task management, and it’s easy to lose track of an email. What was that weird subject line again? If you have multiple people working on the same project or file often and use email, consider upgrading to something designed for the job. Monday.com, Teamwork, Trello, and nTask can significantly simplify task management. We use Teamwork here at Back9 and have seen extraordinary improvements in task management, better team collaboration, and fewer tasks dropping off.

As helpful as those tools are though, they’ll hit a roadblock if you don’t take the time to develop a file management system. This is important both for digital and physical documents. For digital documents, have a folder system that’s simple, intuitive, and relevant. Something like “Client Projects > Client Name > Project Name” works well for many businesses.

Keep a record of policies, procedures, and instructions — and follow them!

It’s a good practice to regularly review policies, procedures, and instructions. Most business advisors suggest doing this annually at a minimum, or whenever there’s a major change; even if it’s a quick skim to make sure everything’s all good. If you notice something out of date or have changed how things are done since it was written, be sure to update it. It will save a lot of time when someone new comes aboard.

While updating these documents is important, what’s just as important is making sure to follow the new procedures. If a document is updated in a business and no one follows the update, did it really update at all? This is particularly important for time-saving when the new method will cut back on admin time. Sometimes changes come with a learning curve and that’s expected, but taking the time to understand how to do something more efficiently will save time and trouble long-term.

Use an external admin company

One solution that some businesses have turned to for cutting down admin is turning to an external company to handle most of it for them. This can be particularly helpful for people who hate or put off admin or aren’t familiar with using the latest software or tech. Outsourcing can free up valuable hours letting you focus on working on tasks that generate income. Just make sure you understand how the company is handling your invoices etc… You’ll want to make sure you can be the one to answer any questions from the customer if they come up.

Combine these solutions to cut back on Admin

If you’ve noticed there are one or multiple things here that you aren’t doing yet, setting aside the time to focus on streamlining admin can help in the long run. But what if you know there’s a problem, but can’t identify where to improve? Sometimes, an external viewpoint can make a major difference. There are several business development companies that can take a look and help you out. If you’re in New Zealand, Malloch McClean has a fantastic reputation for helping you build a smarter, better business.

Once you make your admin processes more efficient, you’ll find a lot more time to focus on what matters. You may even have a little extra time on your hands! If that’s the case, it’s an excellent opportunity to take a look at your marketing. When done right, marketing is an investment, not a cost. If you’ve been wondering if you’re spending the right amount to maximise your return on marketing, take a look at our article How much should I spend on marketing? and see if you could spend more–or could cut back a little.

Read the article, How much should I spend on Marketing?

Why is my website not converting?

Posted on by Phil

So you’ve got a website – great! A website is meant to drive visitors, give you new leads, and increase sales. But what if it isn’t converting? You’ll surely want to know why it isn’t! The most common reasons come down to design, content, and usability. In this article, we’ll break down a few key areas that can contribute to why your website isn’t converting as you hoped.

What are your goals?

It’s easy to get a website these days as there are tons of options from do-it-yourself to custom-built like the websites we do here at Back9. But there’s a lot more to it than just getting online. You’ve got to have goals. What do you want to achieve with your website? Do you want sales leads, to sell more products, or to educate? Whatever your goal is, it needs to be S.M.A.R.T; Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-bound. By planning your goals out ahead of time, you’ll know if your website is doing what it’s supposed to–or if it needs some work. If you want some help creating these types of goals, take a look at our SMART Goals Template–it can help you get started!

Get a FREE S.M.A.R.T. Goal template

Just pop your email in and hit submit and voila! We’ll redirect you to the template

Review and update your goals over time

An important part of goal setting is to review your goals regularly to see how they’re going. Did you achieve them? If not, how come? Were they too ambitious? Or is there something wrong with your website? If you can’t see any reason why you didn’t quite meet your goals, it might be time to review your website for a few key things.

Great design is key

We’ve written about this topic many times but we can’t stress it enough. If you have a well-designed website that is user-friendly and visually appealing, your website is more likely to convert.

A lot goes into the design of your website. It’s more than just looking pretty. It has to be intuitive and easy to use too. One thing strongly believe in at Back9 is growth-driven design. In this way of thinking, your website is constantly growing and improving. Digital technology is one of the fastest-changing industries there is. But with growth-driven design, when something changes, you’ll be ready to adapt quickly!

