Imagine you get a call from a prospective home seller and they want to speak with you about listing their home for sale. Great! You’re a terrific real estate agent and looking forward to meeting with them to go over how you can get their home sold. You meet them at their house and immediately upon walking inside you notice… clutter everywhere!
Do you want to try and sell the home with the clutter? No! You know how difficult it will be to get people to look at the home much less make an offer with all this clutter! Obviously, you’re going to have to educate them about removing the clutter from their home in order for you to be able to do your job which is to help them sell their house. You may even help them stage their home properly to present the home in the best way possible.
Now, consider your print advertising. Do you need to remove some of the clutter from your ad?
The same principles apply to your marketing. Cramming too many listings on a page with small photos and excessive text has the same effect as too much “stuff” in a room. Buyers won’t be able to leave the room – or your advertising – fast enough!
However, a properly designed ad invites prospects in for a long look at you and your listings.
You want to make sure there’s sufficient room in your ad to brand yourself as the professional REALTOR they need to call. You want to make sure your photos are large and professional quality. Homes & Land is a picture book! Our readers want to see a nice quality photo of the home. Include the property basics of the home for sale (BR/BR, price, and location) and include something which makes the home unique or the property’s most important benefit. Keep your copy brief and to the point.
What do you do if your budget doesn’t allow you to advertise all your listings? Let’s say you have 24 listings but you don’t have the budget to buy 2 pages to properly display all your listings. I recommend you advertise 12 of your listings on a full page ad from a variety of price ranges. You want your ad to appeal to the largest number of buyers so advertise listings from low, medium, and high prices if you have them. If all your listings are in a similar price point advertise the ones with the best curb appeal. The goal of your ad is to generate phone calls. We know from many years of experience that the property the buyer calls about is rarely the home they buy. It’s simply a way to build a relationship with them so you can show them additional listings. Some of the listings you can show them will be some of your unadvertised listings in a similar price range!
What do you tell your sellers? They are expecting you to advertise their home! This is what I recommend you tell your home sellers… “I will be marketing some of my listings for sale in each issue of Homes & Land. The reason I’m advertising is to generate leads from additional buyers I might not reach otherwise. I know from experience the home they call about is not the home they usually buy but it’s a way that I can start to work with them to help them find their dream home. I may not advertise your home in every issue but I will advertise a home in your price range so I can generate showings of your property. I will always promote my website where they can find all my listings including yours.”
Cramming your ad full of all your listings just to satisfy every seller is going to work as well as it is trying to sell a home full of clutter. The seller is happy because their home is being advertised but the buyers won’t be calling because it’s cluttered! Less is more! Find a budget that works for you and advertise a variety of listings that fit properly in that space. If you have the budget to advertise all your listings properly, great! If not, choose listings from different price ranges and keep your ad clean.
Watch this short video to learn more
For additional tips and makeovers visit HomesAndLand.com/design
