Virtual Tour Services Near Me

Virtual Tour Services Near Me

What is a Virtual Tour?

Virtual tours are becoming even more popular given the restriction in movements these days. With the global pandemic happening, most of us are asked to stay at home as a precaution. These virtual tours have become an important medium for us to experience the outside world without actually stepping outside of our comfort zones.

But what exactly are virtual tours? Virtual tours are defined as a simulation of a location composed of a series of still photos or videos which are of high quality. It is becoming more sophisticated nowadays, and more multimedia elements are being added. For more interactive tours, music, voice-over, logos, sounds effects, text overlay, and even animation are added. This makes the experience more immersive and realistic. Virtual tours are made possible through photographs and videos taken by ground-based cameras and drones for aerial shots.

These kinds of tours allow us to experience and inspect a particular location or a product through our mobile device or desktops. There are several virtual tours one can choose from. Examples of virtual tours are video tours, panoramic tours, 360-degree tours, aerial tours, still images tours, floor plan tours and others. These virtual tours are proven to be helpful especially during this difficult time and have helped industries such as real estate, hospitality, academies, marketing, advertising, and tourism survive. Are you interested to read more about virtual tours? Check this link.

What are the pros and cons of virtual tours?

Pros

On the business side, virtual tours allow them to continue their operation despite the quarantine protocol in place. Real estate agents can still do their presentations and showcase the real estate properties without having to bring the client physically to the location. At Momentum Virtual Tours, highly immersive real estate virtual tours are offered. Hotel owners can show what is inside their hotel room for customers wanting a bit of staycation. Virtual tours are ideal for the food sectors too, showing customers the food preparation process before it gets delivered to their home address. Having virtual tours integrated into the business website also leads to a higher conversion rate. Customers become willing buyers if they are presented with a product that they can inspect from different angles compared to a single still image. Having photos with 360° drives more sales compared to the conventional type. In addition, providing this rich customer experience also brings a higher retention rate for your website. Virtual tours are fun and exciting experiences that allow your customers to stay longer on your website and navigate its pages.

For the academe or the education sector, virtual tours allow students to continue learning without and stay informed by integrating this technology. They are still able to visit museums and other historical and educational places. The marketing and advertising industry also benefits from virtual tours; brand awareness and brand recall become more interesting using these mediums integrated into websites and other social media platforms. Lastly, for travel and tour companies, through virtual tours, they can highlight the things their clients can experience, the places they can visit, and even the food they will be served. For areas that are also difficult to access or have limited access, virtual tours are ideal.

Some companies offer live guided tours within a 360° setting. This serves as a virtual meeting room where the client talks to the account manager or business representative while having the tour. This is considered a hybrid version of doing the standard video call setting. The great side in doing a guided live virtual tour is that the sales representative can readily answer their clients’ questions. Having this in place allows the client to have a better understanding of the space and what amenities to expect. This real-time interaction allows faster business transactions, closing deals, and better return of investments (ROI). Integrating a virtual tour service in your business also increases your presence online. Virtual tours could help your business improve its ranking in the Google search engine.

Presenting a product, service, or location allows the customers to have a better perspective on what to expect. This confidence could equate to client’s making a purchase or availing a particular service.

Of course, nothing compares to the personal experience of being physically present, but virtual tours are not a bad option given the threat to our health safety. It is even more cost-efficient than hiring a whole team of marketers and doing paid online advertisements. Opting to go with virtual tours could also save you time, money, energy, and having to deal with logistics issues.

Cons

It is already a given fact that virtual tours take away the physical interaction between people. But, for these kinds of tours to be successful, a solid and reliable internet connection is needed. This is important, especially when doing live guided tours. Not all virtual tour software works offline. When internet connection is poor, it would be difficult for the client to decipher what is being discussed; thus, closing a deal would become a challenge. Virtual tours also require a human resource with specialties in doing this kind of platform and the right software to do it. A seasoned professional with expertise in this field can deliver a great virtual tour experience for your clients. Finding this kind of person is the challenge.

To make the virtual tour a great success, it requires high-quality images or video files of high resolution. Remember that the idea behind these tours is to provide people with a realistic representation of a location. Poor quality photos defeat this purpose. If you are going to take a virtual tour, make sure that you are well-equipped with a suitable gadget. A smartphone, a camera, a video recorder, a tripod, a panoramic head, and a drone are some examples of essential tools one should use.

In addition, there is significant competition in this industry. New players are coming in with innovations to present. Current industry players must constantly work on improving the virtual tours experience being provided. Otherwise, clients will move to new industry players offering more services and innovations.

Types of Virtual Tours

Video Tours

Video tours are composed of a series of video clips stitched together, presenting a visual representation of the area.

