[00:00:00] Welcome to the Phoenix Business Brief Podcast. I'm Brian Hyde, and today I'm joined by Jacob Allumbaugh. Jacob is, uh, I'm gonna put you out there on kind of the cutting edge of things, Jacob, in that, uh, you are a media specialist, but specifically regarding real estate media and, and there's a story behind why you do what you do. So let's start off first off, with tell us a little bit about yourself, about your background, and then let's dive into what you do as the owner of Salt Media. Thank you, Brian. Yes. So I work, uh, with primarily real estate agents, um, some architects, some builders as well. And, uh, I, I help them no matter what it is, whether it's photo, whether it's video. Um, some people really big on social content. Um, some people love drone. Um, but I help them really showcase whatever property that they're selling. Um, so I started off in Oregon. I was working with, um, a colleague up there. I worked up there for about two years and then came down to the Phoenix area as we expanded. Um, as we [00:01:00] expanded. Actually, I went off on my own venture, so now I own salt media myself. Um, and so the last little bit over a year has been expanding into the Phoenix market, learning what's different, um, in real estate between Oregon and here. Um, and really just, uh, trying to translate the experience that I have in other forms of media. Into real estate. People who do real estate media normally just do real estate media. Uh, they don't have other. Experience in either photography, videography, or something, something similar. And so trying to find new ways that we can, we can help agents out. Yeah. You know, um, when you talk about the, the, the difference between Oregon and Arizona. My first thoughts are, okay, climate, you know, rainforest versus desert and so forth, but talk to me a little bit about the real estate market. In, in each, I know that, uh, many states have seen a large exodus of people, and I think Oregon is, is one of those that, uh, moved out, especially during the, the COVID years. Um, on the other hand. States like [00:02:00] Arizona have seen a great influx of people. Um, talk to me a little bit about, uh, the real estate markets in, in those respective states and, and, uh, what in particular do you see in, in the, um, Phoenix real estate market that that keeps you there? Yeah. Something that was interesting in Oregon is actually we continually saw an influx of people still mostly from California. And what was interesting about that is that a lot of people were still getting their first touch points with real estate from the internet as everyone does. But there was homes that for a long time still a majority of the transaction will be done purely, virtually, um, because people are able to see it. You know, on a screen and, and that's their first touch point with it. Um, there, there is of course a big difference in climate. There's a big difference in homes too. If you look at it at the homes. I've, I've shot, you can easily tell when one is from Oregon or one is from Phoenix. Uh, just by the difference there. In Phoenix, it's, it's interesting. There's definitely a lot more homes. Uh, I worked primarily in Central Oregon, but also Eugene and Portland. [00:03:00] Um. And coming down in the, in, into the valley, you've got this massive stretch all the way from Mesa to Phoenix up into surprise, just this huge long stretch of just home after home. And so the days on market can definitely get higher. Um, that's the first thing that I realized is that homes would be sticking around for longer, even if it was a great listing. Um, but also just there is this, this fast-paced nature in, in Phoenix of let's get the home listed. Let's get it, get it out there. Uh, Oregon is a little bit more methodical with how they do it. The agents are a little bit slower with the listings, um, and, and slower, not necessarily due to lack of listings, but just there's a little, there's some methodology to how certain things go. It's just different, partially because they have the time. Um. Yeah. Let's talk a little bit about, uh, how media and real estate have kind of become inseparable. Um, it used to be, you know, right, you'd look for the, the for sale sign or the re uh, the real estate company sign out in front [00:04:00] of a place and, oh, well, we'll call the number. We'll set up an appointment to go make a tour. Now you can take a virtual tour a lot easier. Talk to me about some of the tools that you have at your disposal to help people better showcase the property that they're selling. Totally. The first thing that comes to mind, Brian, is uh. Zillow. The Zillow platform has a 3D tour, which is super popular because you can click through the home, like you said, it's a virtual tour. You can see what the home looks like. You can see a floor plan of the home. What's really interesting about that is because it's a Zillow product, it's increasing the views