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Permission Marketing meets Farming, enter “Permission Farming”

By Jim Marks

Services for Real Estate Pros with Virtual Results

April 09, 2009 08:49 AM

So you’re watching the last 10 minutes of the final episode of your favorite reality show, and a commercial interrupts your mind-numbed glee. Are you really in the mood for this message? Are you ready to receive it? Do you even remotely care? This is the issue with “push marketing.” Push Marketing is marketing that pushes a message to the audience, at anytime, anywhere and any media If you are not CURRENTLY looking for information on Poughkeepsie Real Estate or Realtors in general, and it is forced upon you, you have been “pushed to.”

But what about your blog? Blogs are typically found by people who are SEARCHING for a topic that you have written about. They want to find you… (hence the term…search) and once they do, you give them the Information they desire.. They can subscribe, self-identify and request more information. They can even “opt-in” to a mailing list or email subscription to obtain your valuable offer or information. This is called Permission Marketing But how random are your subscribers and readers? Where are they coming from? Are you missing an opportunity to develop a GEOGRAPHIC audience?

In other words, can you Permission Market to your Farm? Imagine Permission Farming… Attracting people who are specically interested in a neighborhood, because they live there, used to live there or want to live there, to your online presence. A hyper-specific geographic website that specifically caters to that neighborhood or farm?What would this site or blog look like? What might the content be? How do you market this site to gain a large number of subscription from the community? How do you become the onlime AUTHORITY for your farm... and how do you attract the residents to this site...

Rather than the typical NICE POST, JIM (although I really do appreciate it…) Lets see if we can engage this idea...

How do you market your HYPER LOCAL blog to a Farm... How do you reach out to a specific neighborhood in a way that motivates them to go on-line and subscribe to your website. Lets get some great ideas flowing and I will chime in along the way!!

Jim Marks is the President of Virtual Results, an Internet Marketing Company that specialized in Create Websites that Work, Internet Strategies, and Social Media Success Stories for Real Estate Agents.

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Winston Westbrook

Westbrook National Real Estate Co - Victorville, CA

Hi Jim! Nice post LOL. Permission farming, never heard of the term but I can dig it. A good way for people in an area to keep coming back to your bog or subscribe to your newsletter is to have not only great real estate information but a little bit about what you do in that area when you are not selling real estate like what restaurants you frequent or who has the cheapest gas in the area for the day, etc. In a way they get to know you for you and not this robot that sells houses. Makes one a little more human.

Apr 09, 2009 10:59 AM

Chris Olsen

Olsen Ziegler Realty - Cleveland, OH

Broker Owner Cleveland Ohio Real Estate

Hi Jim -- There was a company (name escapes me) that targeted realtors for creating single-neighborhood websites that was all things neighorhood -- misc. for sale, recipes, community news, houses sold, etc., all paid for and moderated by the agent. I thought that was a cool idea, but I haven't seen how it may have caught on or not.

Perhaps creating a blog category / menu item for a neighborhood and stuff it full of relevant content for a start?

Apr 09, 2009 11:37 AM

Bridget Cella

Re/Max Connection - Sewell, NJ

e-Pro, Realtor

I would assume that this would be easier with a large farm (neighborhood) than a small one as you may have difficulty finding info to post. Would you go as in depth as to post information about specific people (ie. Jimmy won first place in the 5k race, or stop by Susie and Joe's house to see the new addition to their family).

Apr 09, 2009 12:57 PM

Marcie Purcell Associate Broker

Better Homes and Gardens Real Estate Cassidon Realty - Quakertown, PA

Realtor, Bucks & Montgomery Co PA

Jim, I have a very good success rate with my website www.homesinhaycock. It is my farm area and I send out a newsletter about every 6 weeks that send people there. I update all the time change it up keep people on their toes. I have I had 3 listing appts with 2 months. I get calls and emails of questions. I grew up there for 23 years and people know me. The ones who didn't know me before are getting to know me now :)

Apr 09, 2009 02:30 PM

Christine McInerney

Great Life RE - Knoxville, TN

The McInerney Team, Knoxville TN Homes For Sale

Thanks for the post. I will be the first to admit that I am not a very good farmer at all. It is one of those little things that I know I should do but keep on not having "time" for it.

Apr 09, 2009 02:44 PM

AMBER NOBLE GARLAND - Top Real Estate Expert, Property Tax Appeal Specialist & Author

Strategic Marketing Expert & Relocation Specialist Serving New Jersey and nationwide! - Marlboro, NJ

- The Agent You Can Trust To Deliver REAL Results!

Jim, creating a successful online farm is essentially achieved by doing what you mentioned in your post.....blogging in a hyper-local fashion on a consistent basis with news everyone can use. I also like to support my blog and website with targeted direct mail encouraging readers to go to my sites.

Apr 09, 2009 03:18 PM

Harold "Hal" Benz

Transformative Action Coaching & Consulting, LLC - Westfield, NJ

Business & Life Coach For Agents & Entrepreneurs

Jim,

I like the concept of permission farming on a website or blog. But as others have already pointed out, I think that there is a role for the traditional "push advertising" model to drive people to it. Looking forward to hearing more on this topic...

Apr 09, 2009 03:57 PM

Eric Reid

Renaissance Realty Group of Keller Williams Atlanta Partners - Lawrenceville, GA

Great Blog .. I love reading the feature blogs at the end of a long day.. Happy Easter

Apr 09, 2009 03:58 PM

Christine Donovan

Donovan Blatt Realty - Costa Mesa, CA

Broker/Attorney 714-319-9751 DRE01267479 - Costa M

Permission farming - I really like the term. I've been trying to increase local readership by using hyper local information. I also like the idea that was mentioned above of having a community website where others can contribute, see local calendar, etc.

