Why 3 out of 10 Cabinet Manufacturers Have Chosen 3D Rendering Instead of Photography

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The rapid growth of online purchasing is bringing innovations to the techniques and methods of marketing. Various cabinet manufacturers including famous brands now prefer 3D rendering over product photography for good reasons. The photorealistic feature of rendering is making it popular. You scroll down your favorite online cabinet store or turn pages of a popular cabinet brand’s catalog, the visualization you see has a very high chance of being a rendered image.

Discussing the basis on which 3D rendering is taking over product photography, there are legitimate reasons that make it preferable to cabinet manufacturers.

Time-Saving

Rendering is time-saving as compared to photography. First, you need to hire a team of photographers that will set up a studio for the shoot. All items should be arranged and geared up with the required details. Then it takes time in photography to deliver your desired images, while in rendering you can get images on an urgent basis. It does not even matter if the item is manufactured or not. But make sure to select an experienced professional team with reliable services.

Less Effort

Photography demands more effort as compared to rendering. For example, to get a perfect image of kitchen cabinets through photography, the item must be ready, fully polished and cleaned. Then you need to spend more time in staging to set a proper background and add more details to the matching theme.

3D Rendering requires less effort. There are two ways you can get a rendered visualization. The team will collaborate with the designer or you provide prototypes to them. In return, you will get super realistic visualization.

Less Cost

With photography, you pay a certain base cost every time you need a photographer. And Other than the money your photographer will charge you for his services, your team needs to spend time in staging and time with the photographer, a cost that needs to be factored in. In 3D visualization, all these expenses can be avoided.

Flexibility

Visualization is more flexible than photography. A needed change or correction could be done in rendering anytime. From color and light to background anything can be changed. But in photography, when the photo shoot is over, it is difficult to make changes. You will need to rearrange a photoshoot once again if the results of the previous one disappointed you.

Multiple variations of the same items can also be created with visualization. Details like sizes, colors and shapes are easy to change. Using 3D rendering allows you to create a high variety of images, to show any and all combinations of cabinets, door styles and backgrounds without the need for staging. Online customers respond well to a rich gallery of images. And you don’t need to organize multiple photoshoots for every new cabinet you design. You can also market test new concepts before actually building the product.

Quality

You get the desired quality image through 3D visualization. Customization makes it easy to get a perfect image with realistic features. Using 3D you can control composition and lighting, so all images will come out perfect the first time! There is not a single chance of false lightning, faded shades and wrong angles. Everything is under your control. Measurements, size and shape are accurate.

Ease of composition

Photography emphasizes the physical existence of the furniture item. Visualization can be done using scratch. There is no need for an item to be present physically for visualization.

Outcome:

So, the main fact here is that 3D does have its superiority over photography. 3D rendering will save you time and money, will eliminate the hassle with staging and provide you with a high variety of quality images to market your cabinets, will help you make more sales, reduce your risk of returns, and get people to remember your products for a much longer time. 3D rendering is taking its place and growing day by day.

Addo Visualization is the only North American dedicated provider of 3D solutions for KBI. Get in touch with us at office@addo-visualization.com and request a free consultation.

KBI Market Shift: Three Steps To Help Build Your Brand With Millennials

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We live in an innovative world connected through multimedia and smart devices, so kitchen cabinet manufacturers need to shift their marketing efforts to reach today’s audience. They need to adapt to the changing dynamic of how consumers research and purchase products.

KBI companies that once focused on reaching the baby-boom generation must now target millennials. According to the Pew Research Center, millennials — who our company defines as those ages 20-36, exceeding 75 million people — have surpassed baby boomers (ages 53-71) as the nation’s largest living generation.

To that end, millennials form the largest addressable market for brands to target. For many companies, connecting with millennials is a challenge: They must promote their brand in a way that enables it to stand out from the crowd. In short, brands need to understand millennial buying behaviors and adapt to how they both consume and share information. This is critically important in order to build relationships with consumers and make a lasting impact.

To help reshape your marketing efforts to be more millennial-focused, here are three components that are driving results.

  1. Know Your Numbers

Know your audience analytically. Start with a strategy to determine what your brand is and who you’d like to target. Like any other marketing effort, branding is only as effective as your audience insights. A deep understanding of your target audience is essential when developing a strategy on how to best engage them. Figure out what they think, feel and resonate with and what you want them to think, feel and believe about your brand.

In addition, it’s important to understand trends. Utilizing big data and analytics will make sure your message reaches your target audience. Every social profile online can be mined for rich data. In particular, identify influencers that align with your message and prepare lists of audience demographic data, including age, sex, race/ethnicity, nationality and reach, engagement and amplification. Leveraging exhaustive data and analytics provides brands with the information needed to make the right outreach decision in a micro-targeted, hyperlocal way.

