| |
Are You Trying to Hit a Home Run With Your Prospects Without Asking Them on a Date?
By Tim O'Keefe
Real Estate email marketing
Do you remember the old School girl/boy game of "Around the World", or
"Around the Bases"? If you got a kiss you got to First Base. A french Kiss
was Second Base. Read further to find out how to hit a Home Run!
Are You Trying to Hit a Home Run With Your Prospects Without Asking
Them on a Date?
Most prospects are only leaving their phone number about 1/3 of the
time. So 2/3 are leaving just a name and email. If you don't have a
strategy to approach this group, you are losing big time because your
cost per lead skyrockets.
If you invest $9,000 a year into your online real estate marketing
campaign. And you get 500 leads a month, your Cost per Lead is $1.50*.
But if you aren't touching your email only leads, then you are affectively
only getting 165. Your Cost Per Click jumps over three times to $4.55!
*$9000 a year/12=$750 a month. $750/500 leads=$1.50;$750/165=
$4.55)
Email marketing is the most important part of online marketing. Yet, I find
that it is the least understood, and least time spent by Online Realty
professionals. Some agents will spend all day on their website. They will
effort on SEO to capture a real estate lead. Yet, they never spend the
time to strategize on how to court the opt in subscriber.
Marketing your real estate services thru email is about getting to the first
date. Then the second, and then third. Until there is a marriage whereby
you both swear allegiance to one another. And of course like many
modern day relationships, this guy or gal will break this allegiance as soon
as the scent of the next "hottie" walks past.
You may not even get to First Base let alone hit a home run. And your
prospect may not even let you go on a second date. But one thing is for
sure you will never get to a sale unless you start at the beginning. Then
you can get to First Base....and second and so on. But most agents try to
steal a kiss, without even asking the prospect out!
Instead of being "easy", think of your prospect as that guy or gal you
have to beg and beg to go out out with you. And then after all that
finessing she only agrees to go to breakfast! You have to strategize to
win her over. You bring flowers. You do apparant random acts of
kindness just to get to a second date and maybe first base. Before Free
Love, this was called Courting.
Your prospect is not a product of the 60's. They believe that their loyalty
comes with a cost. They want to be courted and you to prove yourself
worthy. And making your listings available or offering a free report is a nice
olive branch, but this frigid Diva expects some major courting. Do you
really want this gal? Are you going to take care of her in good times and
bad? Then you gotta pah-roove it.
The fact is that the vast amount of your prospects will not leave a phone
number, and most won't take any serious action for several weeks. As I
explained in one of my Ten Commandments of Online Marketing, people
typically come to a real estate website to compare property. And they
just do not know what they do not know.
At this point there is very little or no loyalty to you or your website. As
long as the info flows, and they can get your MLS listings they will be
happy enough to revisit your site, if for only the new home listings.
So in order to breed loyalty and afinity you must do a few specific actions.
Get yourself an Autoreponder/Drip Email system.
These automatic email systems communicate with your prospect while
you sleep. You write your letters and articles once. And the system will
send a mailer on pre-programmed days for ever. Until your prospect raises
their hand and says I am interested to take this relationship to the next
level.
Take your list and segment them.
Why would you segment your visitors? Because they think they are the
most important person in the world. And if you want them to think you
are the most important Realtor in the world, you have to make them
important first.
This goes eons beyond dividing your prospects into buyers and sellers,
and hot, medium and cold. Your email communications to a 30 year Vet
at IBM should convey a unique tone and context diferent than your
typical communication with say a self employed-entreupreneiral
Contractor.
Educate & Interact
When you can get someone to have an "aha" experience, you often
times will etch out a piece of their brain for you. Congratulations! You
have now risen above just Real Estate agent. You are above the rest
because you have become not just someone who sells real estate. But
someone who cares enough to take the time to care for this person who
is the most important person in the world.
How? Teach them and get them to move along the sales funnel by
bringing them to your site to learn and or get valuable and free reports.
I am not talking about the typical pre-written Real Estate articles and
newsletters. You need to pour blood and write from your experience,
from your heart. Would you send the object of your affection a
templated love letter from a book? What would her reaction be? Thats
the same reaction you will get from your prospect.
Your personality and expertise will shine thru and you will seperate
yourself from all the others whom are too lazy to prove that they are an
expert. Which is why when you do it, you will profit handsomely.
As you get your real estate prospect to interact with you and your site.
You can ask them to reveal more and more until you have enough
information to segment them, and take them to the next level of your
relationship. And then perhaps they will want to do more than just "go
out with you".
About the Author
Tim O'Keefe
Spider Juice Technologies
Real Estate Marketing
310-533-9145
http://houseblogger.typepad.com
Article Source: http://www.simplysearch4it.com/article/5152.html
| If you wish to add the above article to your website or newsletters then please include the "Article Source: http://www.simplysearch4it.com/article/5152.html" as shown above and make it hyperlinked. |
| Some other articles by Tim O'Keefe | Making an offer on an Irish Property
More often than not, First Time Buyer Ireland couples/singles find it very difficult to obtain suitable mortgage offers. However, after you pass the mortgage loan toil, the next issue on the ...
Ugly people – more than a joke
We can think long and hard about what makes us humans. The truth of the matter is that we are not perfect and we all have our own defects. Ugliness is part of ...
Ugly men and ugly women – ugly on the inside/outside?
The Internet is one of the most amazing things ever invented. It can offer us all the info we need and much more. The online world can be a lot of fun ...
Do ugly women feel the same as ugly men?
There have been a lot of research studies made about ugly people. When I say ugly people I don't just ...
Ugly women and men facing the issue of beauty
From ugliness to beauty – nothing can be more representative than examples. If you look it up on the Internet, you'll see just how ...
Ugly people and charisma
We are sure that the idea of ugly women who nonetheless possess unbelievable, charming and persuasive powers is not new to your mind. And this doesn't go true for women ...
|
|
| |
|
|
|
