Great Marketing Generates Sales (LA 1396)
Great Marketing Generates Sales (LA 1396)
Transcript:
Steven Butala:
Steve and Jill here.
Jill DeWit:
Hi.
Steven Butala:
Welcome to the Land Academy show, entertaining land investment talk. I’m Steven Jack Butala.
Jill DeWit:
And I’m Jill DeWitt broadcasting from sunny Southern California.
Steven Butala:
Today Jill and I talk about how great marketing generates sales. As I said yesterday, at the end of the show, marketing for regular people was unattainable until around 2009, 2010. You had a choice of print marketing, radio or television, and it was crazy expensive. It was unreachable and unattainable for regular people like us. And so everything changed from a marketing standpoint from 2010 until nowish. Maybe there was some opportunity before that, mostly because of Facebook.
Jill DeWit:
I think people are still using those billboards along the freeway. I just thought about it. I don’t even notice them anymore. Is that still a thing?
Steven Butala:
It is a thing. It is and I think it is what it is.
Jill DeWit:
What?
Steven Butala:
No, I mean signage. I think we did a show recently about putting a sign on your land, it really works, but there’s no replacement for Facebook marketing to a very specific group or a specific zip code about a piece of property that you have in, I don’t care, I’m just going to say central Arizona, that the property’s good for fill in the blank, recreation, building a cabin, taking a dune buggy or a sand rail or whatever. And I think those specific groups are extremely isolated and quantified, especially when they’re geography based, and it’s Facebook. We have an incredible amount of success both through the Facebook backend business marketing and Facebook Marketplace, as do a tremendous number of our members.
And I also think, and I know, that the way the MLS does now, the multiple listing service, used to be in a book like a phone book and it would come out every month. And you would find out way after the fact, if a property was sold or not sold, but selling property on the MLS or places like Zillow or Land And Farm is extremely affordable for people like us. And you hit the right people.
Jill DeWit:
Sweet.
Steven Butala:
Before we get into it, we did really pretty much right then. Let’s take a question posted by one of our members on landinvestors.com online community, it’s free.
Jill DeWit:
Jessica asks, “Hi, I mailed a row of parcels owned by different members of one family. One by one, I’ve received three contracts now. Two parcels are side by side, and I’m going to sell them as package. The third parcel is separated from the other two by one vacant parcel. Would you attempt to sell these three parcels together or just sell the third lot separate by itself? Thanks.” I know what I would do.
Steven Butala:
Go ahead.
Jill DeWit:
I would mark them individually and then also say as a package. I would put each one would have three different postings, a little bit unique photos, make them look a little different from the views. And then I would say in the posting, “By the way, this is one of three available. Here’s the one directly next door. And then here’s the one over here too.” And just have a visual showing all three parcels and let them know it’s priced this way for a single, this way for a double, and if you want all three of them, this price. And it should go down, the more they buy it should be a little bit less to entice someone to go, “I’ll just buy all three.”
Steven Butala:
Perfect synopsis.
Jill DeWit:
Thank you.
Steven Butala:
All right. I couldn’t agree more. I will tell you this, in my however many years and 16,000 deals, I have never, ever in a single circumstance, made more money because I consolidated property. Never. If you buy these properties right, you’re going to sell them individually to three happy people. Is it going to be harder? Yeah. Are you going to make more money? Yup. Sometimes twice as much. This notion of consolidating property, it goes back to, I can almost tell exactly how old are you are if you believe that you should go to the County and say, “I have five properties in five separate APNs. I’d literally like to consolidate them all, have one APN because I’m going to do X with the property.”
Jill DeWit:
I think she just wanted to sell them as a package she said, not necessarily want to change APNs.
Steven Butala:
But this brings up the bigger point here, this consolidation of property is for farmers, developers. It’s almost always better. Somebody went and did all the work to split it already. We have people that are running around in our group. Me included actually right now, picking places to send mail because I know we can split it and split it easily. There’s hoards and hoards of money to be made in splitting properties up, easily and quickly when the County’s open to that idea and has a program for it.
