High-quality images are needed by all types of business, most especially in the real estate industry. Photos are effective tools in selling, no matter what the product is. Whether you’re a realtor or a real estate photographer, ensuring that photos wow your potential clients is your number one priority.
This is why you need to invest in amazing photo editing. Aside from making sure that you get a professional photographer to take photos of the property, having a great team of photo editors will ensure that you have high-quality images. Photo retouching is serious and it can make or break your business.
Where to look for a trusted real estate photo editing company
There are already a lot of image editing solutions companies around the globe. There are a ton of options depending on the type of retouching that you need to be done. If you’re looking for a real estate photo editing company, use the following resources to hire one:
• Search online. Many photo editing companies are usually located in different countries. Although the headquarters and main offices are in the US, the services are outsourced to trained professionals abroad. Just search for real estate photo editing companies and the companies will pop up in your search. Look into their sites and check if they are credible enough to work with.
• Ask friends for recommendations. If you have friends who have recently worked with photo editing companies, you can ask them for recommendations. This is an easier way to get options from people that you trust. Make sure that they have positive feedback for these companies, as well.
If you have a few companies on your list, narrow down your choices to five or fewer companies. Make sure that you go for those that are professional and have been working in the industry. Having a few choices will ensure that you hire the best one.
Factors to consider in hiring a photo editing company
Once you’ve found a company, you have to scrutinize it in order to find a reliable one that produces high-quality images. It’s not enough to hire the first one that you happen to stumble upon.
Here are the factors that you need to consider before you hire a photo editing company to do the work for you.
• Experience. The company needs to have a good amount of experience in the real estate industry. Look into how many years they have been in business. Go for those that have been around for 10 years or more. This ensures that they have dealt with different images and properties. Those with a wide experience can provide you with professional editing and images.
• Technical knowledge and technological expertise. Verify if they use the newest technology and programs for the job. Usually, just having updated technical knowledge will improve the output of the team. Having the right software affects how efficient and effective the company is. They should be able to retouch the most challenging photos and produce the best images.
• Customer feedback. Make sure that you check the reviews left by their previous clients. This gives you the assurance that they always leave their customers feeling satisfied with the output and that they are professional with the work that they do. Check if they have negative feedback and unsatisfied customers. This is a red flag when it comes to outsourcing your retouching work.
• Portfolio. Ask for the company’s portfolio, especially for real estate images that they have worked on. Make sure that they can provide you with a recent portfolio of relevant images that work for your industry. Check if the quality of work that they do is at par with your brand. This will help you make your decision and check if you can get a consistent look in all your photos.
• Turnaround time. Different companies have a different turnaround time for the certain volume of photos. You need to specify the work you require and ask for their expected turnaround time. There will be times when the set time will increase depending if it’s peak season or not. It’s best to go for those who can be flexible and fast with their turnaround time as speed is essential to the business, especially when it comes to keeping up with the competition.
• Pricing. Some companies already specify their pricing depending on the services that they offer. There are those that charge an hourly rate while others go per image or per project. There will also be an additional charge for rush retouching. This is something that you have to tell the company, especially if you need the images right away.
• Support team. Having a local support team can make a great deal of difference if you’re encountering issues with the output. A communicative team will not leave any of your questions unanswered. You are able to discuss queries and openly discuss ideas.