Real Estate Marketing Postcards - The three biggest mistakes an agent or broker can make

Real estate marketing postcards are more powerful than ever. They deliver your information directly into the hands of potential clients for the price of a stamp, some paper, and a little bit of ink.

Relying on the internet to drive clients to you is simply not enough. In fact, I doubt the internet will ever become an agent’s sole source of leads. Remember: the internet is vast and expansive; your farm is not You already know exactly where the people are that you want to contact, and the US post office is prepared to hand-deliver anything you desire.

I’ve been helping southern California agents target their respective farms since 2005 with my custom real estate marketing postcards. I’ve learned a lot during that time – mostly by analyzing my competition. Here are the three biggest mistakes I see from real estate agents and brokers:

1) Don’t talk about your sales record, even if you’re the #1 agent in the state or the U.S. Why? Because while you prattle on about how great you are to potential clients; their ears go deaf, their eyes gloss over, and their minds drift elsewhere. This is true in all encounters, not just postcard marketing. People want to hear about themselves; not you. If you want to keep people interested and keep their eyes on your postcard, discuss their accomplishments, their goals, and their needs. How do you talk about those things when you don’t know the specific person you are mailing to? That’s easy. Talk about their neighborhood (or their city), and they will pay attention to what you have to share. Follow this rule in all walks of life, and you will see a remarkable change in the manner in which people interact with you.

2) Don’t slander another agent. This might seem hard to comprehend, but I have seen this many times. An agent sends a postcard to his or her farm, and writes something to this effect on the cover, “Jane Doe sold your neighbor’s house for only $585,000! I would never undersell your house and de-value your neighborhood! Contact me…” Negativism breeds upon itself. Remember that. Instead of attempting to tarnish another agent who markets within your farm, be positive and send an upbeat message to your potential client. If you blatantly attempt to degrade a fellow real estate agent, how do you think that reflects on your credibility in the eyes of the postcard recipient?

3) Don’t make spelling/grammatical mistakes. I’ve seen countless real estate marketing postcards that contained the simplest of spelling and grammar mistakes. Before you print a thousand copies of your postcard, make sure you have two or three people proofread it. More often than not, they will point out a very obvious error that you have somehow overlooked. After you correct any spelling or grammar mistakes, have another person proofread it. Repeat this process until the postcard is grammatically sound. Professionalism must be upheld in real estate at all times. When you mail a postcard to a homeowner (or a potential homeowner), every inch of that postcard must be perfect. If it is not, and you send a postcard with spelling or grammatical errors, you are effectively tarnishing your own name, and your potential client may look elsewhere for an agent when they finally need one.

Copyright 2007, Christian Blake. This article may be freely republished as long as the author's byline and hyperlinks are retained.