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Realtor’s 60 Second Commercial Has Made Him The Talk of His Small Town
By Mike Bell
In my opinion, video is the most effective way for Realtors to market themselves, and rarely do I come across one that I’d consider a “homerun”. This one is an exception, though. It recently crossed my news feed, so I HAD to reach out to its creator, Scott Connors.
Watch it below. I also asked Scott to give a little backstory, which he provides below the video:
Scott’s commentary:
Well, THAT was fun!
For the last couple of years, I’ve been advertising in local movie theaters, running commercials before the movies begin. I was attracted to the venue because it’s a captive audience, they’re relaxed, and I think it makes a powerful impression to appear 8’ tall!
I’ve experimented with a couple of different video approaches. I’ve played the Always-On Agent, I was the Obvious Choice, and I was the Guardian Agent, protecting my client from all sorts of unforeseen dangers.
For our most recent spot we wanted to try something a little different. I’ve collaborated with Shooters Productions on each of the previous commercials, and they know my business (and my personality!) well. I also have complete confidence in their ability to deliver a terrific product. They originally approached me about doing a film noir-style commercial, and after some initial hesitation, we decided to go for it.
This was by far our most ambitious undertaking to date. We shot over 3 different days in 3 different locations. I was fortunate to have access to a vacant office building which was easily transformed into a 1940s setting. We were even able to find authentic props from the time period (notice the desk fan) around the building. For the scene inside the car, a friend generously lent his 1967 Thunderbird (not quite period correct, but close enough). All of that footage was shot in Shooters’ studio with backgrounds and effects added digitally later.
I felt the casting of the female lead could make or break the entire production. It was my wife who suggested I talk to Erin (who works for me part-time anyway), and I think she absolutely nails it. She has a background in theater and she grew up in New Jersey, so the accent wasn’t a problem.
As you can tell from the outtake reel, we had an absolute blast during shooting. We laughed constantly over the 3-day shoot. I was convinced that the scene in the car was going to look completely ridiculous. We must have done 20 takes before we finally got one that they could make look convincing.
Watch the outtakes below
I initially posted the video to my Facebook page and paid for a small boost. The response was absolutely overwhelming. I work in a small, fairly rural market, and I have around 560 followers. The video received dozens of shares, hundreds of comments and likes, and so far, has been viewed well over 8,000 times. For comparison, a typical post on my page will get around 300-400 views.
The response has been almost universally positive. It was a little terrifying to go out on a limb with something like this, and I really didn’t know how it would be received. Of course, there was a small amount of negativity (I guess it was inevitable):
At first it REALLY bothered me. I didn’t respond (and ohhh, how I wanted to!), and I was thrilled when the comment thread quickly turned back in my favor. This particular response summarized exactly what I hoped the reaction would be from potential clients:
I don’t know the commenters personally, but it was a huge relief when they joined the conversation. This is really what I was hoping to accomplish with this spot. I’m hoping that when potential clients are considering who they may list with, they’ll remember the guy with the creative, very high-quality commercial. Because isn’t that the guy you’d want to do the marketing for your house?
