With the recent NAR settlement being enacted, real estate professionals must be more diligent than ever in ensuring their marketing efforts align with the new rules.
The settlement has introduced changes that require greater transparency, particularly in how commissions and business practices are communicated to clients.
As a result, you may need to adapt your direct mail marketing to clearly and accurately reflect how you conduct your real estate business to stay compliant and maintain trust with your audience.
Customizable Marketing Solutions from ProspectsPLUS!
This is where ProspectsPLUS! Becomes an invaluable resource. We offer a wide range of fully customizable marketing templates for postcards, brochures, newsletters, and more.
This flexibility is crucial in the current climate, as it allows you to adapt your marketing materials to meet the requirements set forth by the NAR settlement.
Adapting Your Marketing to Meet New Requirements
For example, if you are choosing marketing materials, you need to clearly explain how commissions are handled or how your business operates; you can easily modify the verbiage on our marketing materials in our editor.
ProspectsPLUS! templates are designed to be user-friendly, enabling you to quickly and easily make the necessary adjustments without compromising your materials’ professional look and feel.
Stay Compliant While Reaching Your Audience
In a time when clarity and transparency are not only recommended but required, it is essential to be able to tailor your marketing to meet these demands.
Our priority is to continue providing the tools you need to ensure your marketing aligns with the new regulations, helping you stay compliant while effectively reaching your target audience.
As you navigate the new landscape of real estate marketing post-NAR settlement, rest assured that with ProspectsPLUS!, you have the flexibility and support to keep your business thriving while staying within the rules.
Please call our support team at 866.405.3638 with questions or if there is anything we can do to help you succeed.
PLUS: When you have time…below are some marketing tools to help support your success.
1. Put Your Real Estate Business a Step Above with Your Own Branded Magazine
Homes & Life Magazine is a customizable magazine with rich, full-color content and a sharp, professional aesthetic. It includes compelling, direct, response-driven articles written by real estate industry experts and engaging lifestyle content. Send out Homes & Life Magazine in Just Minutes – No Minimums Required. Or we’ll ship it to you. Homes & Life Magazine is the ultimate “Coffee Table Lingerer”! …and it costs less than sending a greeting card! – Click Here
2.The Free 6-Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan
The Real Estate Marketing Planner is a powerful 6-Month Guide that strategically defines what marketing to do and when. Four key market segments include niche Markets, geographic farming, sphere of influence, and past clients. – Click Here
3. The Free Interactive 6-Month Real Estate Business Review
The Free Interactive 6-Month Real Estate Business Review allows you to enter your business goals for the remainder of the year and get a breakdown of how many prospects, listings, closings, and so on are needed to reach your goals. – Click Here
4. The Become a Listing Legend Free eBook
Ready to take a vertical leap in your real estate career? If you’re looking for inspiration…and the tools and methods to dominate a market and go to the top in real estate…you’ll find them in this free book. – Click Here
Think back to 2006. You may remember hearing about the launch of a new social media platform, Twitter. However, you most likely didn’t because it came with little fanfare.
Posts to the social media platform were dubbed “tweets,” and tweeters were limited to only 140 characters at that time.
Does that remind you of anything?
As you know, each MLS has a limit on how many words (or characters) agents can use in the public-facing listing description. We attempted to determine the average word count restriction, but couldn’t.
Unless you write professionally, listing descriptions can be challenging to craft. But they don’t have to be if you follow a few simple rules.
The anatomy of a listing description from a buyer’s point of view
It’s common knowledge now that most house hunters turn to the internet for their initial search.
It’s also well known that these buyers won’t look at a listing that doesn’t include photos (2011 ocular tracking study E.V. Williams Center for Real Estate, Old Dominion University).
That study showed us that homebuyers overwhelmingly scan the listing photo first and spend the most time doing so. They check out the property description next.
The agent’s listing description was the last item they were interested in perusing, and 20 percent of the homebuyers studied didn’t bother reading them.
Because of this, the researchers claim that listing descriptions are unimportant.
Did they miss the fact that 80 percent DID read the agent’s listing description?
This is an important statistic for listing agents to concentrate on when writing the listing description.
Use your words . . . strategically
When asked by Shakespeare’s Polonius what he was reading, Hamlet replied, “Words, words, words.”
What he was reading, obviously, was meaningless. Words with meaning, on the other hand, are powerful and can actually help sell a home.
We don’t advocate outright lying in a listing description, but Spencer Rascoff and Stan Humphries beg to differ:
“Bottom-tier homes described as luxurious tend to beat their expected sale price by a whopping 8.2 percent.”
They go on to claim that if your listing’s value is “$110,000, but your listing includes the keyword ‘luxurious,’ you could pocket an extra $8,965.”
Additional money-making words from their study include:
Captivating
Impeccable (listings in the lower price ranges that include this word sold for nearly 6 percent more than the list price)
Stainless (a 5 percent bonus if your low-priced listing has stainless steel appliances and you incorporate that info in the listing description)
Landscaped
Granite (no surprise here, right?)
Remodeled
Beautiful
Spotless
Check out the rest of the list at Zillow.com. Be aware that the list is a bit old, but some of these trends still exist, such as granite (or quartz) countertops. Research is your friend.
Sure, brilliant listing descriptions aren’t that critical in the current market. But, markets change and often do so on a dime. Keep the aforementioned information in your back pocket and pull it out when homes aren’t selling as soon as listed. And, remember, adjectives, apparently, are money-makers.
Sprinkle liberally for a brilliant listing description.
PLUS: When you have time…below are some marketing tools to help support your success.
