September means Back to Basics here at Inman. As real estate navigates the post-settlement era with new commission rules, real estate professionals from across the country will share what’s working for them, how they’ve evolved their systems and tools, and where they’re investing personally.
Effective marketing doesn’t just happen. There are processes and frameworks that lead to success. Jimmy Mackin, co-founder of Listing Leads, is pulling the curtain back to give us a behind-the-scenes look at his secrets to creating marketing campaigns that make the phone ring.
“Successful marketing is the result of following a few key principles that include a framework of steps that lead to the prospect raising their hand and saying they want more information,” Mackin said. He explained there are four key components for effective marketing: attention, emotion, action and distribution.
Component 1: Attention
Mackin shared that you must figure out how to make your marketing campaign stand out from the crowd. What is it that makes your marketing different in the way that it breaks through all the noise to capture the attention of your prospect? Mackin stated there are eight tools he uses to initially grab the attention of the consumer.
These are the eight tools along with brief examples of each.
- Pattern interrupt: I don’t want to share this information with you, but I have to …
- Scarcity, FOMO, loss aversion: Want to receive information about homes before other buyers …
- Priming: Hey, you’re going to love this …
- Surprising statistic: Eighty-seven percent of homeowners have this in common …
- Comparison: Our listing sold in four days, while the average home is now taking 48 days to sell …
- Contrarian: You shouldn’t sell your house …
- Personalization: This ad is for the person looking to …
- Curiosity: Would you sell if …
Mackin wrapped up the attention portion by sharing the following, “David Ogilvy said it best when he said, ‘You can’t save souls in an empty church.’ The first step in effective marketing is to grab their attention, or get them into the church, so to speak, and then we can start building the emotional connection.”
Component 2: Emotion
“Now that we’ve grabbed their attention, the next step is to create an emotional connection. Neuroscience tells us that 95 percent of all decisions are made by the subconscious mind, and if we don’t create an emotional connection with our audience, we have no chance of success.
When it comes to emotion, there are three things I try to do every time. I want to describe their situation. I want to describe their feelings. Lastly, I want to describe their desired outcome. When I can touch on all three of these areas, that is when emotional connection happens,” Mackin said.
He then explained this process using a homeowner who has just had their listing agreement expire as an example:
Their situation
The homeowner just spent six months in limbo and their home did not sell. Now, they are getting bombarded with calls and messages from agents.
Their feelings
The homeowner is disappointed, frustrated and annoyed.
Their desired outcome
They still want to sell their home, but they don’t want to live through the same experience again, and they have a deep mistrust of real estate agents.
After explaining these areas, he shared this example of a letter for an expired listing that utilizes all three areas to create an emotional connection.
“So, the process begins by gaining their attention utilizing one of the eight principles we discussed. Now, we’ve described their situation, feelings and desired outcome to create an emotional connection.
“The next step is to move them into action. This letter is an effective campaign we’ve used to set listing appointments utilizing the framework I mentioned,” Mackin stated.
Component 3: Action
Effective calls to action are the process of having prospects raise their hands for more information or to take the next step you want them to take in the process. He said we are in a time where the average consumer sees between 8,000 and 10,000 ads every day. This is the part of the process where you break through all the noise to motivate clients to act.
“You can do an amazing job grabbing attention and making emotional connections, but if you don’t get the action step right, you end up with a lot of exposure with limited to no results. One of the keys to creating effective calls to action is to understand what not to do.
The first step is to make sure your calls to action are not too pushy, that there are not too many asks, and that your messaging isn’t too generic,” Mackin stated. He then provided examples of each of these.
- Too pushy: “Don’t miss this one-time offer”
- Too many asks: “Click, call, text, scan, and subscribe”
- Too generic: “Find out how much your home is worth”
He went on to explain that effective calls to action have two key ingredients: clarity and a compelling message.
“Clarity is the process of having a clear message. In other words, what is your desired outcome from the copy and why? The second part is creating a compelling message that clearly states the benefits of taking action and why they should do it,” Mackin explained.
The following are a few examples of calls to action he provided that are both clear and compelling.
- I reviewed my client’s Zestimate. It was off by $123,000. Have you checked yours recently?
- 55 Main Street just sold in your neighborhood. Has anyone called you to give you the details?
- I’d be a terrible Realtor if I didn’t ask, would you consider selling your home if you got a great offer?
- If the only thing you love about your home is the interest rate, have you explored renting your house instead of selling it?
After breaking down the processes of grabbing the prospect’s attention, creating an emotional connection, and structuring a compelling call to action, he shared an example of his “$100M email” to show how all three of these components can work together.
“Now that you have this framework, you can look at an effective marketing campaign like the “$100M email” not as something that is unattainable or something that only a professional could write. You now know it is the result of a process that professionals follow to create great marketing campaigns.
Once you understand this, you can begin to create these types of campaigns yourself. That brings us to the best-kept secret in real estate marketing which is distribution,” Mackin said.
Component 4: Distribution
The process of maximizing the ROI on your marketing is achieved through distribution. The more people you can get the messaging in front of, the more opportunities you will have to do business.
“Every campaign I create, I ask myself: How can I modify this message slightly so that it can be utilized on multiple platforms without having to create a completely new campaign?
“So, every email I create, I ask how I can modify it to be a text message to my SOI. How can I modify this to become a postcard to my farm? Can I convert it to a short-form video? Can it be converted to an Instagram story or paid advertisement?
“When I can do this, I can amplify the message through multiple channels with the same content and reach 10 times the number of prospects I would have reached with the original campaign,” Mackin explained.
The key to great marketing that makes the phone ring is utilizing a framework that naturally walks the prospect from grabbing their attention to raising their hand and asking for additional information. If you follow this framework, I know your results will dramatically improve.