So selling property together, no, Jessica, [crosstalk 00:05:02]. Selling property together, it’s easier, but there’s a reason that the price per acre for a 500 acre property is really low. And the price per acre for a half acre property right next to it is extremely high. And the reason is there’s more people with $50,000, then there are $5 million.
Jill DeWit:
How is this different from what I said?
Steven Butala:
It’s not.
Jill DeWit:
Okay, good. Thank you.
Steven Butala:
It’s not. I’m just talking about the-
Jill DeWit:
Just the mentality and the big picture, yeah.
Steven Butala:
… 35,000 foot view about consolidation. And I’ll tell you where-
Jill DeWit:
Don’t mark them as three. Don’t market it as a three pack.
Steven Butala:
There were a couple of comments below Jessica’s here, where very inexperienced, uninformed people on Land Investors were saying, “You should consolidate it and having a bigger property is better and I’ve just turned 110, congratulate me.”
Jill DeWit:
No, like I said, you’ll make more… If you want to get rid of them all as three and make it available, but it will be less expensive, you make less money. But, like you said, it’s easier and you can move on.
Steven Butala:
Today’s topic, great marketing generates sales? This is the meat of the show.
Jill DeWit:
Did I make you mad?
Steven Butala:
Not at all.
Jill DeWit:
Okay.
Steven Butala:
No. Not at all.
Jill DeWit:
I can’t tell if you’re-
Steven Butala:
I have a peeve about that topic.
Jill DeWit:
Oh, the topic made you mad.
Steven Butala:
I don’t know. What are the peeves that you have about some stuff?
Jill DeWit:
Oh, I got several. I’m staring at three of them right now.
Steven Butala:
Go ahead.
Jill DeWit:
Just kidding.
Steven Butala:
What are they?
Jill DeWit:
I’m joking.
Steven Butala:
You’re staring at three. Let’s hear it.
Jill DeWit:
I’m totally joking.
Steven Butala:
I don’t mean peeves in life. I mean real estate peeves.
Jill DeWit:
Oh, I’m sorry.
Steven Butala:
Like, there’s just misconceptions out there about stuff and consolidating property is one of them.
Jill DeWit:
Well, I’ll tell you what, I’ll give you one peeve, and it’s an insight to our show on Friday. Smart questions versus you didn’t do your research questions. And I’ll leave it at that.
Steven Butala:
Yeah, we have a topic coming up on Friday that Jill and I both have a lot to say about.
Jill DeWit:
How many times? Well, are we into the meat of the show now?
Steven Butala:
Yeah.
Jill DeWit:
Okay. Even though I’m sidetracking just a second here. We communicate with our whole office and each other and via Teams. We’re all Microsoft 365 and Outlook and all that. So, it’s amazing it doesn’t happen anymore, but it used to long time, like I’d be training a new person. Maybe I hired somebody and they’re directly reporting to me. And this is a quick little pass/fail test for them. They don’t know it, but there was a test. They’d asked me a question. I wouldn’t answer it yet. And then 20 minutes later it would be like, “Oh, nevermind. I got it.”
You should have done that first. And that ties into Friday’s, “I can’t turn my computer on, my whatever it is.” Why don’t you Google it or YouTube it? Spend a few minutes on it. Don’t pull me out of what I’m doing because you can’t get it right now. Now two of us are wasting time on this. You got this. And so, anyway, that ties into Friday, which I had to get it off my chest.
Steven Butala:
Don’t get me started.
Jill DeWit:
I know. Well, we have a lot. That’ll be funny. Okay. So this topic, for me, is what we were talking about the other day. If you’re doing everything right in your marketing, you’re not doing a lot of selling. That’s the goal, for me, anyway. I don’t want to be on the phone, or anyone on my staff, talking someone into a property. It’s the last thing you want to do. If you’re having to talk someone into buying your property, it’s probably not the right fit. What you should be doing is a couple of questions. The only calls that you should make are usually something you forgot in the posting, which you need to go back and add like, “Oh shoot, I didn’t put what the taxes are each year. I can add that in. That’s a very valid question.”