1. Put Your Real Estate Business a Step Above with Your Own Branded Magazine
Homes & Life Magazine is a customizable magazine with rich, full-color content and a sharp, professional aesthetic. It includes compelling, direct, response-driven articles written by real estate industry experts and engaging lifestyle content. Send out Homes & Life Magazine in Just Minutes – No Minimums Required. Or we’ll ship it to you. Homes & Life Magazine is the ultimate “Coffee Table Lingerer”! …and it costs less than sending a greeting card! – Click Here
2.The Free 6-Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan
The Real Estate Marketing Planner is a powerful 6-Month Guide that strategically defines what marketing to do and when. Four key market segments include niche Markets, geographic farming, sphere of influence, and past clients. – Click Here
3. The Free Interactive 6-Month Real Estate Business Review
The Free Interactive 6-Month Real Estate Business Review allows you to enter your business goals for the remainder of the year and get a breakdown of how many prospects, listings, closing, and so on are needed to reach your goals. – Click Here
4. The Become a Listing Legend Free eBook
Ready to take a vertical leap in your real estate career? If you’re looking for inspiration…and the tools and methods to dominate a market and go to the top in real estate…you’ll find them in this free book. – Click Here
Real estate agents are always looking for ways to increase their exposure and generate leads. One effective marketing strategy that has stood the test of time is sending Just Listed and Just Sold postcards.
If you’re wondering why even the highest-producing agents still spend time on this marketing tactic, read on.
Five Reasons Why Smart Real Estate Agents Continually Send Just Listed/Just Sold Postcards:
Builds brand awareness
Just Listed and Just Sold postcards are an excellent way to build brand awareness. By sending regular updates on your recent listings and sales, you remind potential clients of your expertise in the field. This can help you stand out in a crowded market and increase the likelihood that clients will choose you over competitors.
Even if you don’t have any current listings or solds of your own, you can still send a postcard announcing to your farm or targeted neighborhood what property was just sold or just listed in the area.
Or highlight a property listed or sold by someone in your office. This can still trigger inbound leads for you.
Targets potential clients
Sending postcards to a targeted audience can help you reach potential clients looking to buy or sell a property. You can purchase mailing lists segmented by location, income, and occupation, making it easy to target your ideal demographic.
Creates a personal touch
In today’s digital age, getting lost in the noise of email and social media is easy. By sending a physical postcard, you can create a personal touch that sets you apart from competitors. A postcard is tangible, and people are more likely to remember it than an email or a social media post.
And I often hear of agents who show up to a listing appointment and are shown the collection of their postcard mailings that have been kept by the homeowner.
It’s cost-effective marketing
Compared to other forms of marketing, sending postcards is a relatively inexpensive and fast way to get in front of prospects in your market. This makes it an affordable way to reach potential clients and generate leads.
Generates referrals
Just Listed and Just Sold postcards can generate referrals from your existing clients. When people receive your postcard, they may share it with friends or family members who are interested in buying or selling a property. This can help you generate leads without having to do any additional marketing.
By sending regular real estate activity updates to potential clients, you can build brand awareness, target your ideal demographic, create a personal, tangible touch, and generate referrals.
If you’re a real estate agent looking to increase your exposure and generate leads, consider adding Just Listed and Just Sold postcards to your marketing strategy.
PLUS: When you have time…below are some marketing tools to help support your success.
1. Put Your Real Estate Business a Step Above with Your Own Branded Magazine
Homes & Life Magazine is a customizable magazine with rich, full-color content and a sharp, professional aesthetic. It includes compelling, direct response-driven articles written by real estate industry experts combined with engaging lifestyle content. Send out Homes & Life Magazine in Just Minutes – No Minimums Required. Or we’ll ship it to you.
Homes & Life Magazine is the ultimate “Coffee Table Lingerer”! …and it costs less than sending a greeting card! – Click Here
2.The Free 12-Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan
The Real Estate Marketing Planner is a powerful 12-Month-Guide that strategically defines what marketing to do and when. Four key market segments include niche Markets, geographic farming, sphere of influence, and past clients. – Click Here
3. The BusinessBase, SOI building system
The most effective thing you can do to build a real estate business is to become more visible, more likable, and remembered more often. The BusinessBASE™ not only checks these boxes but is also a business-building machine. In two easy steps, you can begin to build a robust sphere of influence that will provide you a lifetime of repeat business and referrals. –Click Here
4. The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan
The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan allows you to enter your business goals for this year and get a breakdown of how many prospects, listings, closing, and so on are needed to reach your goals. – Click Here
5. The Become a Listing Legend Free eBook
Ready to take a vertical leap in your real estate career? If you’re looking for inspiration…and the tools and methods to dominate a market and go to the top in real estate…you’ll find them in this free book. – Click Here
A for-sale sign went up in the front yard of a home down the street from me. Each time I drove by, I wondered what the listing price was. I finally looked it up online. I shouldn’t have had to do that. Nor should other neighbors have to do that.
A buyers’ agent with frustrated clients should’ve circle prospected around that listing. A postcard to every home in the subdivision, letting them know that a home just went on the market and the price of the home would put that agent front and center in the residents’ minds.
That is just where he or she needs to be if one of them is thinking of selling. And the chances are excellent that another home will go on the market soon.
It’s no longer enough to counsel clients on being patient, adjusting their expectations, and coming into the market fully prepared.
It’s time to get proactive. Not only is it a way to secure listings, but to expose your brand to a wider audience.
Direct mail as the centerpiece of a circle prospecting campaign is probably the best way to take charge. But, it’s not the only way, and this market demands a multi-pronged strategy.
Just Listed Postcards perfect for circle prospecting. See more HERE
1. Add a pinch of social media
You don’t need to be an influencer to obtain results on social media. Get busy posting and responding. Let your followers know what your buyers’ needs are. Share articles on the huge amount of equity that homeowners are sitting on right now and create a sense of urgency to get them off the fence and into the market.
I once read an inman.com article from seattlehome.com managing broker Sam DeBord. In it, he shared a story about how he dealt with a low inventory situation by blogging consistently and sharing his posts on Facebook.
It worked. He got a call from a stranger who read one of his Facebook posts and offered him the listing.
2. So, you didn’t take the listing
Go through your CRM and dredge up information on every listing presentation you’ve made but didn’t get the listing. Check to see if the home ever sold and, if it didn’t, reach out to the homeowner. This one is especially effective if the original market value is significantly higher today than it was when you made your listing presentation.
Chances are, it is.
3. Equity is a game-changer
Again, the equity angle will most likely move someone if they’re not opposed to selling. As I mentioned earlier, homeowners who keep up with the news understand that home prices are high.
Most, however, don’t have the vaguest notion of what their home is worth and how much equity they’re sitting on.
