Spontaneous Budgetary Combustion and the Quest for Marketing Fire

by Paul Slaybaugh | Apr 29, 2010 | Home Selling, Scottsdale Real Estate

Never confuse activity with production.

As powerful a five word mantra that a salesperson will ever encounter.  When it comes to managing one’s business, the seductive powers of activity are often enough to lead a good REALTOR astray.  While the carefully laid out marketing campaign gets left at home, the erstwhile agent steps out with every new expenditure and panacea that gives him a “come hither” glance.

Ignoring another haggard, old saying, “Never sell a salesman,” we are an easy mark.  Highly susceptible to the allure of the next great promotional campaign or sales technique that is going to set us apart from the competition, we are prone to affairs of the wallet that stand to disrupt the matrimonial bliss of a productive agent and his lovely business plan.

A forgiving bride, we crawl back to her after every unsuccessful tryst.  Whether just looking to spice up a meat and potatoes strategy or a full-fledged case of advertising lust that leads to the delusion that this could be “the next one,” our fundamental methodology will greet us with open arms when we come slink home with tails between legs and hundreds out of pocket.  Jesse James and Tiger Woods could learn a thing or two from a salesman.

What does this confessional mean to you as a consumer?  In short, everything.

The longer you hang around this industry, the better equipped you are to separate the effective marketing wheat from the gimmicky chafe.  Rather than bouncing from product to product in search of an oil strike, we learn to distinguish what works and can be effectively rolled into an existing marketing campaign, and what is an overpriced tramp that has been around more blocks than Heidi Fleiss at Lego Land.

Here at the Scottsdale Property Shop, we won’t gamble with your money.  What, you didn’t realize that it was your coin at stake?  Now we cut to the quick of it.  As all costs of doing business are factored into the fee your chosen professional, in any endeavor, charges, it is an often overlooked component of the value added to the service.  We trot out the advertising we will employ to get your home sold, but seldom do homeowners question what is effective and what is superfluous.  The more the better, right?

Not necessarily.

As the new world order has proven over and over again, print media has been relegated, by and large, to the realm of the ineffective.  Certain exceptions apply, and certain properties must be marketed via publication, but for the most part, newspaper and magazine advertising has become a sinkhole for marketing dollars.  Recognizing this, most sharp agents have directed those dollars to more productive venues:  websites, blogs, social media, etc.

Some, however, continue to throw big money at both defunct media and unproven new products solely to demonstrate to clients that they are spending money.

See, I’m doing my job!  Just look at this splashy front page ad in the Sunday paper!  I also just signed up for a program guaranteed to produce more hits on my website (from non-buyers) to increase your home’s exposure!

Super duper.

All of this activity and all of these expenditures are factored not only into the fees you are charged, but come at great opportunity cost.  There are only so many dollars in every advertising budget.  Those dollars should be spent in a manner that is most likely to produce a buyer for your home.  Only experience gained through ample trial and error will procure a buyer in the most direct and inexpensive manner possible.  The result?  You are not charged exorbinant fees, and your home actually sells.

While it’s true that even the longest tenured agent will look for a little extra-curricular excitement now and again, it shouldn’t be a drunken weekend spree that leaves him devoid of his marketing budget and equilibrium.    Those slots and roulette wheels will eat up your sale in no time.  New tools are brought into the fold, but only as adjuncts to the old standbys, not at their expense.

Traditional networking and sales techniques married to a strong web presence.   And her sister.

Consider it Real Estate Big Love.