Tips For A Profitable Real Estate Marketing Campaign

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2 Tips For A Profitable Real Estate Marketing Campaign What is Marketing? As usual, we like to define the main term that we will be referencing throughout the article to ensure that we re all on the same page. For this post, it s marketing and marketing is all about leveraging the speed and convenience of to communicate important messages, updates, tips and promotions to recipients that have opted into receiving such messages. Unfortunately a lot of spammers have abused marketing. As a result, people are much more difficult to reach, let alone provoke a response or action from. On the positive side, clients have done a better job of catching and blocking spam and marketers are now forced to be much more creative in their approach to get their messages through.even to willing recipients. So herein lies your task: LET S TAKE A LOOK AT HOW YOUR BUSINESS CAN PUT TOGETHER AN EFFECTIVE MARKETING CAMPAIGN IN THESE SIMPLE STEPS. marketing is a marketing method that uses s to promote to customers. To some, this can sound a bit difficult, but it really isn't. Using marketing to reach your customer base isn't as hard as you might think, especially if you pay close attention to the tips in the following article. Page 2

3 1) Select an Marketing Provider. The best thing we could tell you would be to do your homework, talk to and try different providers and go with the one that you click with the most. We re not going to do that though as we know you re probably not prepared to spend the time or money needed to do this. So, to make things a little easier we d like to recommend any of the following providers to support your marketing needs: AWeber MailChimp Constant Contact 2) When you ask people to opt-in, let them know what to expect. Tell them what type of information you will be sending and how often you will send it. People are more likely to sign up if they know that you are not going to flood their inboxes with wordy s that has no valuable content and they have no intention of reading. 3) Keep Your Contacts Organized. One of the most commonly overlooked elements of marketing is list segmentation. If you fail to properly segment your contacts into specific lists, then you will most certainly experience lower click through rates and response rates when you send your messages. Here are some common fields to segment your lists by: Location Industry Lead Source 4) Provide subscribers with a way out. Place an "unsubscribe" link in your s or on your website to allow them to remove themselves from your list. Page 3

4 There is a bit of disagreement about what to do when your reader does not react to your s. Do you remove them? Do you continue to market to them because many times they are at their early stage of the real estate transaction process? There are those who say you should also set up your list to cull itself by removing subscribers after a particular number of messages prompt no response or action from the recipient. This prevents your s from becoming annoying to disinterested subscribers and preserves your image. Then there are others who say, Leave them on the list. It doesn t cost me anything and as long as they have requested removal, they are content. 5) Focus on the Subject Line. Like great copy, one of the most important elements of a successful campaign is the subject line you decide to use. If your subject line is weak, then your may never be opened or could even be filtered as junk mail. We ve found the following subject line tips to help produce higher open rates: Avoid spammy words like guarantee, free, call now, urgent and order now Keep it under 50 characters (including spaces) Include your company / brand name Make it memorable, funny, intriguing and/or actionable 6) Use A/B testing to view the subject line. Choose an and use two different subject lines to see what works better. You will be able to see which subject lines encourage people to open your s and which ones you should avoid. Page 4

5 7) Strategically plan when your s will go out. People do not like getting s at inconvenient times, especially if it's something that they have to act on quickly. Be considerate by making your offers convenient and easy for people to take advantage of, and you will have more sales than you otherwise would. Time of day is typically in the morning at lunch and sometime later in the early evening. I have also heard that 3 a.m. is a good time too. This is something you can track by watching what time of day s are opened. Then set the schedule for the auto-send for that time. 8) Branding your marketing in a similar fashion to your other marketing endeavors will ensure your customers instantly recognize your content. Since this is true, you should put time and effort into designing an template that includes your logo and anything that sets you apart from the crowd. This brand recognition will create a more professional appearance and recognition so people trust the source. 9) Don t Overdo the Design. As with many things in marketing, the more simplified something is the more effective it usually will be. The same goes for design. Keep your s design very simple by following some of the tips below that we have found to be effective: Use more text than images (80% text, 20% images recommended) Include one primary call to action, but present it as both text links and a simple calls to action graphics Use design elements to get recipients to focus on the most important parts of the copy Page 5

