How can you tell what’s truth in the Princeton real estate marketing or for that matter any marketing at all? Did you ever try the detergents that promise to take all the stains out, or those miracle creams that erase the wrinkles in front of your eyes? Did you ever write or respond to a personal ad?
I was writing this post, when in the middle of it I read the excellent post by Jeff Dowler, which if you didn’t read it yet, make sure you do. His topic in some way related to mine. Jeff Belonger also wrote an interesting post on the advertising topic.
Let’ get back to my posed questions which really have to do with truth in advertising. My wrinkles are all still there and so are the stains on the cloths. My dating days go back to the era before the Match.com and to the ancient times of personal ads. I never tried these ads (honestly) because they all said basically the same thing. For the guys it was: “Handsome, 6” tall, athletic, emotionally available, financially secure. Looking for marriage.” For ladies the ads were: “ Gorgeous, blond, blue eyes, 5’7”, 100 lbs., emotionally available, financially secure, looking for marriage”. My friends, who tried responding, reported that 50% of the guys in these ads were in real life overweight, married or never planning to marry, emotional train wrecks and without a job. I could only guess, that man found similar things responding to women's ads. If these people said the truth in their ads, who do you think would have answered them?
What about the “truth in advertising” and more specifically the truth in real estate “advertising”, that being the blog? This is the story that got me thinking about the topic to begin with.
Last week I wrote a post about enjoying a meal in a local seafood restaurant. Several days later I received an e-mail that surprised me. It was from a friend who read the post. She did not think that we would eat in this type of a restaurant because it was not kosher, which means adhering to the Jewish dietary laws. She thought that this post was just for “marketing” purposes.
I explained to her what our dietary practice was and that every word in my blog is true regardless of it being “marketing”. This was the end of it except for two things.
First, is the public perception that in real estate marketing you would say things that are not quite true. Perhaps there is a reason. I have seen so many claims of agents being #1, that I finally stopped figuring out what are they #1 in. This is something I have to remember, when blogging – there is a lot of baggage relating to the public views of real estate agents. Even my friend was unsure.
Second, people who are reading our blogs may or may not know us, and they can make inferences that could be totally wrong. In this case, it was a friend and it was easy to straighten things out. Through my blog, I want to communicate with people who want to buy or sell homes in Princeton. I can’t straighten things out with people I don’t know. I would probably never hear from them again.
I have to be as clear and as unambiguous as possible in my writing. If it's even possible without the body language, facial expressions, and voice inflections that are present when people talk in person. I need to remember that a blog is not a personal conversation, not matter how much I would like it to be.
This brings me back to the issue of truth in blogging. The Internet is filled with characters that live behind their screen names and may have little in common with the actual person. The idea of the Internet dating people is to meet the “real” person. Wouldn’t it be a let down to find out that he/she was not what was “advertised”? The theory behind the truth stretching is that it makes the phone ring. It makes people respond, and when you eventually meet, you can dazzle them with some other aspect of your personality and overcome the “stretching” part.
This didn’t work for me in dating. My husband, the love of my life, had to come to my door for us to meet, but that’s another story. The 
dating concept of marketing doesn’t work for me in Princeton real estate and in the Princeton real estate blog. I am not naive to think that “the love of my life” Princeton home buyers and sellers will appear on my doorstep. I want my phone to ring. Yes, the blogs are self-promotion, and I sleep content to know that every word in my blog is true.
Please contact Faina Sechzer at 609-553-4175 when looking for real estate, homes for sale and/or listing your house to sell, and relocation assistance in Princeton, Montgomery Township, West Windsor, Hopewell, and Lawrenceville New Jersey. Referrals are accepted.
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Truth in advertising, Is that an oxmoron? I remember a comedy a long time ago, I think it was Dudley Moore who was an ad exec, he tried truthful advertising, He said Volvo's Their Boxy but they're safe.
I always wondered why the auto industry never followed suit :)