WGAN-TV Transcript: An MSP Journey: Ross R. Zanzucchi with 3D RoomScapes

WGAN Forum Founder & WGAN-TV Podcast Host 31.32K Website Atlanta, Georgia Linked In Facebook Twitter YouTube TikTok Instragram Matterport Service Partner Google Street View Trusted Photographer Zillow Certified Photographer We Get Around Network Member	31.32K DanSmigrod private msg quote post Address this user	plus 1 plus 1 plus 1 0
	WGAN-TV Matterport Customer Journey with Matterport Service Provider Ross Zanzucchi with 3D RoomScapes (Greater Chicago Area) ((Wednesday, 20 November 2019) Hi All, Here is the WGAN-TV Transcript (below) for an MSP Journey with Grayslake, IL-based Ross R. Zanzucchi @RZPhotoMan with 3D RoomScapes (North of Chicago and south of Milwaukee). Topics covered include: ✓ A snapshot of 3D RoomScapes today (20 November 2019) ✓ The two-year journey to today ✓ How Ross learned about Matterport and his decision process to buy it ✓ Pricing, bundle and rate card ✓ Which marketing strategy worked best for Ross ✓ Monthly recurring revenue (and how to make the competition irrelevant ✓ Services offered ✓ Gear used Happy Thanksgiving, Dan WGAN-TV Transcript: Grayslake, IL-based Ross R. Zanzucchi @RZPhotoMan with 3D RoomScapes - Hi all, I'm Dan Smigrod, Founder of the We Get Around Network Forum. Today is Wednesday, November 20, 2019. And you're watching WGAN-TV Live at 5. Our show today is a Matterport Customer Journey. And that Matterport Customer Journey is of Ross R. Zanzucchi. Ross, good to see you. - Hi, how ya doing, Dan? - Good to see you again. Ross is the Founder, Chief Photographer of 3D RoomScapes. That's 3D RoomScapes, R-O-O-M-S-C-A-P-E-S. And you can find him on 3DRoomScapes.com. And Ross, I know you're located in Grayslake, Illinois, but describe what your coverage area is. - My coverage area is, you know, roughly 40 to 50 miles from where I'm at right now, which covers everything north of Chicago and south of Milwaukee. So I'm kind of right in between Chicago and Milwaukee. - Okay, so kinda Chicago, Deerfield, Libertyville, Barrington, [Schaumburg}? - Schaumburg. - Schaumburg, South Wisconsin, okay. - We have good burgers in Schaumburg, though. - Okay, good, good to know, I'm going to come back and look for you for a hamburger. So today's show is about kind of your journey. I know you've been a Matterport Service Provider for about two years, but I'd rather begin at where you are today. And then, we'll talk about the journey to get here. Can you tell me about 3D RoomScapes today? - Today, I'm doing I'd say probably 50/50 real estate and commercial retail business and commercial spaces. And that's based on that Grayslake Village Map that we created that's really taking off. And so I do a lot of 3D virtual tours of local businesses in the community. And I think I did probably 160 homes last year, and the homes in our market area are in the $250,000 to $350,000 range, which is anywhere from 2,000 to 3,500 square feet, roughly. That's the average home in our market. There are multi-million dollar homes all over the place, but in my market area... my market is more the range of two to $350,000, in that price range, too. - Mm-hmm, and tell me about the services that 3D RoomScapes offers, obviously, Matterport, but in addition to Matterport. - Matterport. We do HDR photography, we do drone photography, drone videography. I don't do any Zillow walkthrough tours, 'cause I think they're pretty much garbage. Nobody really wants to pay to have it done the right way just for Zillow, in my opinion, in my market area anyway. I have REALTORS that use me for everything, but then, they go with their camera and do a Zillow walkthrough, just so they can be ranked higher on Zillow, but I don't even offer that, because it's too time consuming for what they're willing to pay. - Okay, so talk about the services that you do offer. I heard HDR photography, aerial drone, presumably, still photo and video by drone. - Right. - Matterport. - Yeah. - Other services? - Virtual Staging; do a lot of that. It just depends on the properties, some work better with it, some don't. What else do we do? - You're offering floor plans? - Oh yeah, well, floor plans are, we used to just give 'em, but now I don't anymore. I add it as an Add-On for most of the packages that I offer and include it one of 'em. Floor plan, personal staging, twilight photos. I mean, all those typical real estate services. - 'Kay, and how busy? ... Any given day how busy are you? - Well, right now, I'm in the Chicago area. It's a little slow right now, but during the summer, I was, you know, well, we did 160, 170 houses, I think. Over 200 scans, well over 200 for the summer with the businesses and everything. So we were doing it, I was doing, sometimes, two and three a day during the summer. I've done two this week, I'm going to do one more before Christmas and the holidays, it's usually pretty slow. At least that's what I'm told, this is my first busy, real busy, you know, I knew it was going to get slow now, but picks up in January, 'cause last year in January, I was real busy. That's how the market is right now. - Looking at your LinkedIn profile, I think something that I've known is that you've been a professional photographer for 23 years. - Longer than that, since... 1980. - 1980, I can't count that far. - Me too . - Just think that, yeah, it's been a long time that we don't talk about years anymore. - Okay, well, your LinkedIn page may need to be updated a little bit. Do you find that your clients. What services are they asking for? - Just, I mean, every home that I contracted for real estate is 99% Matterport and some drone photos, still photos. We do, maybe, 10% video, drone video, but the majority, you know, for the price range that we're charging doing Matterport, which includes all the interior photos and drone coverage aerial coverage for still photos. So we do that probably 90% to 95% of the time. That's what we do for the real estate properties. - I think I heard you say that that includes photos. - Right. - Photos, and are you shooting the photos with Matterport or with a DSLR? - For the package that I, for that package, those are all photos from the Matterport. - 'Okay, and you have a Matterport Pro2 3D Camera? - Pro2, right. - I imagine when you started, did you start with the Matterport Pro1 3D Camera? - No. - You started with the Matterport Pro2 3D camera? - Yeah, I only have one , that's the only one I've used since I started. - Okay, cool. - Hasn't broke down. - So do you offer photos taken with a DSLR, given your background? - Oh, yeah. - Is it just a different price? - It's an additional price if they want to do that, and quite frankly, all the customers that don't really know what I produce with the Matterport, they don't see a whole lot of difference. At least, it makes sense for them to have one person do the 3D tour and include the still photos with that, rather than having to pay me to do both. I mean, I've already scanned and photographed the whole house, and you know, unless this is Architectural Digest magazine, there's a different level of HDR photography. There's a guy who takes 20 pictures with five exposures of each one, kind of understands where the exposure's supposed to be and gets it right most of the time. It's pretty hard to screw up HDR photography, but still, if you don't know what you're doing, it's not that great anyway, and that's, a lot of guys really don't know how to use it, but when they do, I mean, they get beautiful pictures. As far as the difference between doing that and the Matterport and what I produce with the Matterport camera, my clients have not asked looking to also shoot the HDR, because we really think that makes a huge difference. Hasn't happened, haven't heard it. They look at it as a big savings. For what I'm charging, they would normally, just to get. There are photographers here that just do the 3D tours, and then the HDR, and they don't really offer the pictures from Matterport, but they charge for each service. Two, $300 for the Matterport, whatever their square footage or however they come up with their pricing. And then, they also charge for the still photos, which is another hundred, $125. Some REALTORS