Retool Your Real Estate System by Learning How to Avoid Bad Prospects
Author: Jeff Crossriver
Source: ezinearticles.com
Most real estate marketing plans conjure up ways to get to as many potential candidates as possible. After all, part of marketing a property for sale or rent is about also coming into contact with future prospects that you could do business with. But adopting a "come one come all" approach may not be the best practice for you in the long run. Your goal is to come into contact with the right kind of prospects and having to constantly deal with bad prospects can be a real drag on your business. There are some things you can put into place at the front end as you design your marketing program that can save you big time.
Educate Your Prospects Ahead of Time - This is one of most important things you can do to improve your marketing efficiency. You can't blame prospects for asking a lot of questions and wanting to see the property if you haven't given them any information to start with. Simply by placing good content about your property at their disposal, your prospects will be more than happy to evaluate their fit with your property on their own. Sometimes you risk losing a prospect that really was a good fit because you never had the chance to point out why. But overwhelmingly, you will find that prospects having no business dealing with your property will filter themselves out automatically and that is far better than the risk of losing a one off prospect.
Set Up a 24/7 Pre-recorded Message - This low tech and low cost technique could turn out to be your very best friend. Have your ads or brochures funnel prospects either to your website presentation or to a pre-recorded message. On the telephone message you will present the best aspects about your property, including the key benefits to the listener, in a safe low pressure environment. A lot of prospects prefer getting property information remotely without having to deal with a sales person. This is great news from your point of view. You get to shine by carefully scripting out the very best things your listener should be aware of, without any competitive noise interfering with your message. Your pre-recorded message should be approximately three to five minutes long and should tell them exactly what you want them to do at the end of the message.
Ask Prospects to Participate in an Online Survey - This is a good way to get some advance information about a prospect to help you evaluate their fit for your property. This is typically done through an online website referred to as a Landing Page. Visitors to your website are presented with a minimal amount of information and offered a FREE REPORT if they fill out a short survey. The survey asks them questions regarding their preferences about real estate such as what amenities they would like to live by, how much they would be willing to pay for extraordinary property features, or how long they expect to stay in their next residence. Whatever important information you feel can help you filter your prospects without appearing overbearing can be included in a short 5 -10 question survey.
Prepare a Video Tour of Your Property - This is the perfect vehicle for giving prospects a visual feel for your property before coming over for a viewing. The video tour will be placed on your property website and does not have to be a professionally produced piece. You can quickly put together a great looking video at a surprisingly low cost using Microsoft PowerPoint and a voice over narration. You take the time to script out the story ahead of time in a fashion that points out all of the important benefits of the property to the viewer. Screen capture applications such as Camtasia Studio will record your slide presentation and voice over and convert it into a movie you can upload to your website on the fly. This will make your prospects happy because you gave them an opportunity to wrap their arms around what you have to offer without making the effort to visit the property. It should make you happy that unqualified prospects that have no business wasting your time will filter themselves out before ever giving you a call. As is the case with the pre-recorded telephone message, you have the opportunity to pitch your property message in a focused environment without any competition watering down your message.
The above techniques are but a few of the things you can do in advance to make your real estate marketing as efficient as possible. Your goal is to educate and persuade the best prospects and to filter out those prospects that are a poor fit for your property. Figuring out how to do this remotely without your personal involvement allows you to focus on the most productive aspects of your marketing plan. When you interact with a prospect that has been educated and already has enthusiasm for your property, you can focus all of your efforts on the close, which is the ultimate goal of real estate marketing.
Author - Jeff Crossriver has been marketing real estate for over 20 years. Get FREE video training on his breakthrough real estate system for Marketing Real Estate at http://www.VanquishYourVacancy.com.