  1. Get Visually Social

“The social channels most popular with millennials are visual. They are the first generation to grow up with smartphones, which means web-connected cameras and video in their hands at all times.” If your customers love to post, share pictures and stream video, it makes sense to invest in visually impactful assets to promote your brand.

Millennials consume content in a different way than past generations, and information resonates with them more thoroughly via images and video since it is easier than skimming text. 

As digital marketing evolves, visuals elevate in stature as a millennial targeting tool. In fact, visual communication has grown as corporate social media accounts and individual websites are highlighting images and video more often. With the rise of visuals, brands have tools to quantify the results and validate the direct impact it has on sales.

3D rendering is the best alternative for KBI manufacturers to create visuals. There are many convincing reasons why 3D rendering is superior to kitchen cabinet photography: time spent on the creation of marketing visuals, considerable lower costs, flexibility, and ability to make design changes on the fly.

  1. Engage And Empower

Today’s consumers like to participate and have input. They prefer to feel as though they are part of the process and are quick to provide opinions on new products. 

A robust online presence is critically important in promoting today’s brands. Having an online platform with a static website and sparse social channels can do more harm than good. Strategic marketing campaigns elevate a brand, generate a high level of awareness and encourage engagement through active social channels.

Active social channels leverage big data and analytics to provide more reach, deeper engagement and exponential amplification of a brand’s message. In addition, unique hashtags empower participation and positive sentiment. Social channels integrated with visuals and grown organically enable a brand to shape its narrative and interact directly with consumers. All of this allows for brands to see the power of engagement in real-time to drive results.

In the past, organizations have been successful in growing brands via print and other traditional means. However, with millennials making up a large addressable market, companies must resonate with the ways these customers consume and engage. A strong focus on expanding awareness within targeted demographics, along with visual content can help companies build their brand amongst millennial consumers. Driving engagement within target market segments, influencers, bloggers, traditional media and empowering consumers to be a part of your story, will help amplify your company’s message and elevate your brand.

So, make sure that all your cabinet images, videos, illustrations, e-books, and other visual content are the highest quality they can be. A custom-made, high-quality piece of visual content can be all you need to make the sale!

 

References 

Article initially published on Forbes

 

KBI Visual Marketing – Trends to Look for in 2020

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Marketing Trends for 2020 show that Kitchen and Bath customers will do even more of their research, evaluation and vendor selection online.

The huge variety and accessibility of visual content has made today’s consumers more visually oriented than ever. They already judge your brand based on its visual footprint! One study, for instance, found that 94% of participants considered the quality of a website’s visuals when choosing to place their trust in an online brand.

But that’s not the only role visual content is playing. Research shows most consumers want to interact with brands in a visual way. According to Demand Gen Report’s “2015 Content Preferences Survey,” which polled 177 buyers, 91% said they preferred more interactive and visual content. This has translated to the rise of visual search, which is poised to be one of the most transformative trends in marketing in the next years.

What further developments can we expect to see in the future?

The self-directed buyer – Look Before You Buy

Nearly three in four U.S. web users say they regularly or always search for visuals before they make a purchase, according to a report by eMarketer. Furthermore, in 2016, Moz worked with Jumpshot to research search behavior and reported that nearly 27% of all searches were for images. Websites with fresh visual content created specifically for their brand will attract customers attention.

If your company isn’t providing the kind of visual content consumers crave, you may be missing out on sales. Make sure to post plenty of product photos with metadata optimized for your target keywords. Videos or motion graphics related to your products can also be a big help, given that video is estimated to account for more than 80% of all web traffic by 2022.

So, make sure that all your cabinet images, videos, illustrations, e-books and other visual content are the highest quality they can be in the coming years. A custom-made, high-quality piece of visual content can be all you need to make the sale!

At Addo Visualization, we have long worked with and created a variety of high engagement visuals specializing in the Kitchen and Bath industry.

Lifestyle Kitchen renderings, CGI animations, cabinets and door styles modeling and rendering, 360 kitchen panoramas, interactive web-based visual apps – we have contributed to successful marketing campaigns with each of these formats.

Now and in the following years, prepare to be found online more easily by your customers and to better communicate your vision!  Your message will resonate more clearly driving engagement and a stronger push to action. 

Get in touch with us at office@addo-visualization.com and request a free consultation.

 

References 

Forbes

Researchgate

Emarketer

Moz – State of Searcher Behaviour Revealed

Cisco

 

Cabinet Makers: 3 Steps To Vastly Improve Your Visual Content Marketing

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In direct response to the technology evolution over the past decade, audiences are consuming information in new ways, from smaller, more portable screens on mobile devices to third-party apps and discovery platforms. The result has been a shift in content consumption preferences, and 91% of consumers now prefer interactive and visual content over traditional, text-based or static media. To stay current, Kitchen & Bath businesses are striving to meet the mounting demand for visual content as they revise their multichannel content strategies.

