Now that November has arrived, it's a good time to take stock of what worked and what didn't this season in terms of real estate marketing on Madeline Island.
Of course there will still be some showing activity during November, but for the most part, real estate sales activity on Madeline Island will slow to a crawl by mid-month. And while it's certainly possible to sell a house or lot during the winter months (we've done so many times), it's far less likely than it is during tourist season.
So let's compare marketing methods that brought results to Madeline Island sellers this year with other marketing approaches that failed:
Some area real estate agents like to advertise in small community newspapers. The cost is low, but so is the circulation. This isn't a great place to reach a large number of prospective buyers.
The Island Gazette has a circulation of a few hundred readers. That's nice, but wouldn't you prefer to reach an audience of several hundred thousand instead?
We achieve much better results and we reach a lot more prospective buyers on the ActiveRain real estate Website.
Print and newspaper advertising does work sometimes, but what didn't appear to work was ad placements in the local "Free Real Estate Shopper", the kind that is distributed in grocery stores and gas stations.
Would you want your $500,000 waterfront home to appear in print looking like this?
Postage stamp-sized "thumbnail" photos in black and white, printed on cheap newsprint don't sell fine homes. We stay away from advertising in publications like these.
Our company prefers advertising where we can track the number of people who have viewed each property.
Our clients like having the ability to see how many prospective buyers are actually viewing their listing. Can you do this with newspaper?
We also like to use real estate "virtual tours", which enable the viewer to see vividly what a property looks like before they drive 250 miles to see it in person.
Our clients seem to like them too. Both of our recent sales came from Web visitors who had previewed listings on our Virtual Tour website.
Call us and let us show you how we can put these and other winning real estate solutions to work for you.
