Creative Corner: Build Your Ark

How to build a pipeline and keep leads flowing

June 2006 By Lois Geller

multipage

I was thinking about this the other day when our art director, Pepper, mentioned he’d read real estate values were going to fall in Florida. There’s just so much development here. Look in any direction and you’ll see flocks of cranes lifting building materials.

A couple of upward ticks in interest rates and suddenly not so many people will be buying anymore. What’s a developer to do? What’s a real estate agent to do?

Howard Ruff came to mind once again. It’s not raining yet, so now’s a good time to build the ark.

If developers and real estate agents could apply tried and true direct marketing techniques, they’d develop a pipeline of qualified prospects and constant referrals in a very tough environment. They’d create memorable communications, branding techniques that would position their companies and agents.

Keep the Pipeline Filled
It seems that with many companies, the basic modus operandi is that when business is fine, they stop looking for new prospects. That can’t happen when you remember Howard Ruff.

So here are some ideas for you to use to fill your new business pipeline and keep it filled.

1. Start with your target market. Who are they? What interests them? It helps to visualize these people by creating an internal image of what a prospect might look like. Give her a name, say, Gladys. Imagine Gladys at her mailbox or leafing through a magazine and you will never even consider sending one of those undistinguished, boasting, empty-promise promotional pieces.

2. Begin talking to Gladys on a “knowledge level,” which means using something you already know about her. (Gladys is standing in for your entire audience, remember.) If Staples, for example, had written to Mason & Geller with something like “Welcome to Florida. [Insert a special offer to get us started, here.],” it would be our sole provider of office supplies by now.

3. Develop a curriculum approach. Companies and people who have purchased from you in the past are the most likely to buy again and to refer others to you. To keep your new business pipelines always filled, it’s good to continue to talk to your customers even when they aren’t buying. A newsletter can be great, provided it’s about something of interest to all those Gladyses. E-mail hints and tips also are helpful; thank-you notes are nice for previous business. Treat your best customers great. Remember their birthdays; not everyone will. Unexpected rewards are a special surprise.

4. Keep your database clean and updated. Track what customers have done with you in the past: when they purchased, what they bought, etc. 1-800-FLOWERS is good at reminding me that last year I sent four bouquets at Easter-time, and suggesting that perhaps I’d want to do that again—and of course, I did.

5. Always talk to people in a human voice. Get the best copywriter you can find to work on your business. It’s worth the investment. Then stay with him or her to maintain that wonderful voice or point of view. People prefer to buy from people they like.

6. “Do what the other guy isn’t doing,” as my Dad used to say. If everyone in the real estate world is using postcards, that’s a super opportunity to mail a great letter. In fact, use a letter for anything you’re doing, as it will always outpull the postcard or the self-mailer. And, if you want to use the self-mailer, add a letter anyway. Same with your catalog.

The whole idea of direct marketing is to keep the relationship going—in whichever channels customers choose—and to continue to communicate with them over time. So, whether you’re going through a bubble (as in real estate) or a bust period—regardless of the time—you should create your efforts to keep the pipelines full of leads, prospects and customers.

Make a sign to put over your desk that says, “It wasn’t raining when Noah built the ark!”

Lois Geller is president of Mason & Geller Direct, a direct marketing agency in Hollywood, Fla. You can reach her at loisgeller@masongeller.com.