Facebook Announces Camera First Strategy: Why Real Estate Professionals Need to Listen

Every year, Facebook hosts an annual conference for its developer community called “F8” and they live stream all of the latest developer updates. While augmented reality and messenger bots may not sound like a real estate professional’s first choice of tools for marketing, they may become more important than you think!

Here’s an overview of the major announcements launching soon:

1. Facebook will become “camera first” and augmented reality focused:

This means if you’re not already using video to communicate on the platform and specifically Live video, you’re going to miss out on all the extra reach. Facebook is rewarding video and live video by serving those posts to more people which basically means you’re getting a lot more visibility for free.

Facebook wants people to use the camera to communicate.

Not only will Facebook focus on video and the camera, their main push is augmented reality features like selfie masks and virtual objects overlaid onto photos. AR features will have spatial recognition built in which means you will be able to interact with virtual objects.

Think of all the applications for virtual house hunting!

2. Facebook Messenger 2.0 

The Messenger app is Facebook’s answer to helping businesses and consumers connect. It’s not just a “virtual living room” for anyone you want to talk with, it’s not also a legitimate advertising and eCommerce platform.

There are over 65 million businesses already using Facebook Messenger and approximately 100,000 bots already activated within the platform.

According to a Digital Marketer podcast, Messenger bots will not be spammy, they will maximize a more personalized service experience for the consumer. Messenger “conversations” must be initiated by the consumer which means they are in control.

New releases include ChatBot capabilities that include automated smart answering behaviors that will alleviate businesses answering the same questions manually 24/7.

In short, it’s important for real estate professionals to incorporate Facebook live video and visually compelling content like videos and GIFs to gain more visibility. Considering how to leverage the messaging capabilities within Messenger to communicate with clients or capture new leads is also a very real option up for consideration!

These new releases are only two of the many new features coming soon to an app near you! For the full low down, click here.