L
lanedry77
Guest
Guest
Hi fellow Quick-Turners,First - Full disclosure: I am an owner of Yellow Letters Canada, and if you order this marketing material from us, I will make a few dollars in profit.
If you decide to order yellow letters, you should order from wherever you want. Although I make a small profit on orders, the main reason for the business is to give back to the Canadian quick-turners out there that wouldn`t have a Canadian source for letters otherwise.
With that aside, I know there are hundreds of people that just finished the Ron LeGrand event in Toronto, and are wanting to get started right away with their new business venture.
I wanted to do this post to share my experience with yellow letter marketing, in an effort to help you all.
I also want to say that this type of marketing does work. I just closed on a property on Oct 15th that was found through a yellow letter. This one deal alone will net us $781.36/month of cash flow (for 24 months) plus a back-end payday of $63,659.44
The yellow letters DO work. Where most beginning investors fail (myself included) is in the pre-screening. Like Ron says: "I bet I could pick $1 million of profits out of your garbage basket".
So here`s what I think is important to understand: Regardless of what Ron says, we are a bit different up here. Canadians are not exposed to as much marketing as Americans, and the rate of foreclosures are nearly zero up here compared to in the states.
Because of this, I`ve made a number of small changes to Ron`s "classic" yellow letter over the past year, with a few surprising results.
Here are the three variations I`d like to discuss;
QUOTE (Yellow Letter, Classic)Hi John,
My name is David Sandbrand. My wife Diane and I would like to buy your house at:
123 Main Street
Please call me at: 123-456-7890
Thanks,
David.
This letter will give you the highest number of calls - roughly 25% to 30%. In other words, if you send 1,000 of these letters, you will get 250 to 300 calls! They won`t all come in that week as many people are lazy and won`t call you right away, but you will get the calls.
The biggest problems with this wording are;
- People will want to know how you got their name and/or address. Many will call you just to ask you this
- Many people, being polite Canadians, will call you to tell you their house isn`t for sale.
- A bunch will call and say "I`ll sell it for $1 million", even though it`s only worth $200k.
Even though there is no indication that Diane and I (in this wording) want to buy the house to live in it, that is precisely what people will think the letter means, and then they will feel that you misrepresented yourself.
The bottom line is that you`ll get LOTS of calls, and there will definitely will be deals in there, but you`ll get the highest number of unhappy callers with this.
QUOTE (Yellow Letter, Opt-in)Hi John,
My name is David Sandbrand. My wife Diane and I would like to buy your house at:
123 Main Street
If you are interested in selling, please call me at: 123-456-7890
Thanks,
David.
Although this is nearly identical to the `classic` letter, the simple addition of "If you are interested in selling" will cut down on most (but not all!) of the callers that would otherwise call you to say "thanks for the letter, but I`m not interested in selling".
You can expect the same number of calls wanting to know where you got their information from, and the same number of "$1 million" calls.
QUOTE (Yellow Letter, Fully Transparent)Hi,
My name is David, and I would like to buy a house in your area.
If you or anyone you know has a house for sale, please call me at: 123-456-7890
Thanks,
David
PS: I am an investor (not a realtor!), and can buy fast.
This is my favorite when sending my own letters, because it reduces the wasted time I spend on the phone.
There`s a few things to note in this one;
- in the other two versions, a first name is used if the name was available. In this version, no first name is used. This is to ensure that the letter is not personalized in any way. The envelope still includes a name, to increase the open rate.
- This is the `open kimono` version, and does not imply a specific interest in the recipients house.
This letter will give you the lowest number of calls - roughly 5% to 10%, but they will be the highest quality calls. If someone calls back from this letter, the chances that they have a house for sale is significantly higher (though not 100% of course).
Whatever marketing method you use - yellow letter, a website, a vehicle wrap, billboard, flyer, whatever.. - the single most important thing that will determine your success or failure is the ability to `see` a deal. in other words, the pre-screening of the lead sheet.
I`ve sent thousands and thousands of yellow letters, and am actively doing nearly every kind of marketing possible. In hindsight, the reason I was so slow to start was my inability to see a deal when it was right in front of me. I was looking for one particular kind of lead, while not being able to mentally structure a deal or offer for the hundreds of viable leads that didn`t fit the model I thought I was looking for.
Like Ron says, the top two keys to this business are;
#1 - generate leads
#2 - pre-screen them quickly and accurately.
