I “Seene” this coming a mile away

June 3, 2016

It’s no secret I’ve been hating on SnapChat recently.

I don’t actually dislike the platform. I get it. It’s fun. It’s hip. It’s the next shiny object. But my little marketing mind is always searching for ways things can be adopted for use in the business world, and for the last year or so, I’ve been struggling to wrap my head around how SnapChat was going to do that for us in the real estate industry.

Sure, if you ask the gurus, they’ll point to numerous examples of people that have built a decent following and use it to connect on a more personal level. Can they say there’s a direct correlation to getting business though? I’ve even heard rumors of people using it to showcase their new listings and having success finding buyers.

Of course, there are always going to be outliers which is why I will NEVER say a platform simply “doesn’t work”. However, when it comes to mass adoption, especially in the real estate world… I can confidently say there are a million other ways I’d spend my time than messing around trying to build an audience and get business from SnapChat.

But, just last week, something happened that started to shift my way of thinking about the SnapChat platform for us in the real estate world.

A friend showed me how you can do cool overlays on your face!

I mean, come on, who doesn’t like to make themselves look like a dog, or a whatever this thing is I just put on my face?

So, I know some of you are thinking “Jeff, how the heck is this going to help me in my business?” Well, I hate to break it to you, but it’s not.

However, it did get me thinking…

If they can map our faces, and plop funny little overlays on top of them, what could we do if we were able to map other things, like say the inside of a home? Could we scan objects in a room, and move them around in a real time virtual world, similar to what some of the “virtual staging” platforms offer?

Maybe.

I thought to myself how cool it would be if SnapChat took that route as a way to enter into the “professional” business world. Plus, I’ve seen other technologies being built over the last few years that would make this a reality, but none of them really getting much attention in our world.

Until today.

SnapChat has secretly acquired a company called Seene, so that users can now create 3D content (selfies of themselves – for now).

From their website:

Empowering users to capture in 3D
Seene’s 3D capture technology has applications in gaming & VR, 3D printing, e-commerce and photography.

We’re letting companies across these sectors empower their customers to add user-generated 3D content to their products, using only their mobile phone.

Check it out for yourself:

This is powerful stuff. I’m predicting that soon, we’ll be able to map (scan) ourselves, our pets, our furniture etc. and inject those into whatever virtual world we can dream up.

You know, Elon Musk has been getting criticism this week for saying there’s a chance we’re all just living in someone else’s video game world.

Seeing technologies like this in action make me think, he may not be as crazy as everyone thinks and that MAYBE, just maybe… SnapChat has a future in my world.