My Secret to Tons of Referrals + Make Sense of Online Advertising Metrics + much more...

885,391 daily readers and growing! March 28, 2016 My Secret to Tons of Referrals Dear Reader, After speaking with several agents recently, it struck me that in one area I’ve done a really bad job at communicating and I want to take a moment to see if I can “fix it”. After all, communication is not just about what is “said” but rather what message is perceived by the hearer (or in my case, reader). Many of you have been reading and following me for years and know that I’ve written extensively on the topic of sphere of influence marketing. I’ve been very much against it as a sole method of building a real estate practice. In fact, in a popular article I answered the question, “What do you think of sphere of influence marketing with this quote: “It’s a great supplement to your regular marketing so long as it’s free. As a stand-alone marketing technique, it is destined to fail, and if executed perfectly will yield you maybe a deal a month. Statistically, it can never make you a top producing agent…” Many agents read a statement like that and assume I am down on building a base of repeat and referral business while nothing could be further from the truth. Let’s look at that statement again: “It’s a great supplement to your regular marketing…” and analyze it. At first glance it sounds like I’m against it, but I’m really not. Look around you at all the top producing agents you can think of. Most have been in the business for years and have a seemingly unending base of referral business. Now they are on easy street, so to speak. They are finally reaping the harvest of years of doing business and hundreds of happy clients coming back again and/or referring their friends. My point is this: When an agent reaches that point in his business, he doesn’t even need to advertise. The agent I’m speaking to is the agent who is still building his practice. I hate to see agents who are still in their building phase waste valuable marketing resources on what is already theirs -- the repeat business and referrals of happy customers. Today there are more ways than ever to stay in touch with previous customers without spending a dime. Email, text messages, phone calls, and the easiest of all, social media like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc. I hate to see agents wasting valuable marketing dollars on direct mail like postcards and newsletters, calendars, refrigerator magnets, and the list could go on forever. If you are still building your practice, you need to focus on advertising that has a direct relationship to results. Most advertising ideas are indirect. You spend a lot of money in various ways and hope that someone will call you. It’s the shotgun approach. You throw a bunch of money against the wall hoping some of it will stick. I believe that agents should focus on advertising ideas that have immediate and direct results -- what is known as “direct response” marketing. Indirect advertising or “branding” has one component: the advertisement. Direct response marketing has two: the advertising and some sort of capture mechanism. Of course if you are doing indirect advertising, your advertisement is about you -- how great you are. “I love me” advertising. You tell people enough times how great you are and hopefully some of them will believe you and give you a call. On the other hand, a direct response ad is all about your customer. What are they looking for right now? How can you solve a problem or meet a need right now? Then your ad directs them to a capture mechanism, whether phone or text or web technology, and you capture their contact information in exchange for meeting that need or solving that problem. A direct exchange of value. Unlike indirect advertising or branding, results from direct response marketing is immediate and predictable. But let’s not forget the purpose of immediate and predictable lead generation. It’s to build your practice -- to supplement your current level of repeat and referral business until such time as you no longer need to supplement it. Let me put it this way: By using direct response marketing (ads and lead capture technology), in only two short years of actually practicing real estate -- listing houses and riding in cars with buyers -- I built a large enough base of repeat and referral business that I am still contacted regularly by past customers wanting me to sell their houses or find them a new home, and I haven’t even practiced real estate on the “ground level” in ten years. Sure, I used to practice. But my solo practice grew into a team and then my team eventually to be the largest company in town with 150 agents. But I’ve been working almost exclusively at training agents and perfecting our lead capture and lead management software for the last ten years. I still have a brokerage but it is tiny because that’s not my focus. So what I hope my readers will take away from this is that I am a huge advocate of repeat and referral business. It doesn’t get any better than that. You have to really mess up not to do a deal with a previous client or a referral from a happy client. The work is a dream. Your reputation precedes you. It is fun! But, I also know that most agents I talk to cannot live on their current level of repeat and referral business. And most agents are tempted to take that too-small referral base and try to turn it into a living practice by overworking it, and the result is tragic. They chase off would-be business by being too aggressive. I believe that agents today should aspire to the day when their repeat and referral business keeps them making the level of income and gives them the freedom they desire. Until then I truly hope they will learn to do direct response marketing to supplement that business that is already theirs. Agents using technology like my Ultimate Website system can place proven ads like we teach them, and immediately (within 24 hours) have new customers. Best of all, if used as a consistent part of a comprehensive marketing plan, those agents can use the Ultimate Website to continue to work their repeat and referral business and then immediately supplement with new customers on demand when they are not as busy as they’d like to be. And the total cost to implement such a strategy, the way I teach, and generate a few new opportunities a day is less than the cost of sending out a single postcard to your existing sphere of influence. How cool is that?! So if you’re reading this and are still in the building phase of your practice -- you still could use some more business -- then I urge you to take a look at my Ultimate Website system. It is embarrassingly inexpensive and it will give you the ability to do direct response marketing and produce immediate and predictable results while you build your practice. If you haven’t yet tried my Ultimate Website (with LCM technology), I’d encourage you to check it out. Agents who use it are generating an average of 2-3 new inbound leads every day without spending additional money on advertising. It costs less than most websites and there is no long-term commitment or activation fee. Here is a link: http://GuerillaRealty.com.   Get My Ultimate Website Now » As always, thanks for reading. Matt Jones Broker/President/CEO FavoriteAgent.com Matt Jones is the founder and CEO of FavoriteAgent.com, nationally syndicated columnist, broker, and best selling author. He has been profiled by major media outlets as an innovator and a pioneer in the industry, and CNN's Pulse on America claimed he and his company were "changing the way real estate is done in America."

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