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By ⋅ August 6, 2008 ⋅

Why your marketing may not be working and what to do about it

Every now and then, I hear someone complaining about marketing and how it does not work. I’ve listened to Real Estate Agents as well as Real Estate Investors telling me

"I tried sending out letters, but that didn’t work… I tried newspaper ads and that too did not work… I sent post cards, post cards do not work… what should I do?"

Always copy… but be picky!

I want to talk about this issue because surprisingly it is too common, and this topic is dear to me… You see, Agents and Investors are never truly trained on Marketing and Direct Marketing concepts so they tend to follow the crowd and duplicate letters, or post cards they have seen others sending out, or run ads others run.

Thats not a bad strategy at all, in the world of Marketing this is called building a Swipe File which is basically a collection of successful marketing items by you or others that you can tweak to your message and send out. I have a large list of such swipe files myself.

The key here however is "successful" marketing items, not just marketing items. If you get any kind of Real Estate related mailings, you will quickly realize how they all look the same. Heck, if you open the newspaper and look at the ads by Agents or Investors, you will see ONE ad duplicated over and over with a different phone number. You may see few words in the ad changed, but that is about it. We call this the "Me Too Syndrome" where everyone copies everyone.

Next time you get a mailing piece, or see an ad in the paper, run it through the following test:

1. Does the headline makes you want to read more, or would you throw it away
2. Does it tell you what how you can benefit if you replied?
3. Do you feel compelled to reply?
4. Does it give you a feeling of urgency or a feeling of can’t wait to call?

If it doesn’t, then why copy it? why do the same type of mailing or advertising?

If It Doesn’t Work Then What?

I ask those who complain about certain type of marketing such as letters, post cards, or even ads in the paper that if I tell you another way of marketing and it does not work for you then what?Would you quit the business? or just sit around the office looking for yet another way to throw money at?

The reality is that Marketing works, and works well. When your mailing fails, you should fix the problem not look for a completely different type of marketing media (method).

1. Was the letter well written and follows the guidelines I cover?
2. Was it sent to the right people? You can send a letter soliciting someone to sell their house, but if they just moved in, or they are renting, then your response will most likely suck…
3. Did you follow up or send second and third letter or just one and given up?
4. Did you just mail to low number of people? 100 mailings is not a good measurement
5. Did you TEST different headlines, formats, content?

Marketing is about testing till you find what works best for you, then you stick with it till the return dries down. Then you tweak it and try it again…

My Advice…

Copy those who are successful, not just any one. And don’t pick and choose of what they do to copy… If they are successful, then their entire system is designed to work together. Successful people do make mistakes but they are quickly to correct them.

In business, there is no such thing as failure. There is a test and retest till you get it right. Never think in terms of success and failure.

If certain type of marketing does not work, make sure it failed because that method does not work in your market and not because there is a marketing rule being violated. If all your marketing methods are failing, then it is time to evaluate your marketing and not the method you are using.

Happy Marketing!