30% Off Expired Listing Leads, and a Few Marketing Ideas

My friends over at the RedX Expired Listing Lead Service have been doing a great job in some recent marketing endeavors, and I think I can leverage their activities to share some quick recommendations on how to better attract survival listings in this challenging market. Some of the ideas will translate to direct marketing, but a few may not. However, I thought I would list them out.

1) Discounted service (in this case 30%) in exchange for a larger commitment.
More and more we hear clients asking for a discounted commission in exchange for your dedication and hard work. If you are negotiating a discount in commission, get a bigger commitment for up-front expenses. If the client is taking your money on the back end, let them pay up-front for some of the marketing expenses.

2) If you are promoting yourself online, go where the traffic is.
I posted this on my Realtor Leads Blog, but if you see a politician making commentary on the recent sub-prime meltdown, comment on their site and be sure to include backlinks. They get plenty of traffic and may even improve you page rank.

3) Use multiple media.
If you don’t have a YouTube channel, a MySpace page and a presence on Facebook, it is time to register. Once again, be where your clients can find you.

4) Touch a prospect or partner many times.
RedX sent me a promotional flyer and sales PowerPoint to me today detailing their products and reiterating their promotion. This is part of a larger touch system where every time I take the time to touch them (call, respond to an email, click on a promotion) I receive one or two additional touches with appropriate calls to action. A REALTOR analog would be presenting to a local business group, getting the contact information for all of the attendees and sending out thank you cards with a referral request. Follow that up with an email reminding them of the specific takeaways of your presentation and an additional offer to do business.

5) Add a call to action on your email.
What’s the difference between an email signature that says “Barrett Niehus, REALTOR” and a signature that says “Barrett Niehus, REALTOR, Learn how I can save you $10,000.” A call to action can do a lot for a communication.

Viral Idea and A Deal on Real Estate Leads

It occurs to me that next year is an election year and almost every candidate is trying to leverage the internet to gain attention and push their political platform. Most of the tools that they are using leverage Web 2.0 social technology which means there are plenty of high traffic areas to post. If I were me, which I am…. I would start posting comments around the candidates blogs. The sites likely rank high on the search engines, they have tons of traffic, and backlinks from these sites just might be useful.

On a completely separate note, RedX has authorized a 30% discount off of their expired listing real estate lead service through the end of the month. This is a huge offer to save money and have those all important listings flowing through your door.

Leads, Listings and New Activities

My friends at RedX are busy for the holidays and they have sent some great tools to help educate REALTORS about how to attract clients and listings through the RedX expired listing lead service. Personally, I am glad that they now include FSBO listings as a component of their service because it does expand the pool of potential new clients. After all, in today's market, you need as many active listings as possible, just to survive.
On the viral marketing front, I am implementing a number of touch programs to hit contacts multiple times through multiple media. For example, I am in the process of setting up auto-responders so that those REALTORS that attend a webinar receive three follow up communications with additional information, discounts and calls to action. I am going to start fully leveraging the signature function of my email with an active call to action, as well as begin posting educational videos on the 4MySales section of YouTube. Finally, the webinars themselves are going to be better utilized to educate real estate agents about how to attract leads and convert them to listings.

Back Online and Expired Listing Leads

I received a call today from the expired lead listing company that I have been working with for some time. They offered me a great promotion to share with all of the readers of this blog; a complete waiver of the $150 startup fee for anybody that signs up through this link: http://www.theredx.com/signup/4mysales.html Not a bad offer considering that the only way to survive right now as a Realtor is to attract as many listings as possible.

I’ll talk about viral marketing at a later date. I gave a seminar this evening and used the YouTube video entitled “Cool Wedding Dance” that is making the rounds on the mainstream media (Today Show, daily news, CN?N, etc.) Either way, there is a big world of marketing out there to explore…..