6 10) As time goes on, more and more of your subscribers will be viewing your s through a mobile device such as a smartphone. You'll have much less screen area to work with on these types of devices. Find out more about the limitations that come with these devices, and be sure that the s will be able to be read on all screens. By The Way, Mobile Marketing is the Next Black!!!! Be prepared! 11) Not only should you provide your subscribers with an easy way to unsubscribe, but also you should ensure that it goes into effect immediately. Receiving s from you after they have unsubscribed will give recipients a negative impression about you, harming any future relationships with them. Process requests to unsubscribe right away. 12) Your s should be readable sans images. In this day of technology, most providers disable images by default, and unless the user changes their settings, they will not be able to see any images you include. Because of this, any images you include in the s that you send should also be followed by comprehensive text. Another way to allow readers to view the photo is to give them instruction to allow them to show in their . Most people use Outlook, so that may be a way to get a few more readers on board. 13) When you use pre-header materials, it is easier for the reader to identify your material. This is simply the opening line of your , highlighted. Many clients show this text underneath the subject of the , allowing the reader to get an idea of what the Page 6

7 content is. Make sure the content is reader-worthy or all the highlighting in the world is not going to get that opened. 14) When someone subscribes to your marketing list, confirm that this is what they really intended to do. Implementing this double opt-in strategy will make it much less likely that your provider will receive spam complaints about you. Also, you will be assured that the people receiving your s are actually interested in what you are sending them. 15) People will appreciate you valuing their time and sending out interesting s. Don't disrespect them by constantly sending out s that only want to sell them something. Instead, give them information they can use, such as solutions to problems, advice for homeowners, market reports, buyer and seller tips and information, etc. You know the drill. ADDITIONAL TIPS FOR MARKETING You, or someone else, should proofread your s before you send the campaign to customers. Ensure that it is free from typographical and grammatical errors. You should also make certain that the message flows easily. By checking these three issues are addressed, your marketing will have a professional appearance. If you want your marketing messages to be successful, make sure you have permission to send them. If you do not have permission from your recipients, the potential consequences can range from being added to spam filters all the way up to getting blacklisted by Internet service providers themselves. Be persistent with your marketing messages. It can take as many as twenty s to one prospect before you routinely have Page 7

8 their attention. Try telling a good story through your messages. Hook them with a few messages and let it unfold over a series. Running contests that span several weeks are good way to do this. To get the best results from your marketing campaign, test your messages thoroughly before you send them. Do not just type up a quick message and blast it out to your subscriber list without checking it carefully first. Preview it in different programs and on different platforms to make sure it will display properly for everyone. Beware of including attachments to your marketing! Mass s with attachments are instantly suspected as spam by most spam filters. As well, these days many types of computer malware and viruses are carried in attachments, and people are aware of this. Your is in jeopardy of being immediately deleted when they see an attachment without even being read. 9. Setup Tracking. Before you go sending out any campaigns, it is very important that you setup the proper tracking. Being able to evaluate the effectiveness of each campaign will prove essential to maximizing your ROI. Some of the metrics you should be looking to track through your provider s dashboard and a website analytics tool like Google Analytics are: Deliverability (rate at which your contacts actually received your message) Open rate (rate at which your contacts actually open / view your message) Click through rate (rate at which your contacts click on links / calls to Page 8

9 action in your message) Conversion rate (rate at which your contacts become leads / customers after getting to your website from your message) Collecting and analyzing statistics is as important to the success of an marketing campaign as it is to a business website. Invest in software that allows you to track the effectiveness of every , from what percentage of your s are actually opened to how many result in unsubscriptions. Our hope is that you have learned more about Real Estate Marketing Campaigns and understand how certain actions may affect your campaign. Don t be intimidated by marketing. This widely used marketing practice is fairly simple to implement and can be adapted in no time at all. Simply remember all of the tips that you read here and you will be on your way to using s for marketing. We will see you online! Page 9