Panoramic Tour or 360° tours

These are composed of a series of photos put together. Take out your smartphone and then choose the pano setting, press the record button and slowly move your body around. As you slowly spin yourself around, your phone is already taking a panoramic shot of the area where you are. The result is an image that provides one with a better sense of the location than what a still photo can cover. A panorama allows one to look at something from any direction, right to left and vice versa, and up or down.

Aerial panoramas

This kind of tour is a curation of aerial shots composed of high-resolution photos of videos. You will get to experience the location from a high altitude viewpoint. These tours are becoming more popular through the development of drones which are getting more sophisticated. If you are interested in getting a quote for some awesome aerial panorama, click here.

Still images tours

This tour is composed of a series of photographs that are put together to create a panoramic version of the location.

Virtual Tour Software

Making a virtual tour presentation for a website requires technical know-how and getting yourself acquainted with the right software. These are some softwares for virtual tours which you can choose from.

1. OpenSpace3D

This is a free and open-source platform. You can choose this software for creating mobile applications and mobile games with augmented reality or virtual tours in it. The features of this software include more than 160 functions that can be combined together. It is also equipped with an entire scene editor, allowing one to import files of more than 40 file formats. A range of 3D modeler exporters such as Blender and Maya are provided. Also, part of the software features are leap motion and visual programming.

Website: https://www.openspace3d.com/

2. Makevt

You can start with the free version to try this software. Makevt software can design custom-built virtual tours where their integration varies depending on the feature. The variants of integration are Start, Basic and Ultimate. Start features include an unlimited number of panoramas and tours. Basic and Ultimate have more features. Additional inclusion with Basic includes the tours working on both Android and iOS devices and hotspots editor being embedded. The Ultimate variant has two more additions as compared to Basic. You can customize the styles and icons with this variant and integrate a mobile SDK for easier uploading of panoramic shots. If you are also active on social media, you can easily integrate this with your online accounts. Whichever variant you choose, this software is designed for easy navigation of settings and the creation of virtual tours with ease and convenience.

Website: https://makevt.com/

3. Paneek

Use this virtual tool app in order to upload your images which will be converted into a 360° virtual tour. You may find this cheaper than paying a professional photographer and programmer to put things together. It’s also easy to share your 360° virtual tour content across your social media network. You can make your content as exciting and engaging as you want by simply adding more photos, sounds, texts, and other preferred elements. This software is excellent for real estate virtual tours. It also has no issues operating on both desktop or mobile devices. Try out their free version.

Website: https://www.paneek.net/#/home

4. Matterport 3D Showcase

Matterport provides an immersive 3D experience that captures almost natural properties and transforms them into digital models. With Matterports Cortex Al platform, faces of humans are blurred out automatically, space statistics and measurements are provided with accuracy, and 3D spaces are created from 360 panoramic images. You can make modifications with the tour as you wish and even add tags to your 3D model. You can publish your 3D model using either via social media or email. You could also embed this into your website. Some of the other highlights of Matterport 3D include schematic floor plans and 2D photography.

Website: https://matterport.com/

5. 3D Vista Virtual Tour Pro

Try out the open-source and free version. 3D Vista Virtual Tour makes a live guided virtual tour possible. This makes communication with students and teachers or clients and sales representatives much easier. If you are worried about your gear compatibility, this software works well with a number of DSLRs and 360° cameras, such as Insta 360 One x or Go Pro Fusion Max. You can download the 3D Vista app, where you can see the tours of other users. The app also makes it easy to keep your virtual tours in sync and up to date. This software allows online and offline visits. Also included in its highlighted features are aerial videos, underwater videos and images, and the classic 360° panoramas.

Website: https://www.3dvista.com/

There is plenty of softwares in the market. Read more about them here.

Features of a virtual tour software

There are several features when using virtual tour software that makes it convenient to use. You can use the drag and drop feature to make your edits of the virtual tour quickly. It also has file recovery features enabling you to save the draft. Just imagine the hassle of losing all your files and having to start again from scratch. You can also publish immediately. Once you are done with your final edits, hit the publish button and share your work publicly. You can also use the hotspot feature to make the tour more informative. You could also make use of the map feature. This way, it is easier to locate the list of businesses in your area. Whatever devices the viewer is using, the virtual tour software has an auto-response feature where it automatically adjusts depending on screen size.

Data is important. As a marketer, you would want to know how many people are visiting the virtual tour. You would want to know which real estate property gets the most visits for a real estate agent, right? This is where the viewer traffic statistics come in. With the feature, one can see the tour traffic and which locations this traffic is coming from. Therefore, it is easier to make adjustments depending on what these data are showing. Virtual tour software also offers various views to choose from, such as panoramic, 360-degree, or aerial.

If you have not tried using virtual tours, this is a great time to immerse yourself with this experience. Start here. It’s a great way of visiting places at the comfort of your homes.