like that, but in reality, I think the package that I put together, I include that with all of my packages is the still photos from Matterport, and it seems to work. I know there's purists out there, real estate photographers that would say you have to shoot HDR, and you're right. In some instances, in the high-end models and stuff, but in the market I'm at that works perfectly. - Do you do just photos for some of your real estate clients, or truly, they all want the 3D tour, and they add the photos, and they add the floor plans and the video, or some version of a package? - Right, yeah, I mean, I don't get asked to do video a whole lot, because the 3D tours, you know, I create 'em, when I do the walkthrough tour that I give them , and if you go to my website, you'll see it, and I mean, I put 'em all to music. And it's a walkthrough, it's not a slideshow tour. And I take my time to make sure the camera's moving in the right direction and going in the proper locations and putting it to music, so it's almost like a video, a video file that's, you know, when they click play, it's on auto-start, it just goes, it's on a loop, and to them, that's as good a video as they would get, you know. - And how 'bout just photos, are there clients that just want photos from you? - Very seldom. - Very seldom, and do you shoot those with a DSLR or do you still use Matterport to do the stills? - Oh, I shoot that with DSLR. - The DSLR, now, on the photos, so this is interesting. So a professional photographer for many years. - But I was a portrait photographer, so I was not a real estate photographer. I just started real estate photography, you know, last couple of years, I really didn't-- - Yeah, do you offer headshots as an add-on or a freebie to get clients? - The clients that know me, I do, but I don't advertise it. Only because it's not something, you know, I don't have all, I mean, when I had a studio, I had a big studio, I had a lot of employees, it was a huge operation back then, you know, 10 years ago. But now, I mean, I've got a camera. I don't have any of my lighting equipment, any of the portrait stuff I do. Yeah, I could take people outside with a reflector and shoot 'em against a tree and stuff, but the kind of portrait photographer I was, I'm not into it, I'm into this now. - Yeah, no, I hear you, what you said kind of sparks a lot of questions for me, so just to follow up on the photos, when you deliver the photos, are they simply Matterport Snapshots, boom, uploaded to a Dropbox and delivered, or do you got some workflow before they get to the client? - I spend a lot of time preparing 'em, getting 'em, I run 'em through an HDR program that brings out a lot of detail and stuff, even though they're single images. No, I don't just, and I crop 'em on, make sure everything's lined right, I mean, I do it the right way. - So you have a post-production process in order to enhance the pictures, brighten 'em, clean 'em up. ... Are you editing out wires or odd pieces in the pictures? you know, at the price point I'm at, I'm not doing, unless it's really obnoxious. If I see it, and it bothers me, then I do it. Nothing that, you know, it's not a huge issue, then I won't. Like I said, these aren't million, multi-million dollar homes. - You mentioned you're delivering your tours with music, and maybe some other enhancement. I recall you did another show for WGAN-TV Live at 5. It was Workshop 3.0 Training, "Over-the-Shoulder" with Ross Zanzucchi, where we watched you, actually, edit a Matterport space, and as I recall, you used MP... MPEmbed ... as a way to add your music, and you deliver your tours, I want to say with WP3D Models for the property websites. - Right. I used to use, I don't want to say what it was, but I used to use one of the services that create individual websites, single listing websites. There's a bunch of 'em that, you have 'em on your, on WGAN on the Forum, and they're great. They do a great job, but the volume I'm doing, it didn't make sense, the cost, so the WP3D Models is a free Add-On, thanks to you. - I guess I should clarify, I didn't just gift you that. You're kind enough to be a WGAN Standard Member, comes with 40 plus membership benefits, including the free use of WP3D Models, the free use of MPEmbed Premium Basic and some other things that I think you're probably using, too. But once you have WP3D Models, you're not paying each time you use it in order to generate a property website. So you've got a fixed expense there. - Right, no it's a... For me to use it and create models everyday, I don't pay anything for that now. Before I was paying, what, a hundred something dollars a month just to make a few models, and then I'd have to pay more. So that took a big expense away, and the REALTORS, to be honest with you, most REALTORS, some of 'em use it, some of 'em don't even use 'em. They just use the MLS link, that's it. No matter what you give 'em, you know. They'll use the pictures and MLS link. They don't use the other ones for social media, whatever, which they should, and I try to educate 'em, but sometimes it goes in the ear . - Interesting, you'd think they'd want to use that branded property website to send to their client, to their client's friends, their colleagues, 'cause people will e-mail them about the property, but anyway, that's probably a story for another day. - Lot of 'em do, but some of 'em just don't get it . - Are there other tools that you're using on the back-end for Matterport. We talked about two of them, how about floor plans for example? ... How do you get your 2D schematic floor plans? - I use, I don't buy Matterport's floor plans. I use, what it is it, [Home3ds.com], I think it is. I'd have to look. I've jumped around from a couple different ones, but I think it's [Home3ds.com], are they the ones that do? I have no clue. - I don't know, so I'll tell you what, we'll make a-- - I will look right now. - Well, we'll put it in the notes in WGAN Forum. We're recording today's show, so when we post it in the We Get Around Network Forum, by tomorrow, Thursday, November 21, 2019, we'll put that note in the We Get Around Network Forum of what that other tool is that you're using. Why did you use a different service from Matterport 2D schematic floor plans? - One, their cheaper, and two, they're in color. ... - Okay. - Simple as that. - Got it, any other features on those floor plans that made you choose them instead? - They'll put your logo on it, you just send 'em your logo, your logo will be included on it, that's basically it. They don't look a whole lot different than Matterport. But Matterport doesn't offer color ones. - Got it, I think I heard three things: price, logo, and color. - Yeah, and they give you two sets, they give you black and white and a color set. Matterport, you only get black and white, but the quality's the same as the Matterport, they look pretty much the same. - I know you got your FAA Part 107 drone pilot license. Why did you end up getting that? - Because I was paying too much to hire drone pilots. I decided, you know, it'd be better if I just did it myself. I've always loved video, but I really never got into video. I used to love to fly radio control airplanes. I was very into that for like five years, a long time. I resisted for a while, because I just don't want to have to learn all this stuff again, I don't want to. The drones fly themselves, basically. Once I got the drone, made me more nervous thinking about, you know, am I going to crash, you know, am I going to, you know, here I'm going to blow two grand right off the bat . 'Cause I remember flying radio control planes. I spent a year and a half building one and two seconds later, it was done. Those thoughts are still in my head . - What are you flying today? - It's a Phantom, P4 Pro 2, one of the Phantoms. The new, well, not the new, because they don't even make them anymore, the Pro 2. - Okay, and is that what you started out flying? - Yeah, I got a couple of them, you know. And I've been considering getting a Mavic Pro, but, I don't know, these are working great. I get great stuff on them, so why, you know. I don't have any real need to get another one yet. - Cool, so when you started out with drone, you offered it as a service. I'm guessing your agents were asking for it, so you partnered with someone else that was already doing drone photography, and at some point, the amount of business that you were tossing away to somebody else, you decided to bring it in house. - Yeah, I just decided why not. - Talk to me about your Matterport gear. You have a Matterport Pro2 3D Camera. Which tripod are you using? - It is. Here I'll show you, Manfrotto... 