We all know that Real Estate is sold most commonly by face to
face contact. Sure, there are occasional telephone deals and
appointments etc. made by phone but generally one gets to exercise
their personality and nature through all media. Let me explain.
With face to face contact the following will generally become
known in the space of a short amount of time: grammar, appearance,
punctuality, tone, dress style, age, sex (male/female not how
often), self-image, self-confidence, attitude, permanent injuries,
etc. Anything that one can pick up with sight, smell, touch, feel
and audibility. All the five senses come into play here. This is a
very powerful tool if used correctly.
Then there is selling by the telephone. Here you can't call on
all the senses to work for you as you can with face to face
selling. Your voice, tone and attitude need to emanate your
personality just to get a telephone interview. I was living in
London a couple of years ago selling advertising with an
engineering publishing firm for a percentage. The job entailed
cold calling potential advertisers to both Europe and North
America asking for thousands of pounds from just one telephone
call.
One's honesty and integrity must be instantly made known through
an effervescent personality so it becomes an informative
conversation as opposed to a boring old lecture. I think you know
the type of phone call I mean! Sometimes you'll get a telephone
call from someone with no clue trying to sell you vinyl cladding
for your house. You tell him that you live in an apartment and
you're only renting but he still keeps chatting at the same tone
as if you hadn't said a word. Many of these poor sods are working
for an hourly wage instead of a commission. This lack of incentive
is evidenced by their apparent disinterest in what they're doing.
Just imagine how interested you'd be if they were full of life and
grabbed your attention with a good rapport building joke or
something to open followed by asking questions that could only be
answered yes to whilst radiating personality the whole time!!!
Sure, the telephone is a hard medium to sell through. I
remember my statistics were about 1/70. Every 70 times I picked up
that phone I'd make a sale. Keeping the attitude to maintain the
same level of personality through the entire day needed work but
as time went on I knew it had to become my strong point.
Now I'm online. I believe this to be the hardest method of the
three to sell through. Here are some of the reasons why:
- Objections are not given the chance to be countered.
- Net
Marketing is cheapened by those looking for a quick buck.
- It's
hard to know who you're talking to online.
- It's still new - so
real experts are not plentiful.
- Many would be purchasers don't
take web businesses seriously.
- Purchasers can easily click away
- never 2B seen again.
- Spamming isn't as accepted as it is by
post, telephone or fax. (I Don't advocate spamming online. I also
don't complain about receiving it to the relevant ISP.)
And a host of other reasons...
Like the method of the telephone the ability to use all your
senses is reduced somewhat. Therefore we must capitalize on what
we can use to optimize the results from our message. Many of your
sales will be made through your writing style online. As I see it
there are three ways publishers and salespeople can put their
message before their audience via email. Only one of these methods
utilizes the power of the relationship between the subscriber and
the publisher optimally.
The first is the day to day garbage that we generally filter
out immediately when we get it; commonly known as spam. It is by
far the least effective method of email communication. I have
advanced email filters in place that will trash most of it before
I even see it. Jim Daniels wrote an article in his excellent
BizWeb Gazette last week in relation to "headlines". It
seems that most who opt for spamming don't look past earning the
first dollar. They are generally littered with ridiculous claims
that really do insult the intelligence of any potential target
group. Headlines such as "$10,000 - Overnight For Absolutely
No Effort" or "I Made $500,000 in Six Months! Ask Me
How!"
This form of marketing targets the masses, pisses most people
off and is looking simply for the one off sale. There is no
relationship building at all on the part of the marketer.
Early last year when I first came online I was none the wiser
with spamming. I genuinely thought the whole world would be
delighted to hear my offer. So I sent my offer out to 1500, what I
thought to be targeted, email addresses. I ended up getting 155
replies. 17 were interested in my offerings. The other 138 were
"hate mail". I couldn't believe that first of all not
everyone was over the moon with what I had; and secondly (and most
importantly) that people could be so mean simply because of an
email text message. I was booted off by my ISP and had only 17
interested names to show for my work. I needed to start over!
Imagine how much better my response would have been if I'd
taken the time to target those who are genuinely interested as
opposed to the public at large!!!
It was a big lesson. I'm glad I did it early on as I learnt
first hand the true "non-value" of such an exercise. I
honestly felt like JR Ewing as I got continued abuse letters for a
week. I almost half expected Krystal to break into my office with
a revolver and give me what I (apparently) deserved. Needless to
say I never did it again. I then developed what so many before me
had advised me to do; this was to start my own "opt-in
mailing list".
This is the second option of email marketing. I then decided to
begin my own database for direct marketing; thus the birth of
"AAvenues 2 Your Success" (or "The Topliving
Success Series" as it was until early November, 1998). You
are all more than likely familiar with this form of marketing.
Delivery is by subscription only! Your own opt-in list allows you
to stay in regular contact with your target audience. Your
subscribers are virtually inviting you to send them your offer!
Don't get me wrong here - if you simply send a sales letter to
your subscribers then they'll just laugh you out onto the street.
They will do this by way of mass exodus. Subscribers want
information in their field of interest not simply ways they can
part with their cash! I mentioned in an email to a potential
client last week that in real estate it's "location location
location" that's important. I believe without a doubt in
email marketing this is "value value value". If this
value is not adequately provided then subscription cancellations
will abound and you won't sell anything.
Ezine marketing to an opt-in list allows you so many options as
a Net Marketer. It's paramount to your success! You need to have
an ezine in your field! If you aren't keeping an opt-in list then
start one today. It goes beyond the scope of this article to dig
deeper into this topic. Subscribe to the ezines at the following
URLs to dig deeper on this sub-topic:
http://topliving.com/ezine_list.htm
but most importantly at:
http://topliving.com/thanksnletter.htm
The title of this article is "THE POWER OF PERSONAL
CONTACT: (The In-Depth Benefits of Rapport Building & Personalization)". I want to talk about developing your
opt-in list using not just your suave writing ability and powers
of copy writing but actually adding a spice that very few
marketers have bothered to explore to its potential with email
marketing. This is the power of personalization.
When you receive a letter in the post from a friend you will
almost 100% of the time read the letter from beginning to end.
Why? Because there is a relationship in existence between the two
of you! Everything in this handwritten letter was written
personally for you. All you have to do is transpose this sort of personalization
to your subscriber base.
People are looking to get quality information from someone they
feel they can trust. Building trust on The Net takes time and
needs the right ingredients. Remember, the only one of our five
senses that can be fully utilized by email marketing is really
sight. Everything is virtual! So, those reading your offerings
need to not just be impressed with your finesse and marvelous ability to present your wares professionally and positively but
also to feel a connection that you are indeed a friend with their
greatest interests at heart. I am now truly starting to see the
fruits of my work from adopting this sort of approach.
Personalising your emails coupled with creative and powerful
copy will be a very positive step for your email marketing
campaign. Optimize your resources and reap the benefits.