Apr 09, 2009 04:35 PM

Fernando Herboso - Associate Broker MD, & VA

Maxus Realty Group of Samson Properties - Clarksburg, MD

301-246-0001 Serving Maryland, DC and Northern VA

Don't ask for permission to farm . or to market. .just make it available. .give them TRUE easy to use valuable information about the place. . .the marketing is in the message

You are the information source for a particular place . ..and when they need real estate , they will automatically go to you.

Apr 09, 2009 09:44 PM

Joe Pryor

The Virtual Real Estate Team - Oklahoma City, OK

REALTOR® - Oklahoma Investment Properties

Too often Realtors misinterpret the term, world wide web, and I think that they can get a bit grandiose. I do blog about the country's economy, but Obama hasn't offered me a job based on my keen insights. Your farming with a blog idea is great. Let me add this idea, make your Flip video camera available for every teenagers birthday in your farm. Post it to youtube.com, and give the teenager the location of the video. They will tell everyone they know that their birthday is on youtube. What I see happening is that these other teenagers will tell their parents that they want their birthday on youtube also. If it is on your channel, you are the one they call, and your free marketing keeps going. What do you think?

Apr 10, 2009 07:01 AM

Carlos Silva

Las Vegas, NV

I am still fairly new at bloggin and trying to learn as much as possible. Thank you for the information!

Apr 10, 2009 07:45 AM

Monica Bourgeau

Portland, OR

Authentic Marketing for Heart-Led Agents

Hi Jim - how about Great Post! :) We have several sites for "permission farming" - www.MyMissoulaCounty.com, www.MyMineralCounty.com, www.ILoveMissoula.com. We also were just approved at editors at Topix.com for Missoula, MT. Nice discussion :)

Apr 10, 2009 08:09 AM

Lenn Harley

Lenn Harley, Homefinders.com, MD & VA Homes and Real Estate - Leesburg, VA

Real Estate Broker - Virginia & Maryland

I find that terms such as "permission" anything are far to close to the "High Probability Selling" by Jacques Werth, which used the term "permission" in his cold calling program promotion.

Permission Farming may catch on. It would be either a step forward or a step backward from Pull Advertising, depending on your outlook.

The ultimate in Pull Advertising is SEO for Google. Not easy to achieve, but if a consumer contacts YOU, you are light years ahead of any other advertising or promotion.

Apr 10, 2009 10:00 AM

Anonymous

Isabel Waters

Jim, excellent post on permission concept... a win-win strategy for the seasoned agent...Kudos!

Greetings from Florida!

Isabel Waters (Waters Real Estate) Fort Lauderdale, FL

Apr 10, 2009 10:56 AM

#21

Jim Marks

Virtual Results - Laguna Beach, CA

Thanks again for all the responses...

Please go back and read the comments by Marcie, Amber, and Christine... ALL SPOT ON.

Joe Pryor... said this "Let me add this idea, make your Flip video camera available for every teenagers birthday in your farm. Post it to youtube.com, and give the teenager the location of the video. They will tell everyone they know that their birthday is on youtube. What I see happening is that these other teenagers will tell their parents that they want their birthday on youtube also. If it is on your channel, you are the one they call, and your free marketing keeps going."

Joe, EXACTLY... There are so many cool farming things to do with a flip cam...

Lenn, this is another GREAT advantage of permission marketing... very tough to get ranked for your whole area, but FARM keywords are much easier... and the long tail will do great!!

Apr 10, 2009 11:21 AM

Kimberly Hardin

Treasure Coast Sothebys International Realty - Vero Beach, FL

Broker Associate/Owner - Luxury Waterfront Property Specialist

Enjoyed the post and it got me thinking. My website www.verobeachfloridaproperties.com is currently in development and is mostly aimed at the outsiders (northerners and ppl from Miami who are buying second homes here). The local portions of websites are usually just links to schools, news, restaurants, etc which every web savvy agent has on their site. I am trying to think of ideas so locals will bookmark my site. Look forward to reading more posts here! Thanks.

Apr 14, 2009 02:00 AM

Angelo DiStefano

Exit Realty of the South - Greater Nashville TN area - Nashville, TN

I like Joe Pryor's idea about making quick videos and getting them on YouTube. Also enjoy reading so many other great ideas. It looks like this social networking, blogging, and SEO stuff can become very time consuming. Where do you draw the line? Any info on how to effectively track the time involved and diminishing returns? How much time should I be allocating to blogging, social networking, and ongoing SEO work? It all seems overwhelming -- or is that only because I am at the bottom of the learning curve?

Apr 14, 2009 05:31 AM

Anonymous

Shelly Bryan

In response to Chris Olsens' response (#8), he might be referring to myonlineneighborhood which gives you a neighborhood or city presence (website) to call your own but is only as good as the agent and the time alloted to 'market' the site to restaurants, stores and other merchants or sponsors to help offset the cost ($300/mo). It also requires alot of time to update, approve postings, ads and time ($) is also required to market the site to gain readership, otherwise its useless. Plus side is its exclusive, but in this market that money might be better spent elsewhere.

Apr 14, 2009 03:20 PM

#25

Anonymous

Steve Patti

Jim - why don't you join our Group on LinkedIn that is going to deep-dive into permission marketing dialogue? We've all read the Seth Godin stuff and its strategically sound, but it's awfully absent of hands-on "Fisher Price" steps the average marketer can take to execute on Monday morning. Dave Evans' book "Social Media Marketing: An Hour a Day" fills in lots of the tactical gaps and can be read/understood by the newbie to social media. We're going to discuss hands-on topics where people can share best practices in terms of tools, techniques, and results -- because every marketer in this economy needs to deliver measurable results. (www.polarityinc.com, or Twitter: @polarityinc.com)

Apr 15, 2009 01:37 PM

#26

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