290 Xtra. I don't know if you can see it. - Yeah, we can see that, that's a Manfrotto 290. - Manfrotto. - And you're using, I'm going to guess you're using an aluminum three-section tripod. Yeah, simple little, been using it-- - Ah, you got something unusual on top. Talk to us about what you're using to connect you're Matterport camera to that tripod. - I use this-- - Can you hold it up, let's take a good look at it with the camera here. - Hard seeing where your camera out there is. - Yeah, that's good. - This is a Neewer leveling tripod head, I don't know if you can see it. - N-E-E-W-E-R, Neewer. - And when you mount the camera on it, you can, you want me to mount a camera on it, I can show you. - No, it's okay, but tell us. I notice that it looks like it's moving up and down, so what is it that you got there and why? - Okay, so this is, let me get the-- - Take that off, 'cause that's a separate piece. - This is a separate piece. And this is even comes off. - Show us that top piece, though, that you just took off. - Let me just show you. So this goes on the tripod, and it's a leveling head. When you mount the camera-- - I'm having trouble seeing it, can you put it just towards, and then, yeah, hold it still for a sec. Okay, then, yes, nice hand modeling. Good, it's got a little bubble level. And so why are you using that? - Well, because when I first started, I'd just mount the camera right onto the tripod flat. So if I ever had to level it, I'd level the legs up and down, I mean, that's how the guy from Matterport taught me. I had training from a actual Matterport employee who, I think I knew more than him the day I first looked at the Matterport Camera, but anyway . He's the one that said, "Yeah, you just level the leg. "You know, just put a level on there," and that seemed to take forever, you know. And then, I saw this on Amazon or somewhere. It's a little, it's just a leveling head. So you don't have to level the leg. You just loosen this lever, and then the camera's sitting on there, so now, you can just level the camera with the bubble here. So you're looking down, you're leveling the camera, and then you just lock it in, and you don't have to worry about the legs. The legs stay the same all the time. So you just move house. Some of the new or some of the old houses, you gotta level the camera every time, but it's always just a little bit of a tilt with the head. - Yeah, I moved to something similar for the same reason, 'cause I went through my first tripod pretty fast of leveling the Matterport camera by adjusting the legs of the tripod, which eventually, the action on the, I don't know what you call it, the clamps on the bottom of the tripod gave out, and said, well, there's gotta be a better solution. And yes, found something similar to what you're using, and I think I'd probably recommend you have. And then, I think there was another piece there. - Well, because this, on this particular model-- - Ah, okay, that's a consumer-grade mount that you had. You needed to up it to the professional-grade to get to the-- - Quarter inch, instead I go up to three eighths. Let me take this off for a second, and I can show you. - Okay. - Or maybe I can't. Anyway, this is the plate that the camera mounts on. - Move, yep, yep, yep. - Okay, the camera slips in there. It's a Swiss Arca, what's it called? Three eighths, quarter inch adapter and level. Not sure, you know, I-- - We'll put it in the show notes in the We Get Around Network Forum. For those watching on our YouTube channel, go to WGANForum.com, and we'll publish this show that we're recording by tomorrow, and then, we'll put all these little parts listed so you know what Ross is using there. So you needed something to connect the - Yeah, it's three parts. - That big thing to this other thing, because there was a difference in, you went from a consumer-grade to a professional-grade mount, okay. - That's what this aluminum plate is. It screws onto, I don't know if I can even point this in the right direction. - Yeah, that'll work, we get it. You gotta get from a consumer-grade to a professional-grade, and there's actually this crazy little, thin adapter that fits in between. And then, now, you have a quick-release, so you can put the Matterport camera. And while you're in the field, you can easily adjust the height of the Matterport camera, if it's tilted, by just kinda rocking, there you go, by rocking it this way or the other way. I think that's really cool, and I think, as a Matterport Customer Journey, I think this is really helpful for anyone that's thinking about getting started with Matterport or who's just getting started with Matterport, 'cause the temptation is to say, "Oh, I buy the camera, "I buy a tripod, and I attach the "camera to the tripod, and I'm done. "Or maybe I get a quick release plate, and I'm done." - You know what, I think most people who, if they do that, very quickly they'll learn, yeah, that's a better way . - Yeah. ... I mean, we always talk about in the We Get Around Network Forum it's all about helping Service Providers succeed faster, and I think this is an excellent example of, you know, in the long run, you're going to save on having to replace your tripods, and you're experience in the field will be a lot easier and faster with just that one thing, because otherwise, you're going to be adjusting your tripod legs frequently. Okay, cool, how do you carry your camera to a job site? Are you in a hard case, a soft case? - Got a, let me show ya. This is a, don't know if you can. The NANUK 930. - Okay. - I'll just. - Got some foam inside, yep, fits perfectly. - Just got my iPad and a bunch of-- - iPad. - You know, doorstops. - Do you have a strap that you wear with your iPad? What do you got? - There used to be something to hold onto, but I never used it, so-- - You don't use that, okay, but you use the straps, and I presume that's so it's hanging from you so that you can just move the tripod with two hands. - Right. - Okay. - Makes it much easier. - Much easier, and you have, you mentioned doorstops. What else do you take with you? - I got a toolkit in my car I keep with me with all kinds of little stuff that I... You know, I carry an extra tripod head. And I carry the tools to be able to switch it out if I have to. Tools for the drone, I've got a whole kit of tools for the drone if I need to switch things or whatever. - You carry light bulbs with you? - No, because I used to, but I never had the right bulb. - And either if I did, it was yellow and their lights were white. Or if I had one, they needed two. What I do now is I, usually, if I see they're different colors or there's missing bulbs, and they don't have any in the house, most people have extra bulbs, but if they don't, then I'll switch bulbs from one room to the next and, hopefully, get it to work that way. But I haven't had much trouble with that. I used to carry bulbs, it never worked, so I said, you know, this is crazy, what am I carrying all these bulbs around for ? - Do you find that the residential, that the real estate agents have the space staged when you arrive, or are you there helping moving furniture? To what extent are you involved before you start shooting? - It all depends, you know, 80% of the time, it's already kinda pre-staged. I'd work with on REALTOR that I do a lot of houses for. They actually have a stager go out and help work with the people, you know. I don't know how much she does. She just maybe goes there for an hour or so and helps, gives them ideas, tells them what to buy. It gives them a plan, and then they go out and do a pretty good job. When I get there, I usually go through the house with the owner, and we start wherever the low, I always start with the lowest level of