I hope that helps a few people.
Thanks,
David.
If you decide to order yellow letters, you should order from wherever you want. Although I make a small profit on orders, the main reason for the business is to give back to the Canadian quick-turners out there that wouldn`t have a Canadian source for letters otherwise.
With that aside, I know there are hundreds of people that just finished the Ron LeGrand event in Toronto, and are wanting to get started right away with their new business venture.
I wanted to do this post to share my experience with yellow letter marketing, in an effort to help you all.
I also want to say that this type of marketing does work. I just closed on a property on Oct 15th that was found through a yellow letter. This one deal alone will net us $781.36/month of cash flow (for 24 months) plus a back-end payday of $63,659.44
The yellow letters DO work. Where most beginning investors fail (myself included) is in the pre-screening. Like Ron says: "I bet I could pick $1 million of profits out of your garbage basket".
So here`s what I think is important to understand: Regardless of what Ron says, we are a bit different up here. Canadians are not exposed to as much marketing as Americans, and the rate of foreclosures are nearly zero up here compared to in the states.
Because of this, I`ve made a number of small changes to Ron`s "classic" yellow letter over the past year, with a few surprising results.
Here are the three variations I`d like to discuss;
QUOTE (Yellow Letter, Classic)Hi John,
My name is David Sandbrand. My wife Diane and I would like to buy your house at:
123 Main Street
Please call me at: 123-456-7890
Thanks,
David.
This letter will give you the highest number of calls - roughly 25% to 30%. In other words, if you send 1,000 of these letters, you will get 250 to 300 calls! They won`t all come in that week as many people are lazy and won`t call you right away, but you will get the calls.
The biggest problems with this wording are;
- People will want to know how you got their name and/or address. Many will call you just to ask you this
- Many people, being polite Canadians, will call you to tell you their house isn`t for sale.
- A bunch will call and say "I`ll sell it for $1 million", even though it`s only worth $200k.
Even though there is no indication that Diane and I (in this wording) want to buy the house to live in it, that is precisely what people will think the letter means, and then they will feel that you misrepresented yourself.
The bottom line is that you`ll get LOTS of calls, and there will definitely will be deals in there, but you`ll get the highest number of unhappy callers with this.
QUOTE (Yellow Letter, Opt-in)Hi John,
My name is David Sandbrand. My wife Diane and I would like to buy your house at:
123 Main Street
If you are interested in selling, please call me at: 123-456-7890
Thanks,
David.
Although this is nearly identical to the `classic` letter, the simple addition of "If you are interested in selling" will cut down on most (but not all!) of the callers that would otherwise call you to say "thanks for the letter, but I`m not interested in selling".
You can expect the same number of calls wanting to know where you got their information from, and the same number of "$1 million" calls.
QUOTE (Yellow Letter, Fully Transparent)Hi,
My name is David, and I would like to buy a house in your area.
If you or anyone you know has a house for sale, please call me at: 123-456-7890
Thanks,
David
PS: I am an investor (not a realtor!), and can buy fast.
This is my favorite when sending my own letters, because it reduces the wasted time I spend on the phone.
There`s a few things to note in this one;
- in the other two versions, a first name is used if the name was available. In this version, no first name is used. This is to ensure that the letter is not personalized in any way. The envelope still includes a name, to increase the open rate.
- This is the `open kimono` version, and does not imply a specific interest in the recipients house.
This letter will give you the lowest number of calls - roughly 5% to 10%, but they will be the highest quality calls. If someone calls back from this letter, the chances that they have a house for sale is significantly higher (though not 100% of course).
Whatever marketing method you use - yellow letter, a website, a vehicle wrap, billboard, flyer, whatever.. - the single most important thing that will determine your success or failure is the ability to `see` a deal. in other words, the pre-screening of the lead sheet.
I`ve sent thousands and thousands of yellow letters, and am actively doing nearly every kind of marketing possible. In hindsight, the reason I was so slow to start was my inability to see a deal when it was right in front of me. I was looking for one particular kind of lead, while not being able to mentally structure a deal or offer for the hundreds of viable leads that didn`t fit the model I thought I was looking for.
Like Ron says, the top two keys to this business are;
#1 - generate leads
#2 - pre-screen them quickly and accurately.
I hope that helps a few people.
Thanks,
David.