A proactive agent would’ve not only sent me a postcard when that home in my neighborhood hit the market, but she would’ve followed up a week or two later with an unsolicited, basic CMA. Again, circle prospecting around current real estate activity is one of the best ways to get listings.
No, these three steps aren’t new, but they may be game-changers for an agent who is struggling to find homes for their buyers. They are also terrific at getting you back to that coveted top-of-mind position with your sphere.
PLUS: When you have time…below are some marketing tools to help support your success.
1. Put Your Real Estate Business a Step Above with Your Own Branded Magazine
Homes & Life Magazine is a customizable magazine with rich, full-color content and a sharp, professional aesthetic. It includes compelling, direct response-driven articles written by real estate industry experts combined with engaging lifestyle content. Send out Homes & Life Magazine in Just Minutes – No Minimums Required. Or we’ll ship it to you.
Homes & Life Magazine is the ultimate “Coffee Table Lingerer”! …and it costs less than sending a greeting card! – Click Here
2.The Free 12-Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan
The Real Estate Marketing Planner is a powerful 12-Month-Guide that strategically defines what marketing to do and when. Four key market segments include niche Markets, geographic farming, sphere of influence, and past clients. – Click Here
3. The BusinessBase, SOI building system
The most effective thing you can do to build a real estate business is to become more visible, more likable, and remembered more often. The BusinessBASE™ not only checks all of these boxes but is also a business-building machine. In two easy steps, you can begin to build a robust sphere of influence that will provide you a lifetime of repeat business and referrals. –Click Here
4. The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan
The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan allows you to enter your business goals for this year and get a breakdown of how many prospects, listings, closing, and so on are needed to reach your goals. – Click Here
5. The Become a Listing Legend Free eBook
Ready to take a vertical leap in your real estate career? If you’re looking for inspiration…and the tools and methods to dominate a market and go to the top in real estate…you’ll find them in this free book. – Click Here
6. The Take a Listing Today Podcast
Watch the ProspectsPLUS!, Take a Listing Today Podcast for actionable content to help you get more listings. – Click Here
You know the story: you labor over your listing descriptions, trying desperately to come up with just the right words to describe your brand-new-listing-that-you-want-to-sell-today.
In reality, you should be paying closer attention to the images. Why?
Because the agent’s remarks are ignored by more than 40 percent of buyers.
Tip #1: Spend less time describing a listing and more time photographing it
Multi-Photo Just Listed postcard shown above. To see more, Click Here
I’m not making this up – studies prove it. An ocular tracking study (tracking eye movements of buyers on a real estate website) showed that “the real estate agent’s open remarks section is viewed” last and that viewers place “very little emphasis … on this section.”
In other words, you’re stressing over nothing.
Now, if the home’s photos are sub-par, you do need to stress because more than 95 percent of your website visitors will look first at a home’s photo. Then, they turn to the “quantitative property description.” That’s the MLS template stuff, like the number of bedrooms and bathrooms, square footage, etc.
Now, here’s the really surprising part of the study:
“In our experiment, participants comply by viewing the remainder of the home, but in an actual setting, one has to wonder if the agent remarks would ever get read if the home searcher does not like the initial photo of the home.”
In essence, you could probably fill your agent remarks section with “Lorem Ipsum” and nobody would even notice. Now, I’m not advocating that; just trying to make a point.
Tip #2 Who started this one?
It’s common knowledge that kitchens and bathrooms are the most important to buyers, right? Isn’t that what we all tell our sellers? Don’t photos of those two rooms dominate listings? Where did that come from?
It’s amazing how we do things without questioning why. Sure, at one time, kitchens and bathrooms may have been buyers’ hot buttons, but are they today?
Nope. New-home buyers crave a laundry room over anything else. The second in-room preference is a dining room, according to annual research for the National Association of Home Builders.
Whether you hire a photographer or DIY your listing photos, don’t neglect to feature a home’s usable outdoor space (whether a full backyard or a patio or lanai) as well. Anecdotal evidence from agents across the country hints that this is still a wildly popular feature in existing homes.
Some of the other popular outdoor features mentioned by agents include:
Updated lighting
Outdoor ceiling fan on the patio
Ample fences to keep kids/pets safely enclosed in the yard
Firepit or fireplace for those chilly nights
Allow space for photos of these items in your online listing photos.
We won’t always be in a hot sellers’ market. Someday buyers will rule and you’ll need every tool in your belt to lure them to your listings.
The Get More Listings Series is shown above. To send a one-time mailing, Click Here. To launch a Get More Listing Campaign, Click Here.
PLUS: When you have time…below are some marketing tools to help support your success.
1. Put Your Real Estate Business a Step Above with Your Own Branded Magazine
Homes & Life Magazine is a customizable magazine, with rich, full-color content, and a sharp, professional esthetic. It includes compelling, direct response-driven articles written by real estate industry experts, combined with engaging lifestyle content. Send out Homes & Life Magazine in Just Minutes – No Minimums Required. Or we’ll ship it to you.
Homes & Life Magazine is the ultimate “Coffee Table Lingerer”! …and, it costs less than sending a greeting card! – Click Here
2.The Free 12 Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan
The Real Estate Marketing Planner is a powerful 12-Month-Guide that strategically defines what marketing to do when. Four key market segments are included, niche Markets, geographic farming, sphere of influence, and past clients. – Click Here
3. The BusinessBase, SOI building system
The most effective thing you can do to build a real estate business is to become more visible, more likable, and remembered more often. The BusinessBASE™ not only checks all of these boxes, but it is a business building machine. In two easy steps, you can begin to build a robust sphere of influence that will provide you a lifetime of repeat business and referrals. –Click Here
4. The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan
The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan allows you to enter your business goals for this year and get a breakdown of how many prospects, listings, closing, and so on are needed to reach your goals. – Click Here
5. The Become a Listing Legend Free eBook
Ready to take a vertical leap in your real estate career? If you’re looking for inspiration…and the tools and methods to dominate a market and go to the top in real estate…you’ll find them in this free book. – Click Here
6. The Take a Listing Today Podcast
Watch the ProspectsPLUS!, Take a Listing Today Podcast for actionable content to help you get more listings. – Click Here
It takes more than a statement on your website or business card to truly be considered a neighborhood expert.