Too many options

Something that we often see is a “more is more” approach but unfortunately, this could be another reason why your website isn’t converting. If your potential customers have too many options, it can be overwhelming. For example: the main navigation (home, about, services, etc), and then underneath that you’ve got sub-categories for your services and then you’ve got a product banner with a few buttons that users can click – am I painting a clear picture for you?! It’s too much!

It might seem counterintuitive, but in good design, less is more. Fewer options is often better because, let’s not forget, the average user is very savvy. We don’t need to over-complicate their experience or underestimate their abilities to navigate a website. Finding the right balance is essential. The design should help guide users to other parts of the website, but not overwhelm them with decision paralysis.

Review your website content

Are you producing content that helps your customers or answers those burning questions about your business or service? More than likely you’ve answered no to that question and that’s fine, we know how hard it can be to take the time to produce internal content that is interesting and informative for your potential customers. If you can invest in Inbound Marketing your business will reap the benefits and you will attract the right sort of customers. Educating your customers before you’ve ever interacted with them helps you build trust and it is also a huge time saver for your organization. Find out more about why this is important in our article, 9 reasons why you should educate your buyer.

There’s no clear conversion path

If you have a good design and educational content and your website still isn’t converting, what gives? You might be giving users a lot of information, but what do they do with it? What’s the next step? You need to tell visitors what they need to do next. On almost every page you’ll want a call-to-action (CTA). This will tell someone what you want them to do next and then an easy way for them to do it.

For example: you write an article and at the end of that article, you have a message to book a meeting, or to buy now, or get a free quote. Then you have a link or a button that goes to a calendar, or your shop page, or the contact form. If you don’t have a CTA on a page you might lose some leads on that page instead of moving forward. You might even direct them to the next article in a series and have your contact CTA at the final one. Whatever your goal, make it as easy as you can to achieve it!

My website’s broken, now what?

If failure to plan is planning to fail, overlooking testing is sure to get you overlooked. Yup, you need to test and test and test your website. Remember that people are using different web browsers, different mobile devices and your website can have glitches across these different platforms. We also use/interact with websites differently, that’s the beauty of being human but it also means that just because you as the business owner do it one way and it works, doesn’t mean that it works another way for your customer. Often we see websites being launched without proper testing and wouldn’t you rather find out that your ‘Learn More’ button doesn’t work than your customer? It can have a massive impact on the trust level a customer has for you if there are issues and bugs with your website.

Follow best practices to get your website converting

As you can see, there are a lot of things to do with your website. If your website isn’t converting, it could be one or several of these things that need fixed. But how can you tell? Reviewing data like Google Analytics can be helpful, but it takes some practice to understand what to look for. Something else that can help is to regularly audit your website.

This can be done internally but we recommend an external provider as a fresh set of eyes will provide the most insight and constructive feedback. It can also be quite hard to look at your own business subjectively and truly put yourself in your customers’ shoes. A website audit will review your website design, user experience, content, ranking on Google, data in Google Analytics, and more. Once you’ve had an audit, you have real data that can help to improve your website and start converting.

There are several places where you can get a website audit, but we can do one for you for free here at Back9. This will include an analysis of your site and where you can make improvements. Or you might find the site is doing well already! Interested? Click the button below and fill out the quick form to get your free website audit.

Get-Free-Website-Audit-Button

What is Inbound Marketing? [VIDEO]

Posted on by Phil

Inbound Marketing is a different way of thinking, a better way! Everyone in business wants to increase brand awareness, that’s a no-brainer. Traditionally what we have seen and heard in our local market over the years is the age-old quote, “I want to get my name out there!” But… “Where is there?”

‘There” has usually meant a mass market. That place that is saturated in marketing messages and ruled by the world’s biggest brands. It is known as outbound marketing. It is interruptive and expensive. Big Brands can afford to spend millions of dollars in advertising to reinforce their name. For most, (if not all) smaller local businesses though, this ‘scattergun’ approach of telling everyone “I’m here and this is what I do!”, it simply isn’t financially viable. Not only does mass marketing seldom bear fruit for smaller businesses it’s near on impossible to measure!

