Targeted Marketing and Market Research:
Targeted Marketing and Market Research
In this audio recording below, I interviewed Jim Mitchell, “The Biker Who Buys Houses” about targeted marketing and market research.
Transcription:
(0:05) The audio you're about to hear is part of an interview I did with Jim Mitchell, who's better known as the biker who buys houses. Now, in this part of the interview, I was asking Jim about targeted marketing, what it is, how to do it, and also market research. So listen in now as Jim shares his insights into how you can use these things to attract leads to your business.
(0:29) Now, what are some ways to do targeted marketing? You, the investor, may want to invest in a certain area, so targeting your message output to that area would be wise. If you live in a town with five different subdivisions in it and you only want to buy in subdivision Oak Hills, then you put your marketing material near Oak Hills and you aim it at the folks who live in Oak Hills. So that would be one way to target your marketing.
(0:56) You can also narrow down the list to get your message in front of it and open up other avenues like direct mail, flyers, door hangers, things of this sort. Some investors, like I said earlier, buy lists from companies with specific criteria, some local title companies. Some of the folks listening may want to call their local title companies and find out if they provide free information or what they charge.
(1:22) I know a local title company to us that will provide a list of out-of-area owners, and in addition to that, they'll print out mailing labels for you, and all they'll charge you is for the copy of the mailing labels. So if I contact them and say I want to mail to folks who own houses but don't live in them and live out of state, that title company will not only ship me the list to fax me the list, but I can swing down there and pick up pre-printed mailing labels so that I can just sit down with my postcards or mailers, apply the labels, take them to the post office and drop them off, and I've marketed to that specific list. You could even narrow it down even further.
(2:02) This is the information age. There's a local investor that I've worked with before who specifically seeks out-of-area owners that own houses free and clear within a specific certain square footage range, specific number of bedrooms and baths, and that really narrows down his list. One time, I remember talking to him on the phone, and he had a list of only 20 people he was going to contact in a certain neighborhood.
(2:29) However, out of those 20 people, he wound up buying four houses. His targeted approach is extremely targeted and refined. He knows what he's going after, and he gets out there and does it.
(2:42) I do prefer a little bit more broad marketing myself, but if someone wants to specifically target something, that's the way they can do it. Do you have any kind of resources you could share with those listening where they can go to find lists and things like that to do targeted marketing on their own? Absolutely. In fact, we're always developing new places where they can find these lists.
(3:06) There are several services online, but the most important would be to target someplace local. I would tell folks to contact your direct mail houses locally. There's usually a local firm that handles direct mail, and they can often get your discounts for not only providing the data, but also perhaps handle the printing and the mailing for you, too.
(3:25) That way, you have one place to go for it. Also, larger national title companies, First American Title, and Land America Title, and Chicago Title, and some of the larger companies will have divisions specifically for providing lists. I would encourage folks to contact these companies as well, no matter where they're located in the country.
(3:47) If that doesn't work, drop us an email at re-mentors.com, and we'll help find a place for you. Okay. What is market research, and what are some ways to do that? Well, Todd, taking the time to do some market research can be a big help when targeting your marketing to the correct audience.
(4:03) That could be as simple as driving through neighborhoods to see how many realtor sell by owner signs there are, or calling real estate agents with some knowledge of the area. It makes sense to call real estate agents and brokers, by the way, even though I don't necessarily advocate using them when purchasing. It does make sense to network with some and get to know the areas.
(4:24) Real estate agents and brokers and other investors can be great valuable resources for information, especially if they've been active for at least a few years, because they can tell you which areas locally are hot areas and why, just as much as they can tell you where you shouldn't buy and which places to avoid. In a related vein, you can also talk to people at investor clubs and yield a lot of information. There may be mortgage brokers where you can talk to them and they'll say, hey, Bob, investor, I've been doing 100 loans a month for the last five years, and over the last six months, those 100 loans have all been concentrated in this area of town.
(5:03) That's the place where we're writing mortgages left and right. They may even go even further and say, you know, we're getting all kinds of people applying for refinances down here on the south end of town, and darn it, none of them are going through, we're having all kinds of trouble. Well, now you know there's people seeking refinance in the south end of your town and they're not getting approved, so guess what? They may be in a spot and need to sell their house, so now you market to that end of town.
(5:30) So market research is basically just learning what your market values are, what your market needs, and then providing and filling in those areas. The other thing I always like to tell investors is simply pay attention. Keep your eyes and ears open.
(5:46) If you read the newspaper and you pay attention to what's going on locally, right there will be market research. Just last week, I saw in the newspaper that a certain company in our area is closing and going to be laying off 800 employees. Well, these 800 employees live somewhere, don't they? And they're going to need somewhere to live.
(6:04) So there's a little bit of market research. We'll come to find out the majority of the employees that work at this place live near the place. So there's going to be some neighborhoods that are going to be really heavily affected by this one employer shutting down and laying them off.
(6:19) And so now I can target that area because there's probably going to be some opportunity down there. There's going to be folks looking for jobs, and in the current job climate, it's very likely that several of those folks will have to move from the area to be gainfully employed. And if they're offered a job, most likely they're going to jump on it and need to go fast, which means they're going to have to sell their houses fast.
(6:42) And when they need to sell their houses fast, they're going to call Biker Jim because Biker Jim is going to be in their face for the next six weeks. Yeah. So, yeah, like you mentioned, just keeping your eyes open to things going on and spotting those opportunities as they come up and realizing that it is an opportunity, not just saying, oh, that's too bad, and continuing with what you're doing, but like you're saying, really focusing on that.
(7:05) And most people aren't going to be doing that. Most aren't going to be paying attention to those things and really focusing in on those people. So that really will give you an edge if you do pay attention to those things.