There are many agents using this title as a marketing tool, while not doing the necessary work to make the title a reality.
Let’s consider some ways to prove to potential clients that you are what you say you are.
1. Prove it in your marketing materials
True neighborhood experts, by and large, market to farm areas.
Whether that is a condo community, a specific zip code, or by subdivision, focusing on a smaller pool of homeowners is a brilliant way to become known as the expert in a community.
The best way to reach these homeowners or tenants or whomever you are targeting is via direct mail. It’s quick, it’s inexpensive and it works.
Shown above, FARM, Get More Listings postcard campaign. Learn more, HERE
Be sure to include on the back of the postcards an offer for a free “local market stats” report, that details home listings and sales in that area.
It shows them that you know your stuff and are on top of what’s happening in their area.
And, when homeowners reach out for this report, ensure that your explanation is in plain English. Unless you explain the meaning, avoid insider jargon, such as:
“absorption rate”
“months’ supply of real estate inventory” (what does months’ supply and “inventory” mean?),
“the median price range” (explain median vs. average)
“time on market” or “days on market” (why is this important to the average homeowner thinking of selling?)
We found lots of other examples online of what to AVOID in your Market Stats or CMA reports, such as:
“During this quarter, sales dollar volume increased year over year by 3% to $599,080,374. New listings rose 22% to 2,820, active listings increased 21% to 5,840 and pending sales increased 11% to 2,452. Monthly housing inventory increased by 0.4 months to 2.3 months.”
“Sales dollar volume” is meaningless to a homeowner. We would reword the paragraph to read more like a narrative than a dry list of statistics:
During this quarter, 22 percent more homeowners put their homes on the market here in Any town than in October. As quickly as they’re listed, however, buyers snap them up. One indication of that is the increase in pending sales, which were up 11 percent more than pending sales during the previous quarter of 2021.”
Since potential home sellers are your primary audience when farming, leave out the increase in inventory unless it’s significant (0.4 months isn’t). And, if you must express inventory in “months,” do the readers a solid and explain what that means.
Additional effective farming pieces include:
Just listed and just soldpostcards (even if you haven’t sold or listed the property, if the agent in question has chosen not to announce this news, use their loss as your gain and send these postcards out).
The Market Dominator, an automated mega-newsletter that’s sent to an exclusive carrier route monthly through the use of EDDM.
2. Prove your neighborhood expertise on your website
Your website provides the ideal platform to strut your neighborhood expertise. Start by ensuring it’s localized.
So many agents pay the big bucks for a professional website and fail to remove or change the template text that comes with it.
Add your market area everywhere possible, starting with the above-the-fold area on your home page. Don’t make visitors wonder where on earth you sell real estate.
Create a neighborhoods section on your site and fill it with valuable, hyper-local content. In-depth neighborhood descriptions, quotes from folks who live in the neighborhood about why they love it, links to listings, and lots of photos are the bare necessities for neighborhood pages.
Finally, if you don’t have a blog, start one. It’s the ideal place to post local content and, if promoted across your social media platforms, it will help drive traffic back to your site.
Because You Want The Following Things to Happen in 2022?
Strategic focus – Centralized sales in one area. No more driving across town for a listing. To become a neighborhood expert – You’re committed to a specific neighborhood where you will become known as the expert.
Increased growth – You’re building toward the future instead of “just getting by” working on whatever comes your way.
A branded business – You’re branding yourself and your business within a community and building relationships over time with the people who live there.
Increased demand for your service – Sellers and buyers want to work with real estate agents who are experts in the community where they are buying and selling, and that’s YOU.
Build a geographic farm list (from a desktop or laptop computer) using the MapMyMail tool.
Hit the “CLICK HERE” link, below (from a desktop or laptop computer) and choose the MapMyMail listing building tool.
USE PROMO CODE: FARM15 to get 15% off of your geographic farm list.
For Help Creating Your Geographic Farm List, Watch This Video Below.
This sale expires on 12/25/21. Please reach out to our support team at 866.405.3638 with questions or if there is anything we can do to help you with your success.
PLUS: When you have time…below are some helpful tools to support your success.
1. The Free 12 Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan
The Real Estate Marketing Planner is a powerful 12-Month-Guide that strategically defines what marketing to do when. Four key market segments are included, niche Markets, geographic farming, sphere of influence, and past clients. – Click Here
2. The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan
The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan allows you to enter your business goals for this year and get a breakdown of how many prospects, listings, closing, and so on are needed to reach your goals. – Click Here
3. The Automated Way to Become a Neighborhood Brand
Become branded in a specific neighborhood with a 12X15 marketing piece sent automatically each month to an exclusive carrier route. Watch this video to learn more or Click Here.
4. The Free Real Estate Mailing List Guide
The Real Estate Mailing List Guide outlines the top tools for generating targeted prospecting lists including Baby Boomers, Empty Nesters, Investors, Lifestyle Interests, High-Income Renters, Move-Up Markets, and more. The Guide also defines done-for-you marketing campaigns to match these markets. –Click Here
5. The Become a Listing Legend Free eBook
Ready to take a vertical leap in your real estate career? If you’re looking for inspiration…and the tools and methods to dominate a market and go to the top in real estate…you’ll find them in this free book. – Click Here
6. The Free Online ROI Calculator
Consistency and automation are the keys to success. Discover how effective direct mail marketing can dramatically increase your bottom line. Enter your statistics in our Free online ROI Calculator and click the ‘CALCULATE MY ROI’ button to see your results instantly! –Click Here
7. The Free Real Estate Marketing Guide “CRUSH IT”
The “Crush It” Guide includes easy steps to launching an effective direct mail marketing campaign, how to create a targeted prospect list, the perfect way to layout marketing materials for success, seven opportunities available to target in your area right now. –Click Here
While you’re online scheduling your Holiday postcards to go out, consider launching an annual Holiday scheduled campaign.
What if I told you that sending out 200 marketing postcards for less than $150 (postage included) could potentially net you five new listings?