So what is the answer? How do you get your name out there…? And where should “there” be?

First, you need to understand and more importantly accept that marketing has changed! This is a result of potential customers (or leads) having so much information at their fingertips–and NO, I’m not talking about the Yellow Pages where you used to let your fingers do the walking–With a phone in our pockets and access to an abundance of information, the consumer is in total control.

And the smartest, most successful companies around the world understand this.

Inbound Marketing Simplified

Simply put, Inbound marketing is a business methodology that attracts customers by creating valuable content and experiences tailored to them. While outbound marketing interrupts your audience with content they don’t always want, inbound marketing forms connections they are looking for and solves problems they already have.

To win at marketing these days, successful businesses are adopting this Inbound Marketing methodology.

What is the Inbound Methodology?

The inbound strategy – or methodology is the method of growing your organization by building meaningful, lasting relationships with consumers, prospects, and customers. It’s about valuing and empowering these people to reach their goals at any stage in their journey with you.

Why? Because when your customers succeed, you succeed.

The inbound methodology can be applied in three ways:

  1. Attract. Drawing in the right people with valuable content and conversations that establish you as a trusted advisor with whom they want to engage.
  2. Engage. Presenting insights and solutions that align with their pain points and goals so they are more likely to buy from you.
  3. Delight. Providing help and support to empower your customers to find success with their purchase.

When customers find success and share that success with others, it attracts new prospects to your organization, creating a self-sustaining loop. This is how your business builds momentum, and this is why the inbound methodology serves as a strong foundation for your flywheel.

AED Flywheel

What Is the Flywheel?

The flywheel is a business model adopted by HubSpot to illustrate the momentum your business can gain by prioritising and delivering exceptional customer experience.

AED Flywheel Strangers

You can spin and build momentum in your flywheel by investing in strategies that acquire and retain customers — these work as forces for your flywheel. They keep it moving.

The opposite of this is friction. Anything that slows your flywheel is friction. Often the biggest sources of friction for your customers come in the handoffs between teams. This means alignment and communication between teams are key to keeping your flywheel spinning.

AED Flywheel Spinning

When your flywheel is based on the inbound methodology, your marketing, sales, and service functions can add force and eliminate friction throughout the attract, engage, and delight phases. All organizational functions are also responsible for removing friction from your flywheel.

For example, in the attract phase, marketing will likely play the biggest role by doing things like blogging, event marketing, and running paid ads. Meanwhile, your sales team can also add force by engaging in social selling. And your customer service team can add force by making it easier for current customers to make referrals.

Once you attain enough customers and engage and delight them, they can keep your flywheel spinning by promoting your organization and bringing new customers to you. Over time, your flywheel allows you to grow without continually investing in customer acquisition. Often, your customers will help by sending people your way by word of mouth!

Examples of Inbound Marketing

Now that we’ve talked about the philosophy of Inbound Marketing, it’s time to see some real-world examples. One of the most important aspects of inbound is making sure that you send the right message to the right person at the right time. A good way to do this is by segmenting your audience. First, you need to know who you audience actually is compared to who you think it is. Sometimes those two match up, but other times you might discover there’s a different group that’s attracted to your business. A target market workshop can help you nail down the right people for your specific company.

To reach the kind of people who are a good fit for your company, create messages tailored for them. Then send the message out to them. Digital platforms like Google Ads and Facebook Advertising have these features built-in. Digital platforms like these have fantastic measurement too. You can easily see how many people saw and engaged with your message. Those combined with a great website that informs and educates your buyer can attract, engage, and delight the right people for your business.

Adopting an Inbound Marketing approach

Adopting an Inbound Marketing approach is a long game. it involves really investing in delivering what your potential customers are wanting or needing. Then marketing to them based on which stage of the buyer’s journey they are on. Since Inbound Marketing is a philosophy, it can involve making some big changes. But these changes are worth it! Companies that adopt the inbound approach get better leads and repeat customers.

Many businesses find working with a marketing agency helps make the transition easier. But how do you choose the right one for you? Take a look at our article about how to choose the right Marketing Agency for your business to find out more.

How to Choose the Right Marketing Agency