on that property, 60%. So for me, this is a big education of if it's a, if I'm talking to buyers or if I'm talking to agents. That should be something that's going on every property because it's instantly increasing views, instantly getting more eyes on it. The other thing that I'm a big proponent of is. The way I was trained, I was trained from someone who's really good in architecture photography and in architecture photography, use a very specific set of lenses that's not often, often used in real estate [00:05:00] photography, which makes that front cover photo look a lot more like a picture off of better homes and gardens than just a picture off of Zillow. We, we take off the wide angle lens. It's used on the inside of the house. Swap on this more tight lens. You gotta stand farther back and it, and it gives it more of this magazine finish that. I think when you're scrolling through homes on Zillow, you need to have some stopping power. You need to get them to look at something. So that really helps to highlight that curb appeal, that front yard that the buyer's been working on. You want them to see that. Right? Same thing with drone. Um, I think drone is a, a great way to see what's around the house. Excuse me. Um. You just wanna showcase the whatever is nearby. It's a park, it's a library, it's, it's a school use drone as your way to do that. That was actually one of the questions I wanted to ask you is how drones have, have changed the game, because it seems like you can get so many different angles that, that you can't, you know, just from a camera on the ground [00:06:00] even. Even if you're really creative, it seems like the drone just opens up a whole bunch of different possibilities. There's been a total influx of it. It's interesting you, you didn't see as many people doing drone. You didn't see as many drones in general. Sometimes I'll be flying and I'll recognize, Hey, there's someone flying a drone. Way over in the distance. I can't see it, but I, I see it on my map. Um, and it's interesting to see that influx, like you said, most properties now do have drone, and I think we've shifted from it being a new thing that people are, are surprised when they seek to kind of the standard you wanna see. You know, we, we put property outlines on the property so you know exactly where the property starts and ends. Um, you can see solar, you can see that pool in the backyard. You can see, you know, what the neighbors are doing next door. Sometimes um, you know, it shows you, oh, I actually don't have to worry about my neighbors because I got some distance in between us with that little alley out back. Stuff like that where, where drone just highlights it in a way that a normal camera can't. And, and let's talk about, uh, first impressions. I mean, we hear it in, in so many different areas of life, you know, from the shoes you're wearing to, the clothes you're wearing to how you carry [00:07:00] yourself. What about when it comes to real estate? How do first impressions figure in terms of what, what a potential buyer sees? Fantastic question. Uh, first impressions are everything, primarily because it's happening online. Now we are gone are the days for the most part of drive by, drive by a house, CA four sale sign. Buy it and you're done. Um, uh, that that does not happen. People are scrolling through hundreds, if not thousands of homes as they're on their search for that perfect home. Right? And so really what you have to do is in an age of, of scrolling for buying homes, which is something that we would've never thought of 10, 20 years ago. Um. You really have to cater to the attention span of the, of the person looking at homes. So for example, if you are ordering pho, um, the ordering photos, when you're listing the home, those first 10 photos better be the best 10 that have very specifically showing specific parts of the house, specific selling features. [00:08:00] That first cover photo, like we talked about, has to catch attention. It has to make them stop and go, Ooh, maybe this is something I wanna check out. You really have to. You have to be thinking about the person that's gonna be seeing it, not just thinking about the home, not just thinking about checking off that checkbox, but take another extra five, 10 minutes to slow down, figure out how to best present this home. What's special about it? What's gonna make someone, you know, choose that home over the one that's down the road? Um, that, that first, that first attention grounding thing, it's gonna stick with them for the rest of the time and it's happening online. Jacob, talk to me about, um, the, the, some of the common frustrations you hear from, from real estate agents when it comes to showcasing a property. And, and let's talk about how you, through salt media, help them to, uh, to up their, their presentation. It's a good question. Um. I think the biggest thing is standing out in [00:09:00] crowded markets. So we, we end up in neighborhoods where there are a handful of homes listed and maybe they look similar. Maybe they have similar selling features that it's, they've got similar amenities nearby. And I think the biggest thing is you need to have a reason why someone's looking at that home over the one down the road. That comes from the small things like when I walk through a home, I'm, I'm gonna make sure all the blinds are open. 