the house. We're gonna start in the, if they've got a finished basement, we'll go down there and make sure everything looks right, all the lights are on, no clutter. You know, some houses are wrecks, and some places you just shake your head, and you're wondering what are they doing. And they think this looks good, you know, and they say, "Well, that's okay, just leave that there." And I say, "You don't understand." And she said, "Well, just don't take a picture of that corner," and I said, "You don't understand." And then, I go through the, you know, gonna see everything . And sometimes, you know, I've had to come back couple times, because they didn't get, you know. And they want it done right, I mean, I'm polite about it, we talk about it, and I said, "Here's what's going to happen if we do it like this." You know, and I'd give 'em a sad look , and they finally get it, and they say, "Okay, well, can we reschedule?" and I say, "That'd be a good idea." So if it's not, and if it's in a local area, I don't, yeah, I'll come back. I mean, if I going to drive an hour and a half to get there, I'll help 'em clean up, let's get going. Let's figure out what we can do here. Sometimes, it's just way too much that they, but generally, it's a small amount. I mean, generally, I just go through, we turn on lights, close toilet seats, get rid of trashcans, hide personal stuff that they don't want to see, just make sure everything looks nice. I tell people when they, if I talk to anybody before I go to the home, I tell them, you know, because I'm a portrait photographer by trade, "If you were going to have your "portrait taken, what would you do?" And they'd say, "Well, we'd all get dressed up." "Okay, well, your house is getting a portrait, "so go fix it up," simple as that. You know, sometimes, you just gotta talk common sense and they get it. - Cool, I noticed that your pricing is on your website, 3DRoomScapes.com. Some photographers have the pricing on their website, some don't; what was your thinking about putting your pricing on your website? - Because I don't want to have to think about what it is all the time, and people calling, I'm on the car, "What do you?" "Well, I don't know, go to my website." Sometimes, you know, I got five or six different packages. That's what I have, if you don't like any of those, let me know, we'll put something together for ya. But I want 'em to know upfront what I charge. Look at my work, I think I'm way too low for what I do, but it's based on the market here. - How did you decide on your pricing? - The market, just, you know, first year. I think when I added, when I started just doing. People called me up and said, "Well, can we just get, "you know, can we just get a Matterport?" And I said, "Well, do you have any photographs yet?" She said, "Well, we've got a photographer coming," and I said, "Well, why would you do that?" I said, "I can do both of them for you?" So they, that's, and then, I said. Since I started flying the drone, and I added, I said, "I'll also come in, I'll take five "or 10 drone shots of the property." Doesn't take anything to do it. Putting up a drone and taking five or 10 shots takes 10 minutes, you know? What an Add-On for them, and when I started doing that, I just included it with the packages. I started getting a lot of calls. You know, and that's when I got busy. - Did any of the clients say, "No, I want to keep my still photographer. "I'll do the Matterport with you, I'll do the drone "with you, but I still like my still photographer?" - I have one client that, yeah, does that. - Yeah, so it's-- - I do about 15 houses a year for her. But she does a bunch with a still photographer. Those are her HDR photographs. - Yeah, and it is kind of interesting that, you know, that it didn't take much to undo whatever relationship those agents had with photographers as soon as you said, "I do both," and your pricing is very reasonable. - In many cases, it's less than what they're paying the still photographer just for 15 or 20 still photographs. It doesn't make sense for them to go that way. - You mentioned the pricing based on the market, well, how did you figure that out initially? - Well, when you're not busy, and you're not making any money, you start looking around, what is everybody else doing, talking to REALTORS and what their price point comfort was. I mean, I talked to a lot of REALTORS. So I put my price point where I thought would, you know, where I could make some money. And it's fortunate because I'm not in a, I work out of my home, I don't have an expensive studio or business location to go to, so I can keep my prices fairly low. I'm basically retired, doing this as a hobby that got into more of a, now, it's not a hobby anymore, but . So when I started pricing, I wasn't really considering making a ton of money, I just wanted to keep busy, because I was bored, you know. So now, I'm thinking, well, maybe I should raise my prices, but the market level seems to be right where it's at, so that's where I'm at. I'm sure I'm going to talk about, in one of my... referral groups that I belong to, like a BNI, but it's not BNI, one of the people there is a business coach, business ActionCOACH, they're a company, and they're one of the members of our group, and she keeps wanting me to come in and sit down and talk to her. I said, "'Because I'm working my rear end off, "and I should be making more money, I think." "I am busy, though, I like being busy," and she said, "Well, we can talk, and I can turn you all around." I'm sure she could turn me around by saying, "Here, change this, make, you do this, raise this price," but I know my clients, too. If I start doing all those changes, they like what I do, you know? - How abbout charging more for new clients? - How do I separate that ? You know, then, I going to have another price list. It'll work out, I'm happy with where I'm at. I think in a different area I could be charging twice what I do, and probably be just as busy, but I'd be in a whole different part of the country, and I'm not ready to do that yet. - Got it, so I was gonna ask you about business development. You've sorta kind of led with one, which is a referral network, can you talk more about that? - It's a local group in Grayslake of just, I think there's 10 of us right now in the group. We just get together, and we just refer amongst ourselves, and we put on events once a month. We did our first one about a month ago. It was just a fun event, we had a company come in and do a... escape room, and they did it, and they came to us. We didn't have to go to one of their locations, which was 20 miles away, but they came into the, we built, set up a, in one of the REALTORS's offices that's in the group, and they built this escape room. And we invited everybody in the group, invited four of our friends, close friends, and that was the whole purpose of it, so all of us could meet friends of all the other people in a fun environment, and just-- - Very cool, so this is more than saying, "Hey, here's three people I'm doing business with. "Tell 'em that Ross sent you." You actually did an entertainment experience, and everybody could bring their friends, and then all of a sudden, everybody's meeting everybody. - Right, and we're on teams together and competing. I don't know if you've ever done these, but they're kind of fun. - Did you make it out? - We didn't win, no, we did not make it out. - Did you escape, are you still there? Are you calling from the escape room? - We did not have a good team . But we were drinking, too, so that is an excuse. You know, we had alcohol there, and it was a fun night. - Okay, well, you're not going to be inviting the members of your referral to be watching the recording of this show. Or at least, your team, maybe the winning team, they'll get a chuckle out of it. What else are you doing today in terms of business development? - Well, we're still, you know, one thing that's really got us, well, we talked about that, and I think we, you know, once before about the Grayslake Village Center Project that we've put together for the Village of Grayslake. - Yeah, in fact, you mentioned this at the beginning of the show. What I would encourage