Anyone else feel overwhelmed!?

Question

I started my campaign at the beginning of January targeting absentee owners and I had a list of about 720 that I was going to mail to 5 times. The letter was mailed to half the people one week with a one week break, and mailed to the other half the week after. I'm currently on my 2nd letter for the 2nd half of the people and I am overwhelmed!

I am getting so many phone calls that I am losing track of everything. I have not closed a deal on this mailing yet but it's getting to the point where I am losing focus because I am getting so behind on phone calls.

The crazy thing is I actually have the time to return the phone calls but after speaking with so many unmotivated sellers I just don't feel like returning the rest of the phone calls!

Has anyone else experienced this?

Chaz Reid · Answer

Do you have enough money to hire a virtual assistant @Marcus Kennedy

If not, I'm guessing you're probably calling everyone back and having conversations with them? Learn how to screen your calls based off levels of motivation per call. If I call you and tell you in a mono tone voice, "Yeah, I'll sell you my house. Call me back and tell me how you wanna pay." That's a tire kicker to me. But if I call you and say, "Yes I would like to sell the house. It was my mothers house and its been hell since we've rented it out." That's who I would call back later.

I'm not saying ignore tire kickers or don't call people back, I'm just letting you know to VALUE YOUR TIME...

Robert Solis · Answer

@Marcus Kennedy

I can totally empathize with what you're going through. That was my experience too.

@Chaz Reid is spot on regarding motivation. You want to spend most of your phone time with motivated people. Minimize time-wasters.

What helped me was visualizing the lead-to-close process as a sales funnel. At the top you have a wide range of people with varying motivations and ultimately you want to shrink the funnel so you filter out the un-motivated.

I like to make people leave messages before I call them back. The act of leaving a message is a sign of motivation to me. So that's the first filter.

My next filter is at the beginning of my call back when I tell them right off the bat that what I'm looking for is a house that needs work and I ask them if their house fits that description. That weeds out people who want me to pay top dollar because they want me to think their house is in perfect condition.

At some point during rapport building, I'll ask them what they think their house is worth and how they arrived at that number. Then I'll ask them what they would like to get for it.

Anytime I talk with someone who just wants a price, I tell them the lowest comp. "I'm on the MLS and it looks to me like houses in your neighborhood are selling for <lowest comp>."

If you're still getting overwhelmed by phone calls, you can experiment your direct mail copy.

"I want to buy your house" is a lot broader than "I want to buy your house if you are in this situation".

Hope that helps!

Marcus Kennedy · Answer

@Renee HarrisThat is a good strategy to use. I got my list from listsource. My goal was to find homes that I could rehab and the ones that didnt fit my criteria I would wholesale.

@Chris Martin I have learned but I'm still not quite sure what list I should be marketing to.

If I want to rehab homes but don't necessarily want absentee landlords with tenants in place, does anyone know what list would be best for that?

Chris Martin · Answer

@Marcus Kennedy

hopefully you have learned from this experience and the next campaign can be focused on getting candidates that can better meet your goal(s).

Renee Harris · Answer

@Marcus Kennedy:  when I get overwhelmed I like to break the tasks down into 15 minute intervals. I literally set a timer and I will do it, in your case, return calls for 15 minutes. Then do more if I want.  If not, when the 15 is up, I go do something else and schedule a time to come back later and do another 15 minutes. Usually, I'm in a groove and rarely stop after 15 mins. It'll go for an hour. I like this because it falls in the 15 minutes a day is better than nothing category.  Which is what happens when I'm really stressed and overwhelmed...I get nothing done.

Hope this helps.

Oh yeah, as a newbie who is just learning, where did you get the names/leads for this absentee list? If you don't mind saying.

Marcus Kennedy · Answer

@Jonathan Quintanilla Yea thats what I was thinking too. I would rather have more calls then none but when most if not all of the calls are non motivated people you will begin to sing a different tune. Not to mention you still have to go through those calls to remove them from your list of future mailings because you don't want to mail them again. I use yellow letters with handwritten font to absentee owners.

Thanks @Robert Solis! Those are all good pieces of advice to use while trying to make this thing work! I'm definitely going to have to weed out the tire kickers because they wear you out! How long have you been wholesaling?

Jonathan Quintanilla · Answer

I would honestly rather have more calls than less calls!

Is there a lot of competition in your area? What kind of marketing do you do?

Chaz Reid · Answer

Yeah bro, I learned pretty fast on how to value my time when it came to calling customers back. Most aren't motivated but I would call them back, just when it was convenient for me or later during the day after I've screened my calls. It doesn't hurt to contact them just to get a feel for things. Some will tell you to stop sending them mailers. Cool by me, saved me some more time and money.

Marcus Kennedy · Answer

@Chaz Reid That makes plenty of sense because the phone calls that I have gotten where people are asking how much I will pay them have so far always turned out to be tire kickers and are not very motivated at all.

Anyone else feel overwhelmed!?

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