Could Less Be More?

A recent post on the 1000WATT blog--thanks to Greg Cooper for pointing me to that one--got me to thinking about marketing for our real estate businesses.  The blog noted that, while email "open rates" are at all time highs, we need to remember one of Peter Drucker's wise statements:

"The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well the product or service fits him and sells itself."

By that, Drucker--and the blogger--mean that the better we taylor our marketing message to reflect exactly what the prospective customer wants, the higher the probability we'll connect and develop a client relationship.  That makes sense.

But the blogger points out that with so many emails filling inboxes these days, the effectiveness of drip campaigns like our monthly newsletter, Market Watch, or ecards, may not be as effective as they used to be.  Hmmmm.  He then takes it a step further and recommends "turning off" our drip campaigns--doing less--for our real estate business and only touching our sphere of influence a couple times a year with a much more focused phone call or face to face meeting.  Then, he goes so far as to "guarantee" more success in our business!  

Really?

Recalling Michael Maher's Communication Hierarchy pyramid with shotgun style broad advertising at the bottom, or least effective, level and one on one meetings at the top, or most effective, we all know we get a better return from the investment of our time and money in such face to face chats.  But does it follow that it means that's the ONLY thing we need to do?  How about, instead of making it the ONLY thing, let's just consider it the MOST IMPORTANT thing we can do, and plan and use our time accordingly?

I'd suggest that, especially given the heavy email traffic our sphere of influence may receive, it's even more important to make sure we have an integrated approach--a true marketing plan--that combines email drip campaigns with "Just Sold" postcards, hand written notes, phone calls, and those crucial face to face meetings.   And Drucker is correct, so it will pay off if we taylor our messages to best strike the right chord with our potential clients, and that chord is of course based on our own personalized mission statement focused on our own target market. 

So, now is that time of year when we can take a break and work on our 2014 annual business planning, starting with fine tuning our mission statement and target market so we can create the most effective marketing plan to help our business grow next year.  

I guarantee it!

David M. Hassler
Director of Coaching