Barbara Todaro, a Franklin, MA agent, sent 200 Just Listedpostcards to an area that surrounded her new listing and her mailing resulted in just that number –five new listings.
Todaro’s advice, “Never eliminate a method because it’s basic, those are often the best methods. The reality is, everyone reads their mail”.
Yes, real estate postcard marketing has been around for a while. And, no, it’s not as innovative as digital marketing, but clearly –IT WORKS.
Left in the dust
We’ve definitely come a long way from the days of AOL dial-up connections to jet-propelled search engine rankings and the availability of real-time information.
It was a steep learning curve, but like most things in life, as agents became more tech-proficient, the demand for high-tech grew.
Just Listed/Just Sold Postcards
Unfortunately, along with this came new-fangled ideas regarding listing generation and conversion; that it should be quick and effortless. And, this false belief came at a price.
Old, yet highly effective marketing methods, were left in the dust by some agents, specifically the method with the longest history of success – direct mail marketing.
Snail mail? Guess again!
Direct mail outperforms email, social media, and all digital forms of marketing by 700 percent, according to research from the Data and Marketing Association (DMA).
In addition, the Marketing Sherpa survey showed that direct mail was the third most trusted form of marketing overall (behind magazines/newspapers and TV ads).
For comparison, search engine ads came in sixth and, at the bottom of the list? Online pop-up ads.
A customer of ours recently discussed his return to direct mail marketing, specifically Just Listed/Just Soldpostcards, after spending some time away.
“My business was starting to be flat. I was still a top producer but where I used to have more listings than I did buyers, I now had twice as many buyers as I did listings”, Joe Cooper stated.
“I took a hard look at my business model and realized that it had been around two years since I’d used Just Listed/Just Sold postcards. I decided to start back up and see if it made a difference. Well, it has. Almost immediately, my listings have picked up!”.
Is farming a thing of the past?
In the past, most agents chose farm areas to target their best potential customers and direct mail marketing was the best way for them to reach these people. Guess what?
Direct mail marketing still is the best way to target your ideal customer.
Neighborhoods that are ripe for the picking include those that haven’t turned over in a while. Or you can choose to circle prospect and campaign in an area surrounding a recent listing or sale.
Just Sold Aerial Series
Your research into the right farm doesn’t stop with choosing your neighborhood; learning the area’s demographics (especially the average age and income of the residents) is vital to a successful campaign.
The easiest way to ensure you are targeting the right list is to source it using our targeted mailing list tools.
The postcard winners
So, which are the most effective postcards for real estate? By far, the top agents we’ve spoken with chose Just Listed/Just Sold postcards.
“We host monthly events at our office and invite local businesses and residents. When we send a Just Sold postcard, it includes an invitation message to the party,” states Laurie Laykish, Engle & Volkers.
Though the invite isn’t the focus of the card (the just-sold home is), “we have had at least 2 people from each drop of 200 cards that attend an event and sign up to buy or sell with us,” Laykish concludes.
A tip to keep in mind, nearly 15 percent of direct mail recipients who responded to a Marketing Sherpa survey say they often discard mailed pieces when they are “too focused on the company’s needs and not enough on their own.”
This is why it’s important to keep your postcard’s focus on what’s important to your target market. Detailing what’s in it for them will engage them far more than self-promotion.
If a year-round direct mail marketing strategy isn’t currently part of your plan – the time to change this is now.
Multi-Photo Just Listed Series
Send a Multi-Photo Just Listed postcard to a radius around your new listing. Use the MapMyMailtool, from a desktop or laptop, to generate this list in minutes.
Need help targeting a specific niche of buyers or sellers? Use our prospect list tools to create the ideal list (it’s easy) or call our support team for assistance at 866.405.3638!
PLUS: When you have time…here are some helpful resources we’ve made available to support your success.
1. Become a Neighborhood Brand
Become branded in a specific neighborhood with a 12X15 marketing piece sent automatically each month to an exclusive carrier route. Watch this video to learn more or Click Here.
2. The Free Real Estate Mailing List Guide
The Real Estate Mailing List Guide outlines the top tools for generating targeted prospecting lists including Baby Boomers, Empty Nesters, Investors, Lifestyle Interests, High-Income Renters, Move-Up Markets, and more. The Guide also defines done-for-you marketing campaigns to match these markets. –Click Here
3. The Free 12 Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan
The Real Estate Marketing Planner is a powerful 12-Month-Guide that strategically defines what marketing to do when. Four key market segments are included, Niche Marketing, Get More Listings, Geographic Farming, and Sphere of Influence. –Click Here
4. The Free One-Page Real Estate Business Plan
Treat your business like a business it is vital to long-term success in this industry. Some agents may put together elaborate business plans, yet there’s something powerful about keeping it simple. Check out our one page Online Real Estate Business Plan. – Click Here
5. Become a Listing Legend Free eBook
Ready to take a vertical leap in your real estate career? If you’re looking for inspiration…and the tools and methods to dominate a market and go to the top in real estate…you’ll find them in this free book. – Click Here
6. The Free Online ROI Calculator
Consistency and automation are the keys to success. Discover how effective direct mail marketing can dramatically increase your bottom line. Enter your statistics in our Free online ROI Calculator and click the ‘CALCULATE MY ROI’ button to see your results instantly! –Click Here
7. The Free Real Estate Marketing Guide “CRUSH IT”
The “Crush It” Guide includes easy steps to launching an effective direct mail marketing campaign, how to create a targeted prospect list, the perfect way to layout marketing materials for success, seven opportunities available to target in your area right now. –Click Here
If anyone is an expert at switching strategies, it’s real estate agents and right now with sellers that need to sell and buyers that need to buy, the best way to facilitate this is with video tours.
Therefore, the following are the three best practices to follow to ensure your video tours are an effective marketing tool.
Tight budget? Did you know you can purchase only one Just Listed Just Sold postcard download from our site to send in emails and promote on social media instead of a mailing?
Best Practice 1 — Ensure your video does double duty
Sure, the purpose of the video is to market your listing, but videos can do double duty, according to Forrester Research. Videos are 50 times more likely to show up on the first page of Google search results than text pages, if they’re optimized, according to research.
Why not leverage the power of YouTube to benefit your business while also promoting your client’s listing?
