How Much Should You Spend Marketing to Past Clients?
There are some great thoughts here by my fellow Active Rainer Marte Cliff. It's so true. We all need to stay in touch with our clients. No one is asking you to spend your whole paycheck in doing this. In fact, our clients probably don't expect this. But they would like to hear from us. Enjoy the read!
How Much Should You Spend Staying in Touch With Past Clients and Your Sphere of Influence?By now we all know that these people are important. But HOW important? Are they important enough to spend money mailing them cards or small gifts, or only important enough to be on your email list?To decide, you'll first need to look back over the past year and see how many (good) referrals you received compared to the number of people you've been actively staying in touch with.Then, of course, you have to factor in your average commission.Let's use some "what ifs."What if you've been actively staying in touch with 50 people, and over the past year you received 2 referrals that resulted in sales.Let's say you're selling homes in the $250,000 range, your company charged 6% commission, and you got 90% of one side.Your commission, then, was $6,750 on each transaction, or $13,500.How much of that are you willing to spend to stay actively in touch with them plus 25 or 50 more people?If a small gift costs $5 and you send 100 of them, that's $500.But of course you can't touch them only once a year, so maybe you'll do that twice and send a card or less expensive gift the rest of the time. Maybe you'll only spend $2 per person, so $200 per mailing.Say you reach out every other month. Twice at $5 each ($1,000) and four times at $2 each ($800). Is it worth it to spend $1,800 to get 4 good closings at an average commission of $6,750?Would it be worth it to reach out every month and spend twice that much?You may not get 2 referrals per 50 people – whether you get more or fewer depends on who those people are, who they know, how easy you make it for them to reach you, and of course - your message.Naturally your numbers will be different depending upon the kind of property you sell. If $30,000 lots are your bread and butter, your budget will be different – as it will if you're selling million dollar mansions.If you haven't been actively staying in touch with any of those people, you won't have a knowlege base to start from.But do factor this into your marketing budget for 2013 and do start reaching out to the people who will send you referrals and/or give you repeat business. Then keep track of what happens.When I think back to my start in real estate, this is the one thing I wish my first broker had taught me. I let far too many people slip away before I woke up and realized how valuable they were.
Priest River, Idaho
208-448-1479
Call on Copy by Marte for:
Custom Web Copy....Agent Bios....E-mail Campaigns
Newsletters....Postcards....Custom Prospecting Letters
Articles....Blog Posts....Print AdsPLUS
Pre-written real estate letters that save you time and money -
and keep you in touch with your prospects.
Comments(5)