Friday, June 13th, 2008
I read an article on www.adage.com a while ago by the editor in chief of www.searchengineland.com, Danny Sullivan. He described a revolutionary change in the way Google treats video clips in search results. He said, Google video ads will not only appear in YouTube clips and on pages that carry Google AdSense units, but also in Google’s sacred search results as well.
Since I read that article, Google Adsense Video Units have been rolled out in the USA, the UK, France, Italy, Spain, Australia, Netherlands, Poland, New Zealand and Japan.
I haven’t actually come across one yet but as Adwords advertisers start to pick up on the opportunities video ads bring, I’ll be interested to see what impact this has on the way they communicate their message. Like Mr Sullivan rightly pointed out, “…AdWords advertisers have had to shoehorn their messages into a 70-character limit. Well, if a picture’s worth a 1,000 words, moving-picture ads will let advertisers blow through the haiku-like restriction.”
So perhaps, any day now, we’re going to be swamped by enquiries from companies who want their products brought to life with animation and swooshy graphics specifically for use in Google Adsense Video Units. Or perhaps there’ll be a surge in companies buying digital video cameras and cheap video editing software. One thing that’s certain is that some will be shockingly bad and some will be brilliantly slick, and we’ll enjoy them all.
Tags: Adsense, Advertising, Digital Marketing, Google, June, Units, Video, youtube
Posted in Advertising, Digital Marketing, Miscellany | No Comments »
Tuesday, May 27th, 2008
You’re probably familiar with architectural visualisation. Most property marketing teams know that they can use their architect’s CAD drawings and a specialist 3D visualiser to make some nice marketing images. They also know that having still images or animations which show the property development complete and in its best light, before the builder has even lifted a brick, vastly increases their chances of selling off plan.
But now that architectural visualisation is used by most property marketing teams, how do you ensure yours is the one potential buyers are looking at and talking about?
In my experience, it takes a combination of animation, stills and web-based, interactive media to make a visualisation really stand out. Combining web-based, interactive visualisations with stills and animation is much more effective than stills or animation alone. The stills can be used in print campaigns to drive traffic to the developer’s website where users will find the interactive visualisations. We have found that users spend longer browsing websites with interactive visualisations and are more likely to follow a call to action.
Interactive visualisations enable potential buyers to immerse themselves the property; they can watch the development evolve over time while exploring the space and room layout options. This heightened level of engagement means potential buyers are more likely to make an enquiry.
The interactivity also helps you to communicate the property’s features. So if the development boasts the best, most energy-saving insulation on the market, let the potential buyer click the walls and see inside them. If all the wood used in the property comes from a sustainable resource, give the potential buyer that information while they enjoy a seamless interaction.
Using an interactive visualisation also means you get double the value from the 3D design process. Your 3D artist can render stills and animation from the model they produce for the interactive visualisation, so you get three types of media from one process and engage with your potential buyers on a whole new level.
When you go interactive, architectural visualisation transforms from luxury to necessity; from a tool which is nice to have, to an indispensable means of meeting sales targets.
Tags: 3d, animation, architect, Architectural Visualisation, CAD, interactive, marketing, May, property, stills, virtual, visualisation, web
Posted in 3D Design, Architectural Visualisation, Digital Marketing, Interactive 3D | No Comments »