Mashable’s Nate Elliot suggests doing the following:
Use your keywords in the video’s title, tags and description when you upload it to YouTube.
After uploading the video to YouTube, embed it on your website. According to Elliot, Google considers “how many times a video is viewed, and any views embedded videos receive on your own site get added to the ‘views’ tally on YouTube.”
Create a video sitemap.
Best Practice 2 – Keep your video short
Saying that we humans have short attention spans might just be the understatement of the century.
In fact, 56 percent of all videos published in the last year are less than 2 minutes long. Fewer than half of video viewers (46 percent) stick with a video all the way to the end, according to research published by Vidyard.com.
Smart marketers know this, which is why that same report shows that 75 percent of videos produced by businesses in the last year are less than two minutes in length.
Brevity reigns when it comes to getting someone to press the start button on your videos. You need to engage them immediately. Therefore, avoid putting yourself in the frame at the beginning of the video. Head straight to the most compelling aspects of the home.
And, if you don’t get their attention in the first 10 seconds, kiss them goodbye.
In fact, research shows that you’ll lose 30 percent of viewers within the first 30 seconds of your video and, when it reaches the one-minute mark, another 45 percent will leave.
So, plan on putting the most important stuff upfront and keep the entire video as short as possible.
Best Practice 3 – Promote your video
Like any content you create, promotion is the key to success. After you upload your listing video to YouTube and embed it on your website, also add it to the home’s dedicated page, if you have created one.
Then, start pumping out promotion for this video on social media (especially Facebook and LinkedIn) and through email.
Property Flyers are available as a download or shipped to you.
By following the above guidelines to video tour best practices you will continue to market your property effectively and keep your clients happy.
Download a Property Flyer and promote your property in your emails and on social media.
Need help targeting a specific niche of buyers or sellers? Use our mailing list toolto create the ideal list (it’s easy) or call our support team for assistance at 866.405.3638!
PLUS: When you have time…here are some Free resources we’ve made available to support your success.
1. The 12 Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan
The Real Estate Marketing Planner is a powerful 12-Month-Guide that strategically defines what marketing to do when. Four key market segments are included, Niche Marketing, Get More Listings, Geographic Farming, and Sphere of Influence. –Click Here
2. The Free One-Page Real Estate Business Plan
Treat your business like a business it is vital to long-term success in this industry. Some agents may put together elaborate business plans, yet there’s something powerful about keeping it simple. Check out our one page Online Real Estate Business Plan. – Click Here
4. Become a Listing Legend Free eBook
Ready to take a vertical leap in your real estate career? If you’re looking for inspiration…and the tools and methods to dominate a market and go to the top in real estate…you’ll find them in this free book. – Click Here
5. The Free Online ROI Calculator
Consistency and automation are the keys to success. Discover how effective direct mail marketing can dramatically increase your bottom line. Enter your statistics in our Free online ROI Calculator and click the ‘CALCULATE MY ROI’ button to see your results instantly! –Click Here
3. The Real Estate Marketing Guide “CRUSH IT”
The “Crush It” Guide includes easy steps to launching an effective direct mail marketing campaign, how to create a targeted mailing list, the perfect way to layout marketing materials for success, seven opportunities available to target in your area right now. –Click Here
The reality is, there is never enough time in the day to get all of your necessary work done, including marketing.
And certain important aspects of your work can only be done by YOU. This forces you to make hard choices about where to dedicate your time.
But what happens to the rest of the work?
Go from overwhelmed to an opportunity multiplier
Lets look at marketing activities.
The success of direct response marketing for branding and generating new clients is well known. This is especially true for Just Listed and Just Sold postcards.
However, the effort involved in uploading home photos, adding copy, and creating a targeted mailing list can drain you of valuable time.
We know the importance of getting Just Listed and Just Sold postcards out with every listing and sold. It’s the road map top agents follow to maximize each opportunity and ensure no money is left on the table.
And we also understand that you can’t stop in the middle of an already over-booked day to send out a Just Listed or Just Sold postcard.
Which means, very often, these postcards just don’t go out…and money gets left behind.
It’s the answer that frees you from this time-consuming work, yet provides you with the desired results.
You continue doing the work most important to your business – prospecting and going on appointments. MLSMailings.com takes care of sending out your Just Listed and Just Sold postcards – ensuring no money is left behind.
MLSMailings.com is like your own “invisible marketing assistant”.
It really is easy to maximize your opportunities
You may be thinking, “but I’m so busy, I don’t even have time to execute a process like this”.
MLSMailings.com automatically generates postcards for your listings when they are active and sold. The data is received directly from your MLS and a postcard is generated automatically.
You receive an email 24 hours prior to printing, giving you the option to opt out. If you want the postcard to go out, you do nothing and the postcard is mailed to surrounding home owners of the property address.
That’s it!
There is no commitment for you to use this service and you can stop using it when ever you want.
However, it’s doubtful you’ll stop.
Once you’ve been freed of a time consuming activity and able to focus all of your attention on growing your business there will be no turning back.
There’s no longer a reason to leave money on the table. Your opportunity multiplying Just Listed and Just Sold postcards can go out EVERY TIME.
Go Now to MLSMailings.com and start freeing up time for the important tasks ONLY YOU can do for your business!
Order Free printed sample postcards from MLSMailings.com, here.
Need help targeting the perfect niche of buyers or sellers? Use our mailing list tool to create the ideal list (it’s easy) or call our support team for assistance at 866.405.3638!
PLUS: When you have time…here are Free killer tools to help your success this year!
