Co-founder Rory Wilfong absolutely LOVED using postcards as an active marketing tool during his days as a successful real estate agent. Postcards are a GREAT and INEXPENSIVE way to contact new leads and follow-up with old ones as a gentle reminder that you’re still there, waiting with baited breath to assist them with any real estate need they may have.

One thing to keep in mind when sending postcards is your own EXPECTATIONS. Many agents get frustrated when they send out 100 postcards and don’t have 10 people banging down their door to work with them. If you’re expecting more than a 1% response rate from any good postcard campaigns you sent, you will be disappointed. But before you swear off postcard marketing forever, sit down and do the math. When it comes down to it, as long as you PROFIT from it in the end, it’s worth the initial money you have to spend. As the age old adage goes, “You’ve gotta spend money to make money.”

Printing, labeling, mailing and buying a list of addresses to send the postcards to equals out to about $.75 per postcard, so think $750 for 1000 postcards. You can realistically expect about 10 people to respond to you and of those 10, probably only 20% (or 2) will wind up using you if you follow up with them the way you’re supposed to. Maybe 2 out of 1000 doesn’t sound all that impressive, but think about your commission from just 2 clients.

If both properties sell for at least $200,000 each and you’ve got a 2.5% commission split, you’ve earned $5,000 from each listing. So by originally spending $750 on some postcards, you came out with $9,250 profit. Just think how many postcards you can buy with that!

Now, mailing postcards isn’t some magical marketing feat that will get you tons of listings right away. As with any other marketing tool, you have to WORK to convert your leads to clients. But IF you make good postcards and IF you convert the calls you get in response to leads and IF you follow up consistently and persistently with your leads to get the listings, you WILL make a lot of money.

So now that we’ve outlined WHY you want to be marketing through postcards we’ve got some examples of the different types you can send to the addresses on your mailing list (keeping in mind that the recipients will have different real estate needs):

1. Home Value postcards – The average homeowner has no idea of their true home value and can’t find out without you (or paying an appraiser). Send a postcard with something dramatic like “Home values in you area have skyrocketed! Find out the value of you home today!.” Offer a free home value analysis and you’ll get calls from people thinking of selling.
2. Refinance postcards – We know, we know, you’re a real estate agent, not a loan officer, but if you’ve learned ANYTHING from us at all, let it be that HAVING A PARTNERSHIP WITH A LOAN OFFICER IS AS IMPORTANT AS HAVING A CELL PHONE to a real estate agent! By doing a little bit of research, you can get a list of people with adjustable rate mortgages and when they’ll expire. You can send these people a postcard to let them know this and say “as a complimentary service, I’ll help you find a lender.” Getting calls from homeowners in this situation gets you some leads to send your loan officer (who should be sending leads your way as well) and it also gives you a chance to get to know the people, why they want to refinance, perhaps even give you the opportunity to convert them to a seller. At the very least, if they need an agent later on, they’ll come back to use you.
3. Just Listed postcards – Put your current listings on a postcard and send to possible buyers and everyone in your buying sphere. Don’t just put one listing on a card, send a jumbo postcard with 10 different houses on it to pique more peoples’ interest. One house may not interest too many people, but with 10 properties, more people are likely to see something they like. Don’t provide too much information on the postcard, you want to make sure they have a reason to call you. For example, put listings on your postcard in a variety of price ranges, but don’t include the price of any of the properties. This is a prime example of how to pique interest to generate calls.
4. Just Sold postcards – send this type of card to everyone within a mile radius of a home that has just sold. Put something to pique their interest on the front, something along the lines of “This property just sold for this much $$, turn this card over to find out how much YOUR home is worth.” On the back of the postcard should be a coupon for a free home value analysis along with your contact information, requesting the consumer call to find out how much their home is worth.

These are just a few types of postcards that can be sent out to stay in continuous contact with your leads, as well as to farm for new leads. Stay creative with your design, and always make sure you’re offering something worthwhile, or else your postcards will wind up in the trash without a second thought by the consumer. Hey, to be honest, many of your postcards will wind up in the trash anyway, but it all goes back to the fact that as long as you’re making a profit, it’s worth the time and money to market with postcards.