Many real estate investors will agree…. One of the best marketing techniques for finding deals is direct mail. A steady campaign of communications through the mail can bring in outstanding results. Especially if you stick with it.
But, direct mail is challenging. It can also be expensive. To do a direct mail campaign correctly, you have to:
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Create a list of likely prospects
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Write multiple sales letters or postcards
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Potentially have a website with content that your postcards advertise
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Stuff envelopes (letters) and add stamps to the letters/postcards
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Take them down to the post office
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Repeat over and over again for a steady stream of leads
With the costs and the logistics of direct mail, many people drop out after sending one or two mailings. Most of the success, though, comes after the 5th, 6th or 7th mailing. Or even more.
You have to stay in your prospects head because you never know when they might call.
One Stop Design Shop
We found a website that will remove a lot of the hassle of direct mail. It’s called Prospects Plus. Although a lot of the information on the site is directed at Realtors looking for clients, it could easily be adapted to real estate investors.
Prospects Plus can really help you out with your advertising. It’s a one-stop shop for a whole bunch of design templates:
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Business Cards
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Door Hangers
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Flyers
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Postcards
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Free Reports
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Luxury Marketing Templates for High-End Flippers
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Mailing Lists
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Return Address Labels
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Custom Stationary
You can design all your postcard mailings right on the site or adapt some of their designs. You can upload QR codes and integrate them in your designs. You can have a different postcard going to your prospects with each mailing. You can also test mailings to see which postcard or copy works best.
Send Out Mail Campaigns Automatically
Once you have your designs laid out and ready to go, Prospects Plus can put it in the hands of the best leads.
You can upload your own list of potential motivated sellers or cash buyers with an Excel file. Or you can have Prospects Plus generate a list.
As you can see, they have three options for generating your list. ‘Map My Mail’ uses Google Maps to locate a certain geographic area. Then Prospects Plus scans the tax assessor data to tell you if the address is owner occupied or is an absentee owner. Absentee owners are a great source for potential motivated sellers.
The Demographic Search option (2, above) lets you build your own custom list based on certain criteria. Some of the criteria available for the Demographic search include:
Admittedly, many of these categories might interest Realtors more than investors, but you can still find cash buyers (‘Real Estate Investors’), ‘Empty Nesters’ who want to sell and ‘Baby Boomer and Elderly’ for potential probate leads.
Expired listings are also available. If you select the custom option, you can also find lists of people with lots of equity in their homes. Rates for names on these lists can be as low as .08 cents.
The Nielsen Prizm codes are geared to lots of specific industries. They break down potential customers based on criteria that has worked in previous mail campaigns. There is a category in this method for searching for real estate investors. It looks like it’s meant to target people who invest in real estate, not necessarily motivated sellers.
Still, this could help you find cash buyers. Their titles for certain demographic groups may seem confusing at first. If you hover over the titles, you will find a detailed description of the people who make up the group.
Because these lists are more targeted and take more work to create, the cost of each address on these lists is .12 cents.
Once you have your list created, and your postcards designed, it’s time to mail them out. Yup – Prospects Plus can send them out for you as well, directly from their website.
Here is the pricing page for Prospects Plus postcard mailings. Generally, your price will vary depending on the volume of postcards you send. However, it’s still pretty cheap, even at lower volume levels.
The prices start out at just .64 cents for a standard post card (5.5”x4.25”). Considering the stamp is currently .34 cents at the post office, this seems like a great deal to take the headache away.
Prospects Plus also can schedule your entire campaign. You just upload which postcard you want sent and when you want to send them. Prospects Plus automatically prints the cards and sends them on the dates you specify.
They won’t charge you for the mailings until the postcards have been sent. If you send out a set every month, you will only be charged when you send them out. In the meantime, you can edit the cards, add to the list or subtract from it.
All the postcards are mailed first class. With first class, you’ll know if the name on the address is not correct because the postcard will be returned to you. Returned postcards can be gold mines. Most investors just remove that person from their list. But if you can track down the real owner, though, you might not have any competition for a super deal.
Although Prospects Plus isn’t specifically geared toward real estate investors, it can easily be adapted to help your advertising. The automation cuts down on your work, the pricing is reasonable and the image it presents is very professional.
Speak Up
Have you used Prospects Plus? Tells us about it below.
Be Persistent – Don’t give up after the first contact with a potential lead. Follow up over and over again for the greatest success.
Look into Direct Mail – There’s a reason you get so much junk mail in your mailbox – it works! Consider using it in your advertising.
Link Old Tech with New Tech – Make sure you are putting all your contact information, website and other data on the postcard for people to find out more about you and easily reach you.
JP Moses
is a real estate investor in Memphis, TN, with experience ranging from land lording to note buying, rehabbing, and wholesaling. However, wholesaling is the area that he enjoys most and where he bring the most experience and expertise to his students.