Low-cost marketing can produce high rewards

by Peter Mitchell

As the cost of living crisis continues to bite, we all have to keep a beady eye on the pennies. But for businesses, this is no time to skimp on marketing. And here at The ValPal Network, we believe that estate agents should be concentrating on techniques that won’t break the bank.

Whenever we’re hit by economic storms, there is a tendency for us all to look for places where we can make cut-backs and the marketing budget is often top of the list. But many experts believe that the companies that continue to market themselves in choppy financial waters are the ones most likely to stay afloat!

This makes it an ideal time to consider low-cost marketing options – initiatives that won’t cost a fortune, but will help you re-engage with one of your most precious assets - your customers.  And what makes this idea so devilishly cunning for agents, is that in many cases, the information needed to nurture potential leads is right at your fingertips.

Data Mining is a good example. Whether you’re letting or selling, having an automated lead nurture system such as MovePal, to send something as simple as an email or SMS message is a very low-cost way of re-engaging with hundreds or thousands of contacts at the click of a button.  Why fork out for new leads when you have untapped business sitting quietly in your CRM?

And once that initial contact has been established, the nurturing process can gently begin.

But first, a word of warning. You must have a clearly defined objective when re-engaging with your database. This is where solutions like to ValPal instant valuation tool are invaluable. We always find that the most successful database mining campaigns are highly topical with insight into the current market and always with the objective of asking the consumer to get an up-to-date valuation of their home. For any leads that aren’t ready to re-engage, nurturing software is vitally important to keep those cool and tepid leads interested and turned into hot leads when the time is right.

Marketing doesn’t have to cost the earth to be effective and sometimes taking things back to basics can lead to huge improvements long term. Word of mouth and referrals are an age-old practice, but are you confident your team is asking for the referral? A simple question like ‘Do you know anyone looking to sell or let a property?’ could open up your books to new opportunities with minimal effort and zero additional spend.

Having your team ask how potential leads found you will give you a far better insight into what is currently already working for you. It’s vital that you’re able to track every new lead that enters the business and how it came to you.

Tech solutions can also help when it comes to tracking the source of your lead generation. Take leafleting for example. The addition of a simple QR code driving traffic to your ValPal tool, means you can effectively measure how well the campaign has performed.

And we recommend Facebook ads as a value-for-money solution. Our average cost per sales lead is currently £2-£4. It is our belief that this is one of the lowest cost forms of advertising available. But with Facebook, it’s important that you offer something in exchange for the consumers’ personal information. This could be an instant valuation tool, like ValPal, which provides a valuation of their home. Alternatively, it could be downloading a free guide on a crucial topic in the sales or lettings sector.

Obviously, Facebook isn’t the only form of digital advertising available, but with its low cost and massive database (it has 2 billion users), if you want to be a little bit experimental with your advertising, it is one of the best options out there.

If you would like help or advice on marketing and how to take your business to the next level, get in touch with the team for a no obligation chat: team@valpal.co.uk, 0208 663 4930