'cause we want that natural light coming in. Even if it doesn't make sense to your eye in the photos, you're gonna notice it. Um, if we have couches, we're gonna try and toss some pillows on there just so that it kind of fills up the room and it's a little bit more visually appealing to look at when we go into, um, the primary bathroom. We wanna make sure that. The counters are clean and you can imagine you getting ready there in the morning. Same thing with the bedrooms. We want the beds made, um, the backyard. We wanna get toys outta the backyard and really just put the best foot forward for that property. I think the other thing that agents have been, um, having some frustration with is social media.[00:10:00] I think that more and more people are doing social media, which. Yet again, now creates you just doing it isn't enough. You have to have either some strategy or, or some intention behind that. And so something that I've really enjoyed doing with agents is, is doing a. Personalized approach to social media, whatever it is that, that they can do to stand out. Whether it's, you know, every time they go through, they run through the home and, and point to different things as they run through. And that really catches people's eyes. 'cause who's running through a home? Um, whatever they can do on social media, like with the listings to stand out because just doing it isn't enough anymore. You have to be, you have to have some intention and some strategy behind it. In fact, I'm, I'm very grateful that you mentioned social media because, um, when we say the word media, you know, depending on the generation, you know, for, for my parents' generation, why that's the TV and that's the radio or the newspaper, that's, that's what media is. But that definition seems to have changed quite a bit, particularly in the last couple of decades. That's [00:11:00] a great point. I was teaching a class down in Chandler to a brokerage, I think it was last week, and we were talking about how. Media, social media is just shifting to media. We've seen a change, um, in especially younger generations. Watching television shows is decreasing. Movies are decreasing, but everyone has a phone in their hand and come seven o'clock before people go to bed. Everyone's strong through it. They're not concerned about who they know, they're not concerned about seeing what their grandma made for dinner. That's where they go for entertainment. Um, that is requiring then. A little shift in perspective of, we're not talking about social media anymore. We're talking about media. Media. We need to be entertaining, and it creates fantastic opportunities that some people are totally capitalizing on and absolutely killing it. But if you don't make that change, if you don't have that realization, then you're kind of being left in the dust, which. Is how it goes when innovation happens. It sounds like, uh, then in a very real sense, you're opening up some new frontier, uh, [00:12:00] for, for real estate agents and, and you know, how they go about, uh, marketing the, the homes or properties that they're selling. Tell me a little bit about the story behind salt media. Yeah, so I was, it was earlier this year that I was working with the, the fellow that I was working up in Oregon, and it just made sense for us to part ways. He was up in Oregon, I was down in Arizona. There was a huge separation and so salt media. We are near the Salt River, which I love. Um, I also love cooking, so salt. And then I'm also a Christian, so salt of the earth. And so it just kind of fit together. Salt, everything. I like the short word. And uh, there's, there's a lot of, of meaning behind salt, especially in this area. And so it's been nice working for myself with my team to have a more agile change. Like you said, with social media changing, with even things as simple, we're helping some agents with websites. I've really noticed the. Value and agility, whatever that change needs to be, if we need to switch what we're doing. [00:13:00] Because algorithms change because there's a new thing on the block. There's this new trend that's really getting people a lot of views or impressions or leads. Um, that agility is really important. And that's been something that I've been learning as I've been, uh, uh, leading this team and, and helping agents, talking to agents, trying to figure out truly. The biggest thing for me is that taking photos of homes can be fun. There's some really expensive homes that are awesome to shoot. They take