our audience to do is go to grayslakevillagecenter.com. G-R-A-Y-S-L-A-K-E villagecenter.com, and Ross, we'll spend a little bit of time on this, but you actually did an entire WGAN-TV show on this topic, "How to Make Your Competition Irrelevant". Why don't we do top-line, talking about your Grayslake Village Center Project, what you do for them? - It's kind of a long story, but basically, I created a 360 panoramic... image of the downtown Grayslake area, downtown Grayslake business district, which is where I live. And I presented it to the village board. I went in, before I did that, before I went in and presented to the village board, I went in and scanned-- - Tell us about where it is today. Everybody can watch the episode about how you got there, but what's it look like today? You have an aerial 360, and you have links to Matterport, 3D tours, photo, video, how many different businesses you got, what's going on? - I think we have 75 different businesses, the different entities on the map right now, and we've got about five more with contracts that we're working on right now that we may not get to do until the spring, because they want outdoor pictures and stuff and other properties. It's really looking great right now here. That all happened this year, basically. - And that's recurring revenue for you. You charge a annual or monthly? - We charge a fee for scanning the property, and what we do is we go into the businesses, I do a 3D scan of their business, we take still photos from the scan, I do some aerial shots of some of 'em if they have a business that warrants it, and some exterior photos. And then, I actually do some, whatever, kind of, might do a little picture of the owner or an intro video or something, a real quick one. And we create a WP3D Model, paid for 'em, and then we link them to the map, the 3D virtual tour map. So when you click on their link that they're paying for, you see all the 3D tour and everything else. And the way they pay is they pay us to do the 3D tour, and then a monthly fee to be on the map, and it's either a one year or two year deal with them. There's different price structures based on when we did it, if it was a sale or whatever. So we go in, and that's how we do it. - Is this a significant amount of 3D RoomScapes's business today? - I would say it almost seems like 50/50, but when you think about it, it's probably more like, it was more like probably 30% of what we did this summer was retail businesses. - And growing with recurring revenue. - And it's growing, we've already been requested. The area I live in, there's a county, a big, Lake County, which is the county that I live in, and then there's I don't know how many different communities. 50 or so different communities, maybe 30 different communities in Lake County, and there's one main Chamber of Commerce for the Lake County Chamber of Commerce. And then, each little community has their own little chamber of commerce. Lake County Chamber of Commerce heard about what we were doing and saw what Grayslake was doing with the marketing of their village, and they have been recommending us to other communities that have been talking about changing the way they're doing their marketing or looking for new marketing ideas. We've been contacted by two of 'em right now. One, we've already made a proposal to. We're just waiting for the board to approve it, which I'm pretty sure that's going to happen. And the other one is, we're waiting to do a couple of businesses in the community. They've got some really new, unique businesses, a salt house, and are into the mayor and all the other people are involved in these projects so they want us to scan them, and then we're gonna put a ... simple project together for that community, also. - You mentioned, "We're," who else? - Me and I have, my son works with me right now. - Son works with you, too, great. I know we could talk for an hour on just this topic alone, so I'd rather refer our viewers to say, hey, Ross did do a show, "How to Make Your Competition Irrelevant", that and Workshop 3.0 Training in Matterport, Matterport Workshop 3.0 Training. Both those shows are part of the WGAN-TV Training U , so if you go to the We Get Around Network Forum, WGANForum.com, look for the tab at the top, it says, "Training U," and you can find those shows. - I just want to say something, too, about those training videos, how long ago did I do those, maybe two months ago, three months ago? - Yeah, I think the summer of 2009, yeah. - '18, yeah, it wasn't, too long ago, but I look back at those, and I'm already doing stuff totally different. I mean, you learn so much, that's what I would say to everybody, just don't get locked in to doing something the same way over and over again. The more I keep working with things, I keep finding different things that you do, different ways to do things, and speeding up my workflow. So I mean, I could redo that actually . Not all of it, but I see a bunch of stuff in there that I already don't do anymore, because-- - I know that we had, I think, seven Matterport pros like you do a over-the-shoulder video doing Matterport Workshop 3.0, and what I found interesting is everyone's workflow was totally different, and that was interesting. Ross is a pro, he's got a way to do stuff, so somehow I would expect everybody's workflow to be the same, and it's not, that's interesting. And then, I think the other things is we did a whole theme week, Matterport Workshop 3.0 with the Matterport Content Marketing Manager Amir Frank. For five days in a row, more than an hour each day, he went over every feature and benefit of Workshop 3.0. So if you, literally, watch all those shows, then you can figure out your own workflow, and go, "Oh, I didn't know that you could do that. "Oh, I didn't know you could do that." - To me, it's kind of like Photoshop. Photoshop can do a million things. You can do a million things with Matterport, too, but how many things can you actually use that are going to work for you and your clients. So figure the things out that really make your clients excited about what you do, and focus on how to make those work the best, same thing with Photoshop. I'd focus on what I need for what I'm doing, and I'm great at that, but if you asked me to do something that you saw on Photoshop that was really cool, I'd probably say, "Yeah, it is cool, how do you do that?" - Cool, so before we move on to the topic of Grayslake Village Center, again, G-R-A-Y-S-L-A-K-E, Village Center, C-E-N-T-E-R, dot com, every one should absolutely go to that page, click on the panoramic image in the middle, and you'll go, "Oh, my gosh, this is amazing." I just want to give Ross props for what he's created, because he really has put together something that's bulletproof, how to make your competition irrelevant, because if you want to be on that Grayslake map, that aerial panorama, that's Ross's business, that's his business. I think in this case, your competition, if you had any, is actually your allies, because they're helping create content, whether that's photo, video, aerial, Matterport, drone, whatever. But if they want to be on the map, that client has to pay a recurring fee to you, and again, props to you for figuring that out. And now, it looks like you've got some other franchises that you're about to start, and they're kind of, they're coming to you to do that, so that's really awesome. What I wanted to do, Ross, is kind of go back to the beginning of the journey for you to say, okay, before you got Matterport, were you a full-time portrait photographer running your business or were you retired at that point? - I had been a full-time portrait photographer. Working out of my home, I lived up in a different area of, I didn't live in Grayslake where I'm at now, I lived in a different community, but we had a big house and a big piece of property and a three and a half-car garage. And I converted the garage into a studio. This is after I closed my original studio that I had for 30 years in Grayslake. I closed that and opened up a studio, retired, opened up the studio in my house and did that for eight or nine years. And my father was living with me at the time. This is kinda why