Online Real Estate Technology

Men hold a dominant share in usage of many mobile technologies, according to a new study from comScore.

Men Make Up 6 in 10 US Smartphone Users
“How Women Are Shaping the Internet” indicates that in both the US and Europe, smartphone usage is dominated by men. In the US, there is a fairly consistent 60/40 split, but in Europe the skew toward male users is slightly more pronounced, hovering around 63% compared to 37%.

comScore analysis suggests that the greater likelihood of men to be early technology adopters may explain at least part of this gender imbalance. However, comScore also says that a propensity for men to be higher wage-earners, as well as a greater share of men who have at least part of their mobile phone bill paid by their employer, could also contribute to higher male usage of more expensive smartphones.

Mobile Net Services Skew Male
Mobile Internet services (browsing, apps, and email) skew 65-70% male. However, some activities, such as playing mobile games, making ringtones, and listening to music, skew more female.

Mobile social networking has fairly even gender usage, with women accounting for about 45% of mobile social networking activity. It is also the activity with the youngest participants, averaging 29 years old, compared to an average age of 32 for mobile games (which skews about 50% female). Unsurprisingly, more expensive activities tend to have users with an older average age, and are also more likely to skew male.

Mobile Internet Demographics Reflect Cost
The age difference between PC and mobile Internet users is indicative of the need for money when browsing on the mobile device (e.g., advanced device and data plans). Women’s adoption of mobile social networking, however, is a clear indicator that mobile Internet services are moving out of early adopter mode and into the mainstream.

Men Spend More Time Viewing Online Video
Although gender rates for viewing online video are similar, men spend more time watching, according to other results from “How Women Are Shaping the Internet.” The study indicates that in nine countries and Hong Kong, virtually the same percentage of online males and females watch online video. In every instance, roughly 80% of both online men and women watch online video.

While rates of watching online video are similar, and in some areas women actually watch at a slightly higher rate, in all 10 areas researched by comScore men spend much more time on average watching online video than women.

In the US, men watch more than 15 hours of online video per month, roughly triple the average time spent by women. Similarly wide discrepancies exist in the other three countries where online video consumption is the heaviest: Canada, Germany, and the UK.

Most of the attention in the online video space has focused on either media content and consumers or marketers and video advertisements. But companies continue to push further into this realm with non-advertising content.

Recent studies have shown that growing numbers of retailers are adding video capabilities to their sites. Surveys of Fortune 500 companies also indicate a broad-scale increase in the use of video for marketing purposes. In this sense, video has gone from a luxury to a near necessity for companies seeking an edge in marketing their products. From home-goods merchants to automobile manufacturers, companies across a wide spectrum are finding ways to use video in their marketing efforts, and consumers are embracing—sometimes demanding—these changes.

Retail is a sector where online video is becoming more important for driving sales. When asked by Multichannel Merchant to identify rich media features that they used, 46% of US multichannel retailers picked video, making it the highest-ranked category in the survey. Another 42.3% of respondents said they planned to add video capability in the next year.

Several studies point to increased use of video by US companies. According to Forrester Research, the percentage of the top 50 US online retailers that offer videos on their sites skyrocketed to 68% in 2009 from 18% in 2008.

Marketers are on board with more than just ecommerce applications, as well. A study led by the Society for New Communications Research noted 31% of Fortune 500 companies with public-facing blogs used video blogging in 2009, up from 21% in 2008.

Ad-ology asked US marketing executives whether they would increase, decrease or make no changes in their 2010 marketing budgets for social and traditional media. Nearly 27% said they would increase their online video budgets for viral clips and podcasts, while 5.5% would decrease their budgets. Out of the remainder, 41% would leave the budget intact and another 27% said they did not use video. These responses put video ahead of mobile marketing and search optimization as budget priorities for US marketing executives.

As eMarketer’s Tobi Elkin noted in the report “Consumer Packaged Goods Sector Taps into Online Video,” “Creating an online video presence helps marketers facilitate an ongoing dialogue with consumers, boost brand equity, lure prospective customers and solidify support among brand loyalists.”

On the receiving end of these marketing efforts, consumers are accessing increasing amounts of video on multiple platforms, from laptops and home PCs to smartphones and tablets. As these devices continue to penetrate the market, consumers will expect ubiquitous access to video content. Examples might include watching product videos at the point of sale or viewing a portion of a podcast on a PC and resuming the session on a tablet. Marketers are aware of the potential and are upping their game in a variety of sectors.

Athletic equipment company Nike dominated the top 10 viral videos selected by video-content distributor goviral for April 2010, landing three videos on the list.

Two of Nike’s videos were light and entertaining in tone. However, the number two video, “Earl and Tiger,” was much more somber. Recontexting old an audio recording of pro golfer Tiger Woods’ late father Earl Woods describing himself into a questioning of Tiger, the video asks Tiger what he was thinking and feeling, and if he has learned anything (presumably relating to his recent sex scandal). The video itself is a single black-and-white shot of a stone-faced Tiger Woods facing the camera, wearing Nike golf gear.

One public service announcement made the list for April, “Give Earth a Hand” from nonprofit environmental group Greenpeace. The video was released for last month’s Earth Day celebration and suggests that Greenpeace’s work requires participation from many people.

In a repeat of a trend seen in March 2010, many of April’s videos centered on athletes or some type of athletic activity. In addition to the three Nike videos, there was also a video from Coca-Cola highlighting the upcoming 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa, a Samsung video featuring possibly staged precision tricks with business cards, and a humorous Old Spice video centering on a heavily muscled man flexing his talking biceps and abdominals.

