Sunday, February 21, 2010

Real Estate Investors: How to Get Motivated Sellers Calling in Droves Using Post-It Notes

Outside Company Distribution

There are companies out there that do distribution of post-it notes. There's a company called Markot. I 'm not going to recommend them because I tried them and I was not particularly happy.  There are others and you can look them up on Google under "post-it note distribution" and your city name.  Try one and see how they perform with small batch before you give them more business.

You tell them what neighborhood you want, you give them the post-it notes, and they'll go out and distribute them on each and every door. They'll walk up and down the neighborhood and put them on the doors.
I had some problems with one of my vendors. First, was they'd tell you they were delivering them this week, and then something would happen and it would be next, and then the following week. I had some problems getting them to deliver them on the dates they chose.

Second, I was always concerned when they did finally get around to it, because it seemed like my response was fairly muted compared to when I would have the post-it notes delivered myself by my people I trusted. It always made me wonder if they were getting out there in the exact number they stated.

Hire Someone to Distribute

Again, there's nothing wrong with paying somebody to do it. In fact, that's what I recommend, that you eventually get somebody to hire to go out and put them on doors. It's very easy if you know some people - some young kids, 15 year olds or something like that. You can pay them 10 or 15 cents per post-it note to deliver. They can do it after school or on the weekends. It's a nice part-time job for a kid.

For the most part, if you know the kid and you can trust they'll actually deliver them and they count how many they delivered - you pay them after they're completed. You should know when they're being delivered almost to the moment they're being delivered. That's how often you'll get calls.

If they start delivering them on a particular street at 4:00 in the afternoon and they deliver 300, 400 or 500 of them, it is almost inconceivable that you wouldn't get a couple of calls. That's how effective these are.
Some of these calls might not be very productive. You might even occasionally get a cranky person calling to complain. Tell them you're sorry, apologize, and maybe you'll have the kids run over and pull theirs off the door of something. Just deal with the cranky calls.

You will be getting calls almost immediately so you will know that they're being delivered. I know for sure the date they're being delivered because I get calls. If they deliver on Tuesdays and Thursdays, then I get calls on Tuesdays and Thursdays. If they don't deliver on Wednesday then maybe the phone is quiet on Wednesday. That's how effective these are.

If you would like more information on this topic or to learn more real estate investing tips, ideals or "real world" investing strategies please go to my real estate investing blog at http://www.learnrealestateinvestingblog.com/