Real Estate Advertising: Are you tracking your ads?
The definition of great advertising hasn’t changed in decades. A grandfather of direct response advertising, Claude Hopkins, penned his classic “Scientific Advertising” in 1923. Since then, nothing has changed. Really. Same goes for real estate advertising.
If you haven’t read the book, read it. It could make you a bundle this year. If you have read it, then you should answer YES to my next question…
Are you tracking your ads?
(Pause for answer…)
While the concepts used in great advertising from 1923 still make for great real estate advertising in 2006, two things have changed.
1. The speed of the response
2. The ease and ability to track (everything)
Now if you said NO to the question above, and you don’t track your ad responses, then one of two things is probably definitely happening:
1. You are flushing money down the toilet.
2. You are leaving money on the table.
I don’t know about you, but whether on the table or in the toilet, the money still isn’t in my pocket. Game over. I lose.
Tracking ad response is simple and there is really no excuse for not doing it. This is your money we’re talking about here.
For example, are you tracking what percentage of your postcards actually result in someone signing up for your email list or how many come to your website to look at your listings?
If not, how do you know whether the mailing is worth doing again?
Simple answer: You don’t.
So start tracking everything, especially when you are sending people to your website. On your next postcard, don’t just put your web address www.sunnyrealestate.com. Instead, use an address like www.sunnyrealestate.com/freegift where freegift is the tracking code for you to track response. Or better yet, register a completely new domain name (for $8) so there is no chance that someone will forget to leave off your tracking code.
Any tech person can help you with the details, the important part is that you do it and use the results to help you make better real estate marketing decisions.
If you do a lot of business/marketing online (if you aren’t you are losing ground quickly), then consider signing up for a service like HyperTracker which allows you to track just about anything you do online.