this happened. I was taking care of my father, he was 93-years-old, and he lived with us, so I was his caregiver for the last six years, and he passed away about two years ago. And when he passed away, it was, we decided we just didn't really need this house, it was just too big. We didn't really need it, I wasn't in the portrait business, I wasn't that busy anymore, 'cause it was all high school seniors, and they are all professional photographers now with their iPhones. I'll get into that some other time. We talked to a REALTOR, and she came to our house, and showed me a Matterport example, I'd never seen that before, of a 3D tour, and I asked her, "What is that?" And she said, this was just a couple years ago . And I still hadn't seen this before. And she told me, so I said, "Well, that's kind of cool." when she left, I went and started doing some research, and I found out that Matterport had an office in Chicago, so the next day I called up, and I made an appointment to go down there the following day, which was two days later and met with them and bought the camera there. And that's when I started, because I just figured, well, that looks pretty cool, I want to try that, because I mean, I was kind of a retired photographer. That looks like something interesting, let me try it. So that's how it started. - Tell me about your diligent research that you did on this space prior to making that purchase decision. - I didn't do any diligent research , no. What was it $4,000 two years ago, how much are they charging for the Pro2, whatever it was. I mean, it was a a four or $5,000 investment with the tripod and iPad, and it was a big investment, but it wasn't the end of the world. You know, I said, I can pay for that. In my mind at the time, here's the first thing I'll tell anybody thinking of getting into this, if you think all the REALTORS out there are clamoring for this, first of all, if you know a 100 REALTORS, only 10 of them are REALTORS that are going to do anything for you, okay? I had a lot of friends who were REALTORS. I didn't realize that they were REALTORS in name only. When you start talking to them, "Yeah, when a friend wants to sell something, "or when a cousin wants to sell something, they call me, "and I can handle it for them, and I got a license." That's the way a lot of REALTORS think. I found out the hard way. Because like in general, why, everybody this is so cool, why aren't you calling me, you know? Like I thought, and I started understanding about the real estate business a little bit more and that, really, only about 10% of the REALTORS are active and are the ones that you want to work with, because they're going to keep you busy if you can sell 'em. When I started focusing on that, that's when things started changing for me. And the lady that showed me the Matterport the first time, she worked for an office, a RE/MAX office, and I said, "Well, who does that for ya?" And she said, "Well, it's my boss, "they have their own camera," and I said, "Well, what do they charge?" She said, "They charge a lot." They said they charge like a half a percent of commission or some point." She says, "It ends up costing like eight or $900 every time I use one of these, and they make us use them." He now uses me, and not only that, not only that. She thinks because her boss, who started doing them, is sick and tired of doing them. They're busy, she doesn't like doing them anymore. When she saw mine, the music and everything else, she said, "Well, how much does he charge?" And so I told her what we do, and I said, "Let me talk to her, we'll figure something out." She wants me to do all of her stuff from now on; may happen. The lady that got me started, and she said that's why she was able to use me, because her boss finally said, "You can use whoever you want, because I really, "you know, I'm getting tired of doing this, "so if you want to find somebody else to do it, go ahead." So she found me, or she knew about me, Because she's been a friend anyway from before, but she couldn't use me, because she was forced to use her boss. So now, I've done a couple houses for her. Just recently, this just happened recently. So I'm waiting to hear from her now, see if her boss wants to throw some business my way. - Let's go back, she makes a presentation to you to list your house for sale. Oh, by the way, what did she say when she showed you the Matterport 3D tour? How is that going to be involved in the sale of your house? - Well, she said, we're going to come out and do a 3D tour, and we're going to take pictures. That was her presentation, you know, this is what we're going to do to market your home. She showed me a sample of a 3D tour that her boss had done, the pictures that they use. The typical sales presentation from a REALTOR. - Did you talk to another REALTOR? - We didn't end up selling the house yet, so it didn't go on the market quite yet. So we waited six months or so before we actually decided to put it on the market, and by then, I started doing these things already. And I almost felt , I felt guilty that, Because I didn't use her, we used somebody else. I felt bad, because she had shown me this stuff, and now, I was doing it, and she couldn't use me. I think she was afraid to talk to me, but now, we talk a lot now, I mean, I'm doing work for her again. It was a funny situation back then, though. - All right, so on day zero, when you get that presentation, on day two, you now own a Matterport camera. How'd you begin developing business? It sounded like, let me first say this, it sounded like what you were expecting was, as soon as you bought that camera, there would be an armored car loaded with cash showing up at your front door of your house saying, "Please, come shoot "3D tours of our listings for sale; we want this." Did that happen? - No, that didn't happen. And there weren't too many people doing it around here, and there still aren't that many people. - Right, so help me understand how you went from, "I'm starting a new business." This wasn't an Add-On for you as a photographer. You were a portrait photographer, and for that matter, exiting that business. So you're starting a new business totally around this Matterport solution when you began. ... In the summer of 2019, you shot maybe 200 Matterport tours, I'm guessing you've done 300 plus tours in the last two years. How'd you get from zero to 300 plus in two years? - The first house I did, the first sample was my father-in-law's condo in downtown Chicago. He's a writer, and he lives in this beautiful condo in downtown Chicago, which happened to be right across the street from the Matterport sales office. So that's how they came and helped me with my first scan. Sent the salesman up, and it was across the street. The guy didn't know anything, and that first scan is still front and center on my website, so when you click on it, I'm going to change that, I've been talking about that for the last six months, but anyway. - 3DRoomScapes.com, three, letter D, RoomScapes, R-O-O-M-S-C-A-P-E-S dot com, 3D RoomScapes. Your first scan is to do your father-in-law's condo. - Right, and that's on the, I still have it on the, you know, click on the first thing that's on my webpage, and you'll see it. And it's not bad, but I don't do anything like that anymore, so I got to change that, but that was the first one. And then, I talked to a, I figured, okay, I got all my friends that are REALTORS, so they're going to all hire me right away. And I talked to 'em, and they said, "Well, we don't really "do that, we don't really use that, because we use," there's a company around here, what is it called, VHT Studios, that does, they offer all the realtors, "You get your first 10 pictures free. "Come in and we take the first 10 pictures free, "and then, you can buy additional good pictures." So they're in all the real estate offices, and the realtors that really don't do anything, which are 90% of 'em, use them for their free 10 pictures, and then sometimes, they spend another little bit of money to get a few more pictures. But at the time, and then, they just started doing Matterport, too, but they were, that was my competition, so the realtors that I knew said, "We