1. Become a Listing Legend Free eBook
Ready to take a vertical leap in your real estate career? If you’re looking for inspiration…and the tools and methods to dominate a market and go to the top in real estate…you’ll find them in this free book. – Click Here
2. “Get More Listings” Free Online Webinar
“Get MORE Listings & Begin to Dominate Your Market!” Free online webinar. Learn the 3-7-27 strategy for explosive growth, why 95% of agents have less than 20% market share, and how to become the agent everyone competes against. – Click Here
3. The 12 Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan
The Real Estate Marketing Planner is a powerful 12-Month-Guide that strategically defines what marketing to do when. Four key market segments are included, Niche Marketing, Get More Listings, Geographic Farming, and Sphere of Influence. –Click Here
4. The Free One-Page Real Estate Business Plan
Treat your business like a business it is vital to long-term success in this industry. Some agents may put together elaborate business plans, yet there’s something powerful about keeping it simple. Check out our one page Online Real Estate Business Plan. – Click Here
5. The Free Online ROI Calculator
Consistency and automation are the keys to success. Discover how effective direct mail marketing can dramatically increase your bottom line. Enter your statistics in our Free online ROI Calculator and click the ‘CALCULATE MY ROI’ button to see your results instantly! –Click Here
The importance of video within the real estate industry applies more to listing agents than buyers’ agents, at least according to a six-year-old study. Results of the study found that 73 percent of homeowners want a listing agent who uses video to market homes.
Avoid the top 3 mistakes
Despite knowing that videos may not be popular with all homebuyers, offering them to your listing clients is mandatory. As mentioned above, most want a video of their home and they expect it. Not giving your listing clients what they want is a big mistake.
As long as you are committed to creating a video, why not create one without the mistakes, so often seen online:
Overly-dark videos
Camera shake
Amateur/homemade look
The following are the three most common listing video mistakes and how to correct them.
Mistake 1- Penny-pinching
The old saying that “you get what you pay for” might not have been coined by a real estate agent who pinched pennies and obtained poor quality work, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it was.
Videographers do charge money for their services, but they may not be as expensive as you think. In fact, we did an informal, non-scientific, cursory web search for prices and find professionals offering their services for as little as $200.
There are some photographers who offer packages which include a video walkthrough of the home. For instance, one Phoenix, Arizona photographer charges a reasonable $400 for a package that includes 25 photos, HD walkthrough video, twilight photos and a virtual tour.
Remember, your listing videos will most likely become examples in the marketing plan you show potential listing clients. Will they be examples of how you cut corners or will they show home sellers that you will pull out all the stops to sell their homes?
Mistake 2 — Not ensuring your videos do double duty
Sure, the purpose of the video is to market your listing, but videos do double duty, according to Forrester Research. Videos are 50 times more likely to show up on the first page of Google search results than text pages, if they’re optimized, according to research.
Why not leverage the power of YouTube to benefit your business while also promoting your client’s listing?
The Fix:
Mashable’s Nate Elliot suggests doing the following:
Use your keywords in the video’s title, tags and description when you upload it to YouTube.
After uploading the video to YouTube, embed it on your website. According to Elliot, Google considers “how many times a video is viewed, and any views embedded videos receive on your own site get added to the ‘views’ tally on YouTube.”
Create a video sitemap.
Mistake 3 – Too long, didn’t watch
When something becomes such a common, annoying practice that an acronym is created (tl;dw) stands for “too long, didn’t watch”, you know it’s best to avoid the practice.
Americans are busy. We also tend to have the attention span of a kitten – and are as easily distracted. YouTube says that visitors typically watch for 3.5 minutes.
The National Center for Biotechnology Information, on the other hand, claims that the average amount of time spent on a single video is 2 minutes and 42 seconds.
And, if you don’t get their attention in the first 10 seconds, kiss them goodbye.
In fact, research shows that you’ll lose 30 percent of viewers within the first 30 seconds of your video and, when it reaches the one-minute mark, another 45 percent will leave.
So, plan on putting the most important stuff up front and keep the entire video as short as possible.
Nearly 90 percent of the homebuyers surveyed by NAR found “photos very useful,” while only half of them said the same for real estate videos. Don’t make the common mistakes of other agents that result in unwatchable videos.
Follow the above guidelines to produce listing videos that enhance your marketing and sales efforts and keep your clients smiling.
Need help targeting the perfect niche of buyers or sellers? Use our mailing list toolto create the ideal list or call our support team for assistance at 866.405.3638!
PLUS: When you have time…here are 3 free ways we can help you CRUSH IT in 2018!
1. The Free 2018 Real Estate Business Plan.
Treat your business like a business it is vital to long-term success in this industry. Some agents may put together elaborate business plans, yet there’s something powerful about keeping it simple. Check out our one page Online Real Estate Business Plan – Click Here
2. The Free Online ROI Calculator.
Consistency and automation are the keys to success. Discover how effective direct mail marketing can dramatically increase your bottom line. Enter your statistics in our Free online ROI Calculator and click the ‘CALCULATE MY ROI’ button to see your results instantly! –Click Here
3. The 12 Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan.
The Real Estate Marketing Planner is a powerful 12-Month-Guide that strategically defines what marketing to do when. Four key market segments are included, Niche Marketing, Listing Inventory, Geographic Farming, and Sphere of Influence – Click Here – Click Here
New agents, tortured by what feels like an enormously long wait between license application and receipt, typically tend to want to hit the ground running the minute that license is in the broker’s hands.
It’s only natural to want to jet down the runway to success, but how will you get from here to there?
That’s what a business plan is: a roadmap of how to reach your income goals from where you are right now. Once you’re familiar with the real estate terrain, and you know the shortcuts, the map may feel like an unnecessary encumbrance, but it’s not.
Business plans aren’t static and require tweaking as you move up in your real estate career. Your sphere of influence grows, requiring the use of good contact management software. Your personal expenses may change and you will no doubt need to adjust your marketing expenses along the way.
The process of creating a “roadmap for success” for the new agent is a bit challenging, though. I mean, you have no past expenses with which to estimate a budget. How do you plan for marketing when you don’t know how much money you’ll have to play with?
You estimate. It’s that simple.
Map out your first-year goals
Make a realistic determination of where you want to be in your new business by the end of your first year.
This should include both a financial goal (how much money you’ll make) and other goals as well. For instance, your goals may include adding 100 people to your sphere of influence or to come up with a killer listing presentation. A financial goal could be planning to put aside a certain dollar amount to buy additional tools.
Create a budget
To come up with an accurate budget requires understanding your personal as well as business expenses, both fixed and variable.
Start with your personal expenses, such as your house payment or rent, what you pay for utilities, groceries, entertainment and the like. This will give you an idea of the total amount of income you’ll need to cover these expenses.
