When you’re using postal mail to prospect to a niche market, it’s easy to have good intentions. It isn’t always so easy to be consistent.
As you know, consistency counts in any kind of prospecting. The first time someone receives your mailing they might not
pay much attention. But when they start finding you in their mailbox again and again – and when you send messages that give them the information they want and need – they’ll start to pay attention. Studies conducted by marketing agencies show that when mailing to a “cold” list it takes at least 5 touches to see any real results.
(Which is not to say that you can’t get lucky and get some response to a first mailing.)
So… to make sure that every letter in your series gets mailed, try this.
First, download your entire prospecting letter set. Put the letters in a file where they're easy to find. Then go immediately and do your personalization, so they're ready to go.
If you're using a contact management program, enter the appropriate client personalization fields, such as [name], [address], [city], etc.
If you're writing to contacts one at a time - such as FSBO's you've spotted or expired listings you've found in today's MLS reports, go to your letters file, enter the prospect's name on each letter, and print it.
Next, create all the envelopes, addressed and ready except for the stamp.
Now sign each letter and put it in an envelope - and write the date when it should be mailed in the corner, where the stamp will go.
Create a spot on your desk for these outgoing letters, and all you'll have to do each morning is check the dates, affix the postage, and drop them in the mail.
This whole process, done all at one time, will take a matter of minutes.
If you put it off to do later, or try to print and mail one letter at a time, it will not only use up all that "start time" but will create a real possibility that the follow up letters will never go in the mail.
It’s hard to believe, but I do have customers who have purchased letter sets and never gotten around to using them. A few have written me months later saying they put them somewhere in the computer and can’t find them – could I resend. (Of course I will.)
So don't do that! Whether you use one of my prospecting letter sets or write your own, once you have the letters, automate your process so they actually get out there in the world and bring you new clients.
phone image courtesy of fantasista at freedigitalphotos.net
mailing image courtesy of morguefile.com
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