have some, let you know some friends." I said, "I'll do 'em for free." I did like 10 of 'em or 15 for free for my friends' realtor friends, none of my friends had any houses for sale or had anything in the pipeline that I could even do, but they did give me some referrals and I talked to people, and that's how I kinda got started doing, I think I did about 10 of 'em for free in the very beginning. And then, it just started, getting a website, and getting a good website is critical. I started, I went to Fiverr and paid $400 to have somebody create a website, and I looked at it, and it was a piece of garbage. I'm part of your forum at the time. I don't know who recommended him, I got a hold of Glenn from, maybe it was you, probably was, and put me in touch with Glenn with Nail Soup Media, he was a member of the Forum, and guy's a genius. I mean, that's all I can say, I mean, he took me from nothing to front page of the search engines where I wanted to be, and that was huge, so I would recommend spending the money to get a good website made. If you think you can do it Fiverr or you can do it on your own and you can do it with WordPress, yeah, you can, but if you don't understand SEO, I'm telling ya, I had no clue, I had no clue. Honestly, I still don't, I let Glenn worry about it, but he's enlightened me about a lotta stuff, and I think that's a huge-- - Glenn Tremain with Nail Soup Media, nailsoupmedia.com. - Right, but anyway, so website, very important. And then, networking, extremely important. The majority of my business came from networking, joining the Chamber of Commerce, I used to be the president of the Chamber of Commerce in my county in '85, '86, for two years. It was in '85, '86, so I knew the community. I hadn't been involved in the chamber in the last 10 or 12 years, 15 years. When I joined again, when I started this in Grayslake, I saw a lot of the old faces, but a lot of new people that I'd never .... The number of clients that I met just at two or three Chamber meetings, really got me started in this whole thing, and that's where the majority of the business came. And then, when I started with the Village Center Project, that really got my phone ringing, too, because people started seeing it, especially this summer, because it was everywhere, you know? The village posts a lot of stuff on their website, lot of the scans, I get a lotta hits, I get a lotta calls. I got a call from a lady in Dallas last week who saw, she lived in Grayslake, her family still lives here, but she lives in Dallas. And she called me, and said, "I loved what I saw, "all the pictures," she says, "Do you ever travel?" I said, "Well, yeah, I can, I did a job in Tennessee "not too long ago, but I don't generally travel." She says, "Well, I have two houses I want you to do. "One is a house I live in, and then a townhouse." And I said, "Well, give me the information, let me look." So I wanted to research a little bit, and what it was involved in, and we talked for a while, but she never really told me much about the property. I look it up on the Internet, ... and the house is a 8,000 square foot, four million dollar home, and the townhouse is a 3,000 square foot, $800,000 townhouse two miles away, it's right in Plano, Texas. But it was, you know, I said, it's going to take, I'm going to have to book two days out there minimum, because she wants twilight photos, she wants everything done. I said, "You know, for me to come down there, "it's going to be $1,500 a day at least, "and you pay all the expenses." And quite frankly, you should be able to find somebody in Plano, Texas in that community that can do what I do, but she was, she wanted, it didn't make sense to go down there. And when I gave her a price, I said, "To me, that's ridiculous," and she said, "Yeah, that's more than I want to spend," even though she's probably, I don't know, must have some money if she's living, she's widowed so, but anyway. She said, "I may rethink it in the spring "if don't get any, if I don't like what "I'm getting that's out here," so we'll see. - How 'bout the 10 scans that you did for free. Did that turn into any business for you? - Other than if people saw it on my website, I don't think any of the REALTORS, I did it for like five different REALTORS, I don't think any of 'em, I don't recall if I'm doing any business with any of 'em right now. I don't think I am, I think they just got their free stuff and, you know, just . So it's not, when people see it, it's not like, "Oh, great, that's so amazing. "I gotta hire you for everything." That's not the way it works , but once you can get a reputation, the more people see what you're doing, and if you do things a little differently than everybody else, I mean, quite frankly, I see a lot of Matterport scans that are just, all they do is they go in, they set the camera four feet apart or six feet apart, and they just walk around and scan and make sure all the black spots are covered. That's not necessarily got the camera tilted quite right, and they don't necessarily make even a walkthrough. They just put it on, they give it to the REALTORS, and the REALTOR throws it up on MLS, and the pictures are, you now, the scan is crooked there, they didn't create anything, and I think it gives 3D Matterport tours a bad name when I see that, 'cause I go to so much effort to make 'em look exciting. You know, with the music, with everything. It's a different level, I think, and too many of the REALTORS are seeing the bad scans. I think it hurts what we're trying to do. So all I could say is do great jobs, and it picks everybody up, I think we'll all get busier. - So I think what I'm hearing is a good website, good SEO, get out on the pavement, go meet people. In your case, you had at least two organizations, one was the local chamber of commerce, the other was a local leads group getting together. - The referral group came from me sitting down and talking with people at the chamber of commerce. We got together and said lets start our own little referral group, and that's how that started, and those are some of my biggest clients. - All roads lead to the chamber of commerce. Did you do any, a breakfast, bring in the donuts and coffee for realtors? - No, never. - Any other kinda promotion that you might have tried, done? - No, I mean, I don't offer any big . My son travels around and goes to different real estate offices, drops off brochures. We have a $50 off coupon for a first try, give us a try, see how you like it for $50 off any of our packages. We get hits on that a lot. And some of those turn into good customers. That's what I do, and social media is big. I mean, if you're not, everything I do, I post on Facebook, I tag people with it, I tag realtors, I tag their office. With Twitter and Instagram are the three that I basically use, three social media platforms that I use. So every home goes on there, and then Google My Business, I post a lot of stuff on there, do that and if people are looking for ya, they're gonna find ya. - So today, you have clients that keep coming back to you, so you're not hustling as hard as you were on day one that you bought the camera. - No, not so much, calls, I'm getting more, I used to have to beg for calls. Now, I'm getting, you know, calls come. - Cool. ... - On Monday morning and I look at my schedule, and I've got, or Sunday afternoon, and I'm looking, I've got nothing booked for the next week. Monday morning I'll, by the end of the day Monday, I have the week scheduled with two to three houses a day. It's crazy the way one minute you're not busy, the next minute, it's like the phone doesn't stop ringing, it's a crazy business. - Cool, so a couple questions before we kinda wrap it up. The REALTORS that you did free scans for, they never turned into business. The clients that you have today, do they keep you a secret, because they don't want to tell other agents and compete, or are you getting referrals from your clients. - I think I'm getting referrals, because they're posting my stuff on their Facebook, they're giving me credit for it. So they're promoting me, so they're not keeping me a secret. And a couple of the REALTORS, I have two or three of 'em that I do