Many businesses are already seeing the value of incorporating more visual content, that can make a noticeable impact on every major business goal — influencing website traffic, brand awareness, social media engagement, lead generation and sales.

 

Here are some steps cabinet manufacturers can take to vastly improve their visual content strategies.

Build Diverse Visual Assets  

The most effective visual-first strategies embrace multiple types of visual content: still images, 3D animations and 360 Degree kitchen renderings, to name a few. Different forms of visual content all add value in different ways, so it’s important for marketers to diversify their visual assets. Going beyond still images, cabinetry renderings, when it comes to visual content, video is king: It’s predicted that by 2021, video content will account for almost 82% of internet traffic, making it an ideal format for marketers to disperse a narrative to a desired audience.

Once an option and now a necessity, employing technology to help create and deliver high-quality, cross-platform video content will pay dividends.

Start using visual marketing on your online platforms

Use visual marketing on your website and social media channels. Once you have a clear direction on the voice and imagery associated with your brand, start using visual marketing on your online platforms.

  • Create branded images for each of your blog posts so that your articles will stand out on social networks. The image may include the title or a quote from the posts
  • Embed videos on your webpages. Videos are the perfect way to show a product in action, introduce your staff, or show off your business location.
  • Create Pinterest boards. Use images that represent the lifestyle of your ideal customer, not just promotional and products pictures.
  • Publish infographics that share complicated data or information about your brand or industry.
  • Create interactive quizzes that entertain your audience (and collect valuable data for you).
  • Published slideshows on Slideshare that educate your customers on topics related to your industry.
  • Avoid stock photos and use custom and unique images as much as possible. 3D renderings are the best option.

The opportunities and possibilities of visual marketing are plentiful, varied, and powerful. Once you begin creating cabinet visuals that accurately share your brand story and clearly articulate your messages, your business will begin to build stronger relationships with customer and clients, both new and old.  

 

Choose Your Partner Wisely

On the path to earn the benefits of incorporating visual content, marketers will inevitably face obstacles in terms of creation and execution. Without employing solutions and working with teams that know the ropes, a lack of expertise and resources could hinder a visual-first strategy and place greater strains on already stretched budgets.

Similar to choosing a partner for any endeavor, selecting the right 3D rendering partner to back a visual strategy is essential. Look for premium quality, fast delivery times and competitive pricing, because you need plenty of images to sustain all these tactics.

Among the very few 3D Rendering companies specialized in the Kitchen & Bath industry, Addo Visualization is best positioned to assist you in this endeavor. At Addo we use effective procedures that can cut your costs in half, while providing you with enough premium quality cabinet images to support all your online and offline marketing strategies.

 

Visual content is now essential for Kitchen & Bath businesses to keep consumers engaged, enabling you, the cabinet manufacturer, to excel over your competition. 

Audiences’ demand for visual content is only increasing, therefore marketers need to adjust their strategies to make them both visually appealing and effective. All businesses strive to serve diverse audiences across all channels, and while this process can feel overwhelming, the right images alongside the right partner will help marketers be fully armed and ready to deliver consistently and sustainably.

 

Get in touch with us to discuss your upcoming projects!

E-Mail: office@addo-visualization.com

 

References

Forbes

Spectrio

 

5 Ways Irresistible Cabinet Images Boost Conversions

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According to a survey by the National Retail Federation, 67% of customers consider images to be more important than product-specific information, long descriptions, and even product reviews.  Professional images can engage the interest of your visitors and increase the chances of making a sale.

This is why any cabinet manufacturer that also sells online or promotes content across online  channels would do well to invest in their cabinet images. Here’s how to use images for maximum conversion-boosting effect.

 

1. Quality is a must.

This should go without saying, but too many cabinet dealers try to sell products with low quality images or no images at all.

In order to effectively boost conversions, images need to be high-quality. Brand trust is a major component when it comes to online marketing. Professional and consistent images will lend credibility to your brand and help customers feel more comfortable purchasing from your site. Avoid low quality images, stock photos and any visuals that aren’t relevant to the product at hand. And make sure your photos are large and high-resolution to optimize their impact; large photos consistently result in better conversion rates.

 

2. Provide as many views as possible.

Buying products online can be daunting, because customers don’t have a chance to interact with them up close and ensure they’re getting exactly what they want. Allow them to inspect a product from all angles by posting images with alternate views, include a zoom option that allows customers to view details up close, and include photos of each of the different color and style options on offer. Bonus points for 360-degree panoramas or 3D imaging features. Adding images with multiple views and 360-degree panoramas also gives your customers the feel of a physical store, thus enhancing their buying experience. This will bolster their confidence, which in turn, leads to higher conversions.

