All Forum Posts by: Ethan Summers

@Collin Schwartz thats awesome have you set up any followup sequences via email ?? Are you only focused on multifamily properties? 

@Justin Silverio you make a very great point. As I learn more about marketing on multiple channels Ive discovered the importance of getting extremely targeted with my message. With my skill set i find it easier to target the audience i want to discover my message online. This has helped me become more selective and direct with my marketing(which saves a small guy like me some marketing dollars). Maybe as I learn more about DM and grow my business i'll be able to send out MASSIVE, consistent and wonderfully engineered DM campaigns much like the big time players like yourself. thanks for your post and insight. 

@Justin Silverio how much longer will people check their mailbox and go through the tons of "investors" that mail them to buy their properties. Can we expect millennials to be responding to direct mail? I believe that direct mail works to a certain extent as well, but im a firm believer in diversifying your marketing efforts and becoming OMNIPRESENT! I think the direct mail market is getting over saturated.

In regards to the properties I own that I receive yellow letters and different mailers i trash them without looking at them. There are instances where i've received a fed ex package and entertained the marketing message, maybe im just numb to the direct mail marketing that i receive personally because I invest and send out mailers myself. 

@Michael Hayes $6 per search is a little outrageous if you intend to do this in bulk, finding a skiptracer who can get the data to you at a reasonable price who will take the time to skiptrace each record individually would be the best advice i could give when it comes to locating data. Good luck let me know if you have any further questions about skiptracing. Or any specific cold calling questions I maybe able to assist! 

@Jeff B. Yes just under %1 is the response rate i've received, and most investors and vendors i've worked with state you must mail a minimum of 5-7 mailings to really get a decent response rate and start getting a measurable ROI in my last few years its been sporadic and very hard to track. I've almost completely abandoned direct mail and just skiptrace leads from my direct mail list and any drive for dollar leads i may come across. Im a member to a few skiptracing services so im able to get a 91% hit rate on phone numbers dialing directly and sending out text has been better for me within my competitive market. thanks for you post!!

Some resources you can use to locate correct addresses and phone numbers are findtheseller.com, TLO, Microbilt, or Spokeo. If you plan on prioritizing your list and going after the low hanging fruit, then I would use findtheseller.com. This can get very pricy because they charge like $6 per search; however, it's a quick fix and they have a quick turnaround time. Spokeo is as about good as White Pages, but I would use them for phone numbers rather than correct addresses because they'll likely be wrong. Microbilt was the first tool I used, and it was spotty with numbers but typically gave me correct addresses. It costs about $50 per month and is good if you are doing around 20 searches per month. You'll need to contact them and go through the process of getting an account, which takes roughly 2 weeks. Lastly, if you plan on doing this consistently then I would seriously consider TLO. I've had great experience with it, and it costs roughly $250 monthly for 3600 searches annually. I've found that I get 1 out of 25 numbers are incorrect, which is roughly 90% accuracy rate on a 1000-lead list. You need to go through the process of getting an account, like Microbilt. TLO will take you about a month to get but well worth it if you do plan on making skip tracing returned letters part of your business model. I would just weigh your options and see what fits your needs. I've skip traced tens of thousands of leads so I can answer any specific questions you have. Just ask away! @Michael Hayes

My market is pretty competitive, so brokers and rehabbers came to us to get a leg up on the competition. While I love direct mail, the sellers have almost become numb to it because there are so many new "investors" entering the market every year. So cold calling sellers is the way we get a leg up on our competition. I imagine that this is the case nationally, also. What we do is tedious and requires thick skin. Any absentee direct mail response rate statistics would be greatly appreciated on this forum!! 

@Mike Taravella be sure to implement a returned letter strategy for the undelivered mail pieces.

Initially, I skip traced every returned letter and repacked the letters in new hand-written envelopes. This was very tedious because I was sending out thousands of pieces every month and getting a couple of hundred returned mail pieces. Due to this, I began prioritizing my returned letters to determine if it was worth the time to resend them. If I saw that a property clearly looked abandoned from Google Maps or bought over 20 years ago, then I would find the owner's correct address and resend the letter. I still do this for some of my lists. However, I prefer to get my virtual assistant to use my skip tracing tools to locate the correct addresses of all my returned letters then just update my excel spreadsheet and wait until the next month to resend those letters out. This way I'm avoiding hand writing all of the letters. This has helped me tremendously as it is important to not waste marketing dollars when you're first starting in REI. In response to your question you should get more specific with what your investment strategy is, maybe I could provide some guidance. 

Hello, Dana

Lets connect and discuss some of the issues you're having with your cold calling efforts! PM me anytime I cold call daily for my business and may have some techniques that may improve your experience! 

@Aaron Tjomsland I use investorfuse to help with my automation. What CRM have you had success with in the past?