Determining your business expenses will be a bit more challenging since you have no figures from last year on which to base your assumptions. Breaking these expenses into smaller chunks will help you get a handle on them.
Startup expenses: These include your NAR, state and local association fees, MLS dues, lockbox expenses and the cost of any tools you’ll need to buy to get going (laptop, software, website expenses, etc.).
Marketing expenses: You’ll need to market your business as well as any homes you may list this year. We offer a series of Agent Introduction, Listing Inventory and Just Listed postcards that will get you off on the right foot.
Ongoing expenses: Your automobile gas budget is about to explode now that you are part of the real estate industry. Plan on spending a good deal of your budget on your vehicle – maintenance and gas for starters.
Then, there are your phone, internet, web hosting and the other costs that will recur routinely throughout the year.
How much do you need to make?
This is the trickiest part of your business plan, but the most critical as well. You’ll want to estimate how many sides you’ll need this year to get the money you want to make. This means figuring out how many prospects it will take to get a transaction, knowing the average sales price in the area in which you work and crunching some numbers.
We have put together the perfect simple yet effective business plan worksheet to help you do these calculations. You can find it online here.
Once you know how many listings or sales you’ll need each month to reach your financial goals, you’re on your way to success.
It’s time to introduce your new status to the world (or at least your corner of it).
Send out the Neighborhood Specialist postcard from the Agent Introduction Series to at least 100 new prospects in an area you want listings.
Need help targeting the perfect niche of sellers or buyers? Use our mailing list tool to create the ideal list or call our support team for assistance at 866.405.3638!
PLUS: When you have time…here are 3 free ways we can help you CRUSH IT in 2018!
1. The Free 2018 Real Estate Business Plan.
Treat your business like a business it is vital to long-term success in this industry. Some agents may put together elaborate business plans, yet there’s something powerful about keeping it simple. Check out our one page Online Real Estate Business Plan – Click Here
2. The Free Online ROI Calculator.
Consistency and automation are the keys to success. Discover how effective direct mail marketing can dramatically increase your bottom line. Enter your statistics in our Free online ROI Calculator and click the ‘CALCULATE MY ROI’ button to see your results instantly! – Click Here
3. The 12 Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan.
The Real Estate Marketing Planner is a powerful 12-Month-Guide that strategically defines what marketing to do when. Four key market segments are included, Niche Marketing, Listing Inventory, Geographic Farming, and Sphere of Influence – Click Here – Click Here
Success begins with the right mindset. Real estate sales is not just a job; it is a business. A business that requires planning, organization and systems to maintain balance, accountability and forward momentum. The following details the 3 steps to epic success.
Step 1: Have a Plan
Planning is critical to realizing your goals, generating consistent income and creating an exit plan. The proper exist plan ensures you have a valuable “book of business” that you can sell when you are ready to retire. Your plan should:
be written out and clearly defined
have a realistic and comprehensive budget
be based not only on your goals, but also on your family’s goals (very important to maintaining the support system necessary during long days or tough weeks!)
outline the number of transactions you need to reach those goals based on commission dollars, list-to-close ratio and fall-through rate
outline the number of contacts, appointments scheduled/.attended you need to realize your transaction goal
break your numbers down into daily, weekly and monthly activities so that you ALWAYS know where you are in relation to your goal
Be sure to share your plan with a manager, coach or partner so that you can set up a system of accountability.
Step 2: Employ Smart Marketing
In today’s competitive arena, effectively marketing yourself and your business requires both consistency and laser focus.
Countless agents send single marketing pieces to thousand of consumers, with no intention of following up. This approach is a waste of time, energy and valuable marketing dollars.
The truth is, you should be in contact with your sphere of influence at least every 30-45 days. One month, send a postcard, letter, newsletter or flyer. Many of our customers find the Listing Inventory Series, Content Cards, and Market Dominator among their favorites.
The following month, call with a friendly event reminder, helpful hint, or just to say hello.
During the third month, arrange to see them via a networking event, social gathering or in-person visit. Drop off a small token, informational item or card. Then start the “rotation” over again.
Such consistency creates vital ‘top-of-mind’ awareness. This awareness becomes “the key to the kingdom” when growing your referral base and creating a reliable income.
Gone are the days when agents could afford to take a “shotgun” approach-casting a wide net in the hopes of “catching a few”.
Response rates increase dramatically when you speak directly to the needs and interests of a particular group.
Wise agents seek out demographics or geographics that they relate to or have a history of success with.
The more comfortable you become speaking to a particular group or segment, the more you become recognized or thought of as a specialist in that field.
First-time homeowners – Try MapMyMail to quickly create a list of local renters. Send a postcard that explains the advantages of home ownership.
Builders – Offer to help builders eliminate their #1 worry: standing inventory. Create a list of every builder in your area and send a flyer explaining how you can find their perfect customer.
Find a new niche – With our Lifestyle Interest data, you can reach consumers who are just the demographic you want to work with. Think Golfers, Boaters, Fitness Lovers and more.
FSBOs – There are many effective search products for this demographic. Fear leads many agents to steer clear of FSBOs, which eliminates at least a portion of your competition.
A New Geographic Farm – Find an area in your market that is beginning to see turnover, but doesn’t currently have another agent with more than a 10% market share. Start connecting month after month using the Neighborhood Update/Free Offer series. This series will present yourself effectively as the turn-to agent in your market.
Step 3: Put Solid Systems in Place
Without systems, you’re like a hamster on the wheel-spinning without really getting anywhere. Systems are the only way to maintain the delegation, automation and streamlining that will continuously work on your business. Systems allow you to:
manage your time effectively
create a consistent standard of service
assure clients that their needs are being met by a “team”
provide checks and balances for fine tuning your business
promote efficiency and accuracy
reduce training time when bringing on new team members
What systems should you have in place?
time management
lead generation/prospecting
pre-listing/listing presentations (download some of the free reports we have for these)
The success mind-set requires dedication and a commitment to the activities that earn you top dollar and allow you to “feed” the career you’re building.
pectsPLUS! Becomes an invaluable resource. We offer a wide range of fully customizable marketing templates for postcards, brochures, newsletters, and more.
