Have you ever got an email from someone that was unclear, confused or full of grammatical errors? In commercial real estate brokerage, the emails that we send should be of the highest quality in all respects.
Low quality communications are usually ‘deleted’ faster than you can imagine. They are typically not read beyond the first sentence. If you want to have any chance of converting new business from email marketing and communications, your messages should be accurate and specific.
Email Frequency
We typically send out lots of emails every day as part of connecting with prospects, clients, and colleagues. If anything, the volume of emails that we send is growing. Quality in the email process is really important.
It is not unusual for a top agent to be sending out 40 direct emails per day with specific client or prospect communications; you can add to that number a few hundred or perhaps thousand emails from marketing based auto-responders.
Rules to Electronic Marketing
The quality of your email and written message is a direct reflection on your business skills and communication intelligence. Consider these factors in your email marketing campaigns and or general business emails:
- Property updates – If you are sending out property information make sure that it is up to date and accurate. Generic property information doesn’t work in our industry.
- Personal facts – Always ensure that you have the person’s name and title correct for the purpose of sending the email. Any errors with addresses and names made will ‘kill’ your message and content.
- Contact information – Provide your contact information so it is easy for the other person to connect with you. Include your email, website, mobile telephone, and social media connections. Give the other person some alternatives in reaching out to you.
- Informational – If you are providing attachments, convert them to pdf so that the formatting is stable and presentable. A pdf will usually get to the other end or person with accuracy and integrity.
- Spell check – Get a spell check done automatically as part of message creation. You can set the email client program to do that for you automatically.
- Timing – If you are sending a marketing based email it is generally more effective to send it around the middle to end of the week. Certainly avoid sending marketing emails from Saturday to Monday (inclusive) as most people have other interests away from business on those days.
- Length – Long emails are generally not read in entirety. Your message should be contained in just 3 or 4 paragraphs. Adults don’t like to read long and complex marketing emails. The ‘deletion’ button is the common approach to lengthy emails.
- Images re-sized – If you are sending photographs then make sure they are re-sized for dispatch. Compress the image size so it can send easily across the internet. There are plenty of image based programs that let you create smaller file sizes for images.
- Headings and highlights – If you have something specific to say then you will have a need for heading simplicity and highlighting of key issues within the message. Understand the important points that you want the other person to note. Highlighting those points in a particular color is helpful with some important communications.
- Hyperlinks – Check out your hyperlinks before you send the message.
- Follow-up calls – If you are sending out marketing type emails, then you should be making follow up calls.
- Title or topic relevance – If you are sending out emails as part of a marketing process, choose your key words and images with relevance and care. Professional photographs and message copy will always help open conversions.
The email process in commercial real estate is specific and direct. Make sure you have all the elements of the communication process under control and optimized.
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