testimonials with, and they'll do testimonials for me in front of the house. When we're done, I'll say, "Mind saying "a few things in front of the camera?" And I'll have the drones flying behind 'em, and they'll say something like, "Here's Ross with the drone "and the Matterport," and they'll give me a testimonial. They use it for themselves, and they put it on their Facebook, you gotta do stuff like that. That's the stuff that goes viral, and not huge viral, but I mean, that starts getting passed around, and you get noticed. - For those who're just thinking about getting Matterport, why don't we say photographers, and they're real estate photographers, what would you suggest to them? They're thinking about getting Matterport. ... Do they get Matterport? Do they not get Matterport, do they, you know? You made a decision in, a split-second decision, and within two days, you had a camera before you even thought what your business plan was gonna be. - Right, it was stupid, business I've been in business for 35 years, I didn't need to build a business plan. I wasn't really thinking long-term, because I'm already 60 something years old. So I was just thinking, listen, I'm gonna have some fun. I'll be happy, and I'll keep busy, and I'll make a little bit of money, and that's all I was thinking. Most people that would get into this, I would hope you would be a little more thorough and do a little more research and put a good business plan together. But you gotta do research, don't assume. Remember this, only 10% of the realtors out there do anything, they do the work for the other 90%. In some markets, it's maybe 20% of 'em, but don't think that all realtors out there are just anxious to, you know. And half of the ones that are actually working, are still using their cellphone to take the pictures. So you still gotta beat that down . So it's not as big a market as you think. And then, you got competition probably, you know, depending on where you're at. You gotta be aggressive, you just gotta keep meeting people and put your stuff out there. And if you don't have your best stuff out there, you know. Look at what other Matterport Service Providers are doing in your area, and make sure you're at least compatible with them, or competitive with them. If you can't do what they're doing or better, you're gonna struggle. - I did one tip based on you, 'cause somehow, some way, you found the forum real fast, the We Get Around Network Forum. And you were posting questions, you had questions, you know, you were posting your questions and crowdsourcing answers as you were getting started, and I thought that was a really good thing. - And this is a great forum, because I'm telling ya, Matterport, to me, I've never got an answer from Matterport. I just had a huge job, not a huge job, turned into a huge problem was what I had. I had a three-story townhouse in Chicago that had the most unusual stair situation I've ever seen in a house. They had stairs that went from the second floor to the, or the first floor to the second floor that went into the bedroom on the second floor in the ceiling. It cut into it, it was really strange. I did all three floors, everything looked perfect. When I got I back from Matterport, the top two floors connected and were one floor, and you couldn't get out, you couldn't go to, if you click one spot, you'd be in one kitchen, you click another one, you'd be in another kitchen. I didn't even bother calling Matterport. I just called the client, and I said, "Listen, I'm going to have to redo this, "because I'm sure there's some answer to this, "but I've never seen a stair situation like that." And I had ended up going back, and I did not make the connection with that stair the second time. We had to go through a back staircase to make the connection, because the main stair, the way it was configured, I tried it again, it just kept locking the two floors together. Those kinda answers, you can find answers for those kind of things faster on the Forum than you can through Matterport. Matterport, if you call Matterport, you're lucky if you're going to get a answer in three or four days. This one I had to do, I didn't even ask this question on the forum, because I knew the only answer for me was go back and redo it, but if I didn't know that, I woulda asked the question to the forum, probably the answer I woulda got would be don't bother with Matterport. Yeah, if you've got time, they can probably look at it in a week or two, you'll get some answer, or maybe they'll fix it for you, but in reality, you gotta just go out and redo it or ask questions on the forum, because the people on the forum are gonna get you answer much quicker than Matterport ever will. - So if you're watching on our YouTube channel or elsewhere, 'cause we're, actually, syndicated in many different places, either WeGetAroundNetworkForum.com, no hyphens, WeGetAroundNetworkForum.com or wganforum.com. Excuse me, Ross, 'ey, before we go, anything else that you wanna share or talk about. - I can't think of anything, you know, it's a fun business. It got a lot more fun when I started flying the drone, 'cause I look forward to flying the drone a lot. That made it more fun than just doing Matterport. - Maybe it won't be too long that you'll have the drone and the scanning combined into one and just pressing the button, and the drone flies through the house doing the scanning for you. And you're going to charge double for that, because you're, ... you'll be so busy. - Be nice. - Ross, thanks for being on the show today. - Thanks, Dan, thanks for having me. - Thank you, we've been visiting with Ross R. Zanzucchi. Ross is the founder and chief photographer for 3D RoomScapes, based in Grayslake, Illinois, though, covers the greater Chicago land area, north of Chicago all the way up to South Wisconsin. He's been a Matterport Service Provider for two plus years, obviously, he's been very successful doing this. I think, probably his DNA going back to being a photographer for many years has contributed a lot to his success and his tenacity to go make things happen. So we're just really appreciative to Russ, I think, Ross, excuse me, for being able to explain his Matterport Customer Journey so that those who're just starting out or thinking about getting started with Matterport can just see what a real person has experienced, both in terms of success and that process for getting there. So Ross, thanks again, I'm Dan Smigrod, founder of the We Get Around Network Forum, and you've been watching WGAN-TV Live at 5.
	5 years ago	Post 1 • IP flag post

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	Hi Ross, Excuse me, I wanted to ask you something to see if you can help me. I have read the transcript of the interview and I have a question. It's been a while since I learned about the https://threesixty.tours/ platform and it seemed like a great service. What I have not yet managed to solve, is how to obtain a 360º panorama over urban areas. In my country it is totally forbidden to use drones over inhabited areas. I know the Google Earth panoramic technique, but from what I have read, they cannot be used for commercial purposes. I've seen your work https://grayslakevillagecenter.com/ and I think it's great. I have seen that at the zenith of the panorama there is a Google earth logo with some information. I have been searching the internet to see if I found anything related to the zenith information and I had no luck. Could you tell me, if they are your providers of satellite panoramic images? Do you know how to get a provider of these types of scenarios? I hope you can help me and wish you much happiness.
	5 years ago	Post 2 • IP flag post

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	Thanks @Dan for the information. At the moment my search is to be able to find a provider that can generate satellite-based scenarios for commercial use. Since I want to present an initial format similar to the https://grayslakevillagecenter.com/example-2/ project to different local governments and merchant associations. I hope to find the way. Cheers,
	5 years ago	Post 4 • IP flag post

WGAN-TV Transcript: An MSP Journey: Ross R. Zanzucchi with 3D RoomScapes10548