a long time. There's some less expensive homes that might not be as flashy, but I have a great time because I'm talking to the buyers as I'm going and they're explaining what's important about it. But truly at the bottom of it, um, the reason that I am, I'm building salt media and working with agents is because I just love helping people do what they're good at. And when I work with an agent. That is killing it with what they're doing, that they're obviously have deep care for the buyers or sellers. It is, it is truly a joy for me to be able to walk in and know that I'm going to take gorgeous photos, I'm gonna make them look great in whatever video we're doing. Um, and it's, [00:14:00] it's not taking the photos of the home that I'm, that I'm loving. It's, it's helping those agents do what they're really good at. You've got my curiosity going now. Um, I mean, look a, a parade home, you know, like for the parade of homes should be a pretty easy thing to sell and should be pretty easy to present, you know, um, visually through whatever form of media you're using. Um, you mentioned a few things earlier, like opening the blinds, putting some pillows on the couch, clearing the countertops and so forth. Are there any other, um. Strategies that, that people, we'll, I'll say with more modest homes, less showcase homes can do to, to bolster, uh, the, the curb appeal of, of their property. Totally. Whether we're, I am talking to an agent right now, or I'm talking to someone who is thinking about selling their home. The biggest thing is what makes that home special? I've said it before and I'll say it again. There, there is something with every single home. I don't care if it's a single porch outback that we put a rocking chair and a table on, we need something where a buyer says, oh, I could see [00:15:00] myself sitting in that rocking chair and just looking out over the sunset. I say this because I shot, like you said, a more modest home that was on a golf course. Um, it was, it was a few streets off of the golf course, so it wasn't right on the edge. It wasn't the fanciest home in the neighborhood, but it had this gorgeous covered porch. And not many other homes had a gorgeous covered porch. And so what we did is we staged that porch. If we hadn't staged it, you wouldn't really even notice it's a porch. Um, and, and really when you take, took the photo of it, that front cover photo, you could see that rocking chair. You're like, oh, I could sit there. And we had specific photos of that. So the first thing would be finding that special thing really make people feel at home. The other thing is just be clean. Just clean up as you can. Replace light bulbs. The biggest thing is light. Light, make lights, makes things look better, makes my job easier. So clean up, get those light bulbs put in. Um, remove clutter, remove things off counters. You wanna have less things on counters. You wanna have some staging stuff in the living rooms and, and stuff like that. But the biggest thing would [00:16:00] most often be just replacing those lights and, and removing clutter. Alright. One final question for you, Jacob, and that is, um, let's talk about, uh, how you help realtors, uh, build their personal brand and why personal brand is something that they need to be concerned with. Totally. The, the working definition that I go with, with branding is associating yourself with things that your, your target market perceives as good, or your target audience. And so when I'm talking to agents, I, I wanna balance what people they work with perceive as good and what they enjoy doing. So maybe you're the fancy car guy or maybe you're the, the, the woman that loves to go for a hike or whatever that is. But whether we're talking social media or interacting with people. I love to sit down with agents and really brainstorm what is that niche that you can conquer? Maybe you love going to wine bars or cigars are your thing. Tie that into real estate to both make it interesting and make people feel like they know you because they do, because you're creating things that both you and the [00:17:00] person values. You both love cars. Great. You are gonna talk for half the time about cars and then the other half about real estate as they're looking for a home with you. So whatever you can do, truly start building that brand. What I do is I'll sit down with you, I talk with them about it. I really try and work through a couple different checklists to, to get the cogs and the mind thinking, but truly the work is done by the agent who, uh, recognizes what they like doing and what that overlaps with, with their target audience. Again, we are talking with Jacob Allumbaugh. He's the owner of Salt Media. Jacob, where, where can people find your website? Website is salt media usa.com. Salt Media USA is Instagram as well. Those two places you can find me. Jacob, thank you for being our guest today on the Phoenix Business Brief Podcast.