 

3. Help customers envision the product in their lives.

In order to purchase a product, customers need to be convinced it will enhance their lives in some way. Help potential customers visualize how your products could play a role in their lives by showcasing cabinets in the settings where people are most likely to use them. For example, 3D images of kitchens, laundries, offices, bedrooms, bar rooms, entertainment rooms etc. will show your cabinets utilized in different spaces, so potential customers can visualize exactly how various options would relate to their own projects.

 

4. Prioritize accuracy.

While a few professional touch-ups are fine, it’s important that your photos accurately represent your products. If customers purchase a product based on a photo only to discover the real thing looks nothing like what they thought, that’s going to result in dissatisfied customers, poor reviews, high return rates and lost customer retention. Make sure your 3D images are accurate depictions of your products, and test the view on multiple devices and in multiple web browsers to ensure that colors and details are presenting accurately.

No two people are the same, and neither are their likes and dislikes. So, why limit your product to just one colour or design? If a product is available in different colours, then make sure your page has images of the product in all the colours. Doing so not only gives your customers more choices but also appeals to a wider target audience.

 

5. Use images in content marketing.

Not only should you be incorporating images into your own content marketing efforts but you also should be encouraging your external PR and marketing efforts to do the same.

Research has shown that when people hear information, they’re likely to remember only 10 percent of that information three days later. However, if a relevant image is paired with that same information, people retained 65 percent of the information three days later.

 

When it comes to boosting online sales, cabinet images matter. In addition to writing detailed product and features descriptions, providing high quality 3D images to your network of dealers will help you make more sales, reduce your risk of returns, and get people to remember your products for a much longer time.

 

Get in touch with us to discuss your upcoming projects!

E-Mail: office@addo-visualization.com

 

References

Entrepreneur

Lumina Datamatics

Brain Rules

CXL

 

Two challenges facing cabinet manufacturers in 2018

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Online retailers have taken away a good portion of the market share of brick-and-mortar retailers and will continue to grow and to be a preferred buying channel for millennials in particular. With instant access to available information, catalogs and price lists, customers have a clearer idea of what they want.

Online stores are becoming the fastest-growing channel and cabinet manufacturers need to be abreast of emerging trends that are shaping the new cabinet industry landscape.

Let’s look at the two challenges facing cabinet manufacturers in 2018, focusing mainly on the fundamental shifts in B2B buying preferences.

 

  1. Challenge #1: Attract more dealers

Dealers’ behaviour and the transformation of lead generation

“The abundance of information readily available online has led to the rise of the “self-directed buyer”.

In the age of the self-directed buyer, marketers need to find new ways to reach their potential customers and get heard through the noise. Instead of finding customers through mass advertising, marketers must now focus on being found.”

Buyers do most of their research, evaluation and finally selecting a vendor very differently today than in the past. A chart from Marketo explains the differences between then and now.

 

The opportunity:  Content Marketing and Resource Centers

Content marketing – Read our previous articles about Why visual communication is changing marketing and about the Successful marketing tactic for 2018, in order to “be found” and inspire engagement.

Keep an updated Resource Center – Lack of support is one of the biggest complaints most dealers have about their manufacturing partners. Whether there is a lack of promotional and sales materials to support dealers’ sales efforts, lack of training, or even lack of communication, manufacturers and dealers need to communicate and work together to to ensure that each partner has what they need to be successful.

Manufacturers need to remember that the real customer is further down the supply chain and the dealer’s role is to bring your products to the hands of as many customers as possible. This leads to the second challenge, of helping your network of dealers to sell more cabinets.

 

  1. Challenge #2: Help your dealers sell more

Are your products easy for dealers to sell?

One way to maintain a good relationship with your dealers is to make sure your products are as easy as possible for your dealers to sell. Being the easiest to do business with goes a long way toward ensuring that you are their preferred manufacturer.

The opportunity:  Providing high quality 3D images to your network of dealers will sell more of your cabinets, especially online.

Giving your dealers the ability to visually present your products is something every cabinet manufacturer will benefit from.

No product can be sold, especially online, without the visual and detailed description of the product through high quality images. 67% of customers believe reviews and descriptions are less important than product images when it comes to deciding whether to buy or not.

 

 

High quality 3D images are not All you need, but are a necessary ingredient for your success.

We can show you how we are helping our clients maximise results in creating 3D cabinetry images, in order to meet their needs for putting into practice all these successful tactics. Let us know if we can help. For all the details you need to decide, email us at office@addo-visualization.com

 

References

Kitchen Cabinet Manufacturers Assn. KCMA

National Kitchen & Bath Assn. NKBA

Marketo

CMTC

Entrepreneur.com