Or who knows, like a basic thing like that. Or you should be answering phone saying, “You want to wire the money instead of paying the credit card fees?” We’re all on the same page there. “Yes, here’s what we’re going to do.” Or, “Do you want to go see it on Tuesday? Well, call me before you get in the car because it’s first come first serve. I’m not going to hold it for you. So just let me know. I’ll make sure. Or if you see the posting up, you know it’s still available and you can head out there on Tuesday if you want to, and look at it.” What you shouldn’t be doing is really a lot of, “Oh, the area’s great and the creek,” and they can look all that up and figure that out themselves. And just general selling. Also too, “How much money do you have to spend? Okay, well, you could buy 10 acres over here. I’ve got this over here.” And then you’re really talking them into something they don’t want. That’s all the stuff you don’t want to do.
You should have a really good posting that instantly pulls people in. You should have a great title that accurately describes quickly what it is, where it is and the stellar attribute. And then your lead photo should showcase that attribute. It’s got a waterfall. There’s a big cliff. Look at this view or it’s on the water. Oh my gosh, you could build a dock right here if you want to, or look at this great spot to put your cabin, something like that. And then they’re going to click on it, read through if they’re the right person, they’re going to fall in love with it. And there’s not a lot of talking, so can I keep going? Do you mind?
Steven Butala:
No, I love it. Especially, there’s not a lot of talking part.
Jill DeWit:
Okay. So that’s the marketing of your actual posting, right? But then I think what the point of the show today, as I got a little sidetracked on that was, now you’ve got the great posting you did a great everything, got to get in front of the right people. That’s the next point. And I’m going to let you talk about that and how you use Marketplace.
Steven Butala:
Back in my day, sales and marketing were just that. Sales and marketing, sales and marketing, sales and marketing. Everybody said, “Well, go to sales and marketing for that.” And they’re completely separate things. They probably were back then too. And they certainly are now. The fastest way to fail at marketing is to attempt to use what I call no money up front marketing. Here’s a few examples. You bought a piece of property, maybe you bought it as your primary residence and you want to sell it and you call a real estate agent, they come over and after they put their hairspray on out in their car and everything, they get out of the car and walk in and they say, “Well, what we’re going to do-”
Jill DeWit:
They flip on their high heel shoes. They take off their flip flops and put on their high heeled shoes.
Steven Butala:
And they go up to your house and sit down in your kitchen and your husband refuses to sit down and talk to a real estate agent, so he’s out in the backyard doing something. So you have to deal with the whole thing yourself.
And what I’m leading to is this is… You’re signing up, listing your house with a real estate agent for no money. It’s no money up front. It’s not the right way to do it. Or let’s say you go on your Instagram and you say, “I’m going to sell my house,” and it’s completely wrong audience. It’s all the people you went to high school with or whatever. This is all no upfront marketing. The flip side is putting out a television ad to sell your house is not going to work. It’s just too wide of an audience. So what you want to do, great marketing starts with upfront cost marketing. And you do that in the back end of Facebook, the business Facebook. And I’m not talking about posting a little thing on your thing with all the high school people, not that. Or posting it in the groups that you’re in, because you’re into basket weaving.
I’m talking about taking a look at a piece of property, whether it’s your house or a piece of land that you have, and looking at the attributes like Jill said, this is all after Jill’s content that she described as complete and saying, “Look, if you’re a prepper,” and by the way, I’m not going to send this ad to anybody but preppers in these five zip codes or this County, and they haven’t identified themselves as that. It’s not that Facebook has said, “Oh, this guy’s a prepper.” They’ve identified themselves along the way as, “Yeah. I’m interested in prepping,” or, “I’m interested in sand rails. I have three.”
