A friend and I just finished a wonderful conversation on how perfect a time it is to use real estate postcard marketing as an effective means to reaching prospects. Here are three things we concluded on the benefits of real estate postcard marketing in today’s market:
Open Mail (no need to open)
When mailing brochures, packages, and envelopes, you’re left hoping that prospects take the time to open and read your message. However, with postcards the visuals and message go to work immediately without any need for opening. Prospects are hit upon contact. This is important since research shows that your marketing pieces have only 3 seconds to capture the attention of potential clients.
Effective -vs- other methods
Unlike emails or websites, postcards are held in hand while read. The act of consciously picking up a postcard is the first step toward opening up your prospect to your message. Remember, the prospect is physically holding your message and has to interact with your postcard (turn it over) for more information. This experience makes for a loose personal contact between you and your prospect from right within their home.
Personal Interaction
Aside from being cost-effective, real estate postcards beat out other real estate marketing methods by sheer circumstance. Unlike an ad, your postcard competes with only a handful of items in the mailbox on that day, rather than with the 250-300 ads in a typical newspaper or magazine.
Just the other day I received a real estate postcard in my mailbox from an agent. Aside from the postcard harboring lousy design, the postcard had horrible copy. This particular postcard I’d seen online from a vendor I’m well acquainted with. Then the question hit me: “Are today’s real estate postcard vendors aware that the market has changed?” The copy on the postcard read something to the effect of, “Call me to make your real estate dreams come true!” Does this agent have any idea that the market is embattled in a war for trust and value? Do they realize today’s copy on postcard marketing material must be about persuasive proofs, not claims alone. However, even more, is the postcard company who sold her the postcard aware of that? Is the company aware of the credit and housing crisis and how that factors into real estate marketing copy? I seriously doubt it.
Whether marketing with a just sold postcard, just listed postcard, or farming postcard, your message has to match the climate. In marketing it’s called “message-to-market match”. This postcard was most certainly off target. I could just see homeowners either (1) not noticing it because of its failed design or (2) reading it and throwing it the trash with all the other marketing junk we get that offer wild claims.
Is it really as simple as just throwing up a real estate website and having prospects line up for business? The short answer is an obvious no. However, it’s quite common to hear many play up the benefits of having a website. For certain, a website is a necessity for today’s Realtor, but it’s important to understand that having a site alone means nothing if it isn’t marketed. And with thousands of agent sites already in existents, and more being added everyday, marketing is ever an important thing.
Using Google Adwords is certainly an option, however, here’s the problem with this channel of marketing: it’s not personal enough. If you think about it, you’re using the same thing as your competition to attempt to stand out and appear different. A simple looking headline along with two lines of body copy. Is that really enough? Where’s the experience for the customer? There isn’t one. And the fact is it doesn’t take much for them to move past your ad and go to a larger competitor like Ziprealty or Redin who are buying up better ranking Adwords in the area you work. Bottom line: it’s too easy to get eaten by the big guys and not enough to stand out for the customer.
The answer to all of this is using real estate postcards to market your website. If you really want people to get a sense of what you’re about and what you can offer them put something in their hand. Give them something in their hand they can interact with and experience. Remember, according a 2005 National Association of Realtors study, most home sellers and buyers contacted only one agent. That means prospects aren’t doing a lot of searching out there for Realtors. So it’s best to go to the prospect first and meet them at their doorstep in the form of a postcard.
Another benefit about marketing with real estate postcards is that your marketing material is only competing for attention with mail that the prospect has received for that day (and chances are it won’t be another agent’s postcard right then and there.) So, again, using our website postcards will give you a better chance of standing out and securing a customer. It’s about increasing chances not taking them.
