One of the greatest marketing stories may be something you never knew. Natural gas doesn’t smell. In 1937 in Texas, a shop instructor turned on a sander and within minutes almost 300 students in the New London, Texas school died from the explosion. The cause was a faulty and leaking natural gas line.

I was eating dinner at an Outback restaurant in Orange, CT and ran into a man whose job it was to travel around the country to place a liquid into the gas to give it an odor. This odorant is the same odor that you and I both know spells danger. But how do we know that?

What makes this so remarkable is that in a matter of 71 years the gas company has been able to implement, educate and train the public to be aware of this smell and act accordingly. Think back to how you know the smell of gas to be dangerous? Did you see a commercial or a billboard? I’m sure there were some. But like most people, someone probably had to tell you and since then, you have associated the smell with being dangerous. In its most basic form, this is word of mouth advertising.

There is something to be said for an approach in business that is subtle and unassuming.The greatest forms of marketing are the kind you can’t see. It’s the marketing that is inconspicuous, honest and underlying.

So the question remains. How can you tell everyone that you are a real estate professional without being overbearing about it? The answer is simple. Being an authentic agent will spread faster then any advertisement. View my past blog “Agents, Be Authentic”.

Matthew S. Gosselin is the author of My Blue Goose, Exploiting The Wow Factor In Real Estate Marketing. The book can be purchased on MyBlueGoose.com or Amazon