And it’s very specifically marketing this property to them. And your content says that, this is sand rail property. This is perfect for sand railing. And here’s why, and here’s some pictures and here’s a drone video of people doing it in the area, nearby. You will sell that property that day. And it costs… Facebook marketing, and I’m not talking about Marketplace. I wish they would’ve totally called it something different. Back end of business Facebook marketing, I think we spend, and I’m not exaggerating here, 10 or $12 a day on it with huge, huge success. Upfront marketing. You have to run that for a week. Maybe spend a hundred dollars just to sell a 20 or $30,000 piece of property.
The inhibition for people to spend even a dollar in this internet age that we’re in, for anything, cracks me up. We have been so conditioned that everything is free. That even when it costs five or $8, we don’t do it. So if you want to sell a piece of property, Facebook marketing and Facebook Marketplace, which I actually think is free, but I think you have to get in there and work it real hard, is the absolute way to go. Your sales will be automatic. And then you’ve got to have a phone number in there and an email address or whatever they allow. And you got to answer the phone, and be available, and then sell. That’s the title, great marketing generates those sales or sales opportunities.
So I don’t want to sound preachy on this. It’s so frustrating because sales, I’d bet 50, 60% of the questions that we deal with or the topics we deal with are sales, not what I think is real important, which is data and getting mailers out and managing all that and acquisitions. I think acquisitions are… we’re going to get to that tomorrow actually. Metrics on how people gauge their businesses and I have a lot to say about that too. Acquisitions are infinitely more important than sales will ever be because you’ve had great acquisition at a great price. And you’ve got a little marketing system that I just described. It’s going to sell that day.
Jill DeWit:
Touché. Happy you could join us today. Monday through Friday can find us right here on the Land Academy Show.
Steven Butala:
Tomorrow the episode on the Land Academy Show is called, there’s no such thing as a failed mailer, you are not alone in your real estate ambition. You just let me go off today.
Jill DeWit:
I did. You had a lot of good stuff to say, why would I mess with that?
Steven Butala:
Because there weren’t sales in there, and you’re all sales.
Jill DeWit:
Well, the point was… What was the title again? It was good marketing-
Steven Butala:
Exactly. You’re off thinking about something else.
Jill DeWit:
Well, scroll up, scroll up.
Steven Butala:
What was the title?
Jill DeWit:
Yeah. Great marketing generates sales. It’s Not sales.
Steven Butala:
We’re doing a podcast today?
Jill DeWit:
It’s not sales. It’s marketing. I already covered my topic. I said, if you did it right-
Steven Butala:
I’m just teasing you.
Jill DeWit:
… You’re not alone. You’re not doing much selling. That’s that’s the whole point. Make it easy on yourself and weed out those people. That’s where I’m at.
Steven Butala:
Hard sales is dead.
Jill DeWit:
What did you say?
Steven Butala:
Hard sales, like when we were kids.
Jill DeWit:
Cold calling and all that. [crosstalk 00:16:34] There’s people still trying to do that. I don’t know why they’re doing that. I see it all the time. Even in our space, people are like, “Oh, I’ll get you X amount of bleeds here from social media and you can-”
Steven Butala:
Wow, really?
Jill DeWit:
Not kidding. Cold calling.
Steven Butala:
I don’t get that stuff.
Jill DeWit:
Am I going to cold call somebody and say, “Buy this property or buy anything?” That’s the craziest thing.
Steven Butala:
It’s insulting to them.
Jill DeWit:
I know.
Steven Butala:
It’s insulting to everyone. Especially the person who’s doing the cold calling.
Jill DeWit:
Exactly. It’s nuts. Thank you for tuning in. We hope you find our content valuable and we really do appreciate your support. If you haven’t already, please zip on over to our YouTube channel and hit the subscribe button.
Steven Butala:
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Both:
We are Steve and Jill. Information…
Jill DeWit:
And inspiration…
Steven Butala:
To buy undervalued property.
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