The top 10 picks for April, with links to view on YouTube:

1. Heineken – Men With Talent, agency: TBWA
2. Nike – Earl and Tiger, agency: Wieden & Kennedy
3. Old Spice – Flex, agency: n/a
4. Samsung – Master of Business Card Throwing, agency: The Viral Factory
5. Coca-Cola – Quest, agency: SANTO
6. Nike – The Secret Behind Nike Air, agency: n/a
7. Sony – Around the World in 80 Seconds, agency: Rapp
8. Nike – Music Shoe, agency: Wieden & Kennedy
9. Greenpeace – Give Earth a Hand, agency: n/a
10. Nestle – I Like Big Butterfingers, agency: n/a

About the Rankings: goviral issues a monthly top-10 list of viral video rankings on its site, including additional commentary about the videos, their approaches and why the firm thinks they are viral or likely to become viral in the future.

The lovable Evian Roller Babies, which broke the world record for the most viewed online advertisement in history last year, have made the leap from YouTube to your television.

Evian’s wildly successful viral campaign has surpassed 100 million views across all of its many versions. It was one of the first YouTube-exclusive campaigns by a major brand: there were no TV commercials for the viral videos.

Now according to Social Times, the campaign has already made its debut on Los Angeles TV stations, and will run in New York sometime this summer. They are also airing in other countries, including France and the UK.

The Evian Roller Babies showed advertisers that viral videos have tremendous reach. Hopefully we’ll see more advertisers take their ads to the YouTube masses first before pushing them out on the far more expensive TV airwaves.

Continuing a trend established in January and February 2010, the videos selected by video-content distributor goviral for March 2010 were universally light in tone.

For the first time this year, goviral did not select any public service announcement videos. Four of the 10 videos selected for March centered on some form of athletic performance or achievement. These include the number one video, which demonstrates a possibly staged trick performed on a BMW motorcycle, as well as a Pepsi video featuring famous soccer players, a Nike ad highlighting the connection between athletes (both famous and unknown), and an Adidas ad with numerous athletic and non-athletic celebrities.

Two videos featured humor mocking other brands. Sony Playstation directly ridicules the controllers used by rival Microsoft’s Xbox gaming system, and SpecSavers directly parodies the sexist ads from men’s body spray Axe that suggest men who use Axe will have beautiful women in bikinis purse them.

In a return to a trend seen in January 2010, most of last month’s videos were global in theme and featured little or no language. Globally famous celebrities and/or simple yet powerful imagery made these videos easily consumed by viewers anywhere in the world. Most of February 2010’s videos required knowledge of the English language and US or UK popular culture and humor to fully appreciate, which partially reflects the inclusion of several commercials aired during the February 2010 Super Bowl telecast.

The top 10 picks for February, with links to view on YouTube:

1. BMW S1000RR – Dinner Table, agency: n/a
2. Pedigree – Dogs, agency: TBWA
3. Pepsi Max – ‘Oh Africa,’ agency: n/a
4. Nike – The Human Chain, agency: Wieden & Kennedy
5. Adidas Originals – Street Corner, agency: Sid Lee
6. Tropicana – Arctic Sun, agency: BBDO
7. Sprite – Spark, agency: Bartle Bogle Hegarty
8. Sony Playstation – Move, agency: Deutsch
9. Specsavers – ‘The Specs Effect,’ agency: Specsavers Creative
10. Natural Gas Belgium – Soft Heat, agency: TBWA

About the Rankings: goviral issues a monthly top-10 list of viral video rankings on its site, including additional commentary about the videos, their approaches and why the firm thinks they are viral or likely to become viral in the future.

It had to happen at some stage and here it is, a song and video about Social Media, not quite as serious and informative as my previous post and video about  Social Media, but I thought this great video would bring a smile to your day.

So please enjoy!!

During my research I’ve come across a great video that I thought I would share with you, the video was compiled by Socialnomics09, and is called Social Media Revolution: Is Social Media a Fad?

For those real estate business owners that have yet to consider social media as a business strategy then hopefully this will provide some insights into the On Line world of the future. This video details some facts and figures that are hard to ignore.

I’ve been like a voice in the wilderness promoting the value of a social media within the real estate industry in Australia so hopefully this video will add some weight to my voice.

If you do decide to adopt a social media strategy for your office, make sure you get someone who knows what they are doing, read my post on Fake Social Media Experts before you get fooled to part with your hard earned dollars by these so called experts, or better still, give me a call.

Please enjoy

It’s been a little while since I last wrote about the worst property videos on the net, so given that they are very popular with you the readers of this blog, lets have a look at another little gem sitting on the web.

This one is not strictly a property video tour, this is actually a demo from a company offering to do a video of your house for sale. This one shows you how “good” a property video can be.

There’s no soundtrack, no voice over and the opening shot is of a car, so ladies and gentlemen, rollup, because this is how “not” to film a property video demo. 

Thought I’d continue to share with you some of these little gems that appear on Youtube, proudly displayed by the listing Real Estate Agent. This one is a right little doosy, the property was listed at $17.5 million US and the agency responsible for this one is Hilton Hyland Realty Brokerage.

One of the owners of this agency just happens to be Paris Hilton’s father. At a price tag of $17.5 million, you would have thought the agent could have at least organised a proper video rather than use a slide show. The background music shows a certain flare, although I’m not quite sure what they were trying to achieve, the video is cheap and the agent looks cheap, to me at least.

It really makes you wonder why they bothered.

Have you ever wondered how far we have come with technology? Do you think that today we can communicate faster than we did 100 years ago? well this little gem may get you thinking about how far we really have come. 

Please enjoy