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Chris Rolls, Writing killer prospecting letters


Chris Rolls, Writing killer prospecting letters

Spending time thinking about the response to direct mail campaigns will pay dividends in the long run.

The "Ticket on the meat"

“There are some real basics in writing a good letter that make an enormous difference,” Mr Rolls explained, and said the first place to start was with a great headline. Famous ad man David Ogilvy calls headlines the “ticket on the meat,” because of their importance in highlighting what is being advertised. Think about when people read a newspaper - they don’t actually read the article, but scan the headlines to decide what is worth reading.

So, if you send someone a letter with an interesting headline that grabs their attention, they are more likely to read the letter. “If they’re more likely to read the letter, they’re more likely to respond to you,” Mr Rolls said.

Secondly, include an offer. “If you have an offer or a reason for someone to give you a call now, then they will. If you have no reason for people to give you a call now, then they won’t,” Mr Rolls said. Make sure it’s an offer no other agency has. For example everyone does free rental appraisals but if you offer two movie tickets with every appraisal it will attract more interest. “If for one in every five people who you go to do a rental appraisal you actually end up managing their property, you’re giving away five sets of two movies tickets, which might be $150, to get a new property on your rent roll.”

Next is putting in a deadline by which time people must respond. “If you say give me a call, this offer lasts forever, there’s no urgency, so they put the letter down. They think I’ll call you on the weekend or I’ll call you next week and they forget,” Mr Rolls said. Instead, give prospects a time and date to call you by. “You’re making that sense of urgency – they need to call you now,” he added.

Longer is better

These three components form the basis of a good direct mail letter, and what makes it great, is in the detail. One detail that surprises many is the longer a letter, the more likely it is the sender will get a response. “When I show somebody some of our really well responded letters, which are six or seven pages long, their response is ‘I’d never read that’, and that’s true because they’re not interested in what it’s selling, but if you send that to someone who is interested they will read the letter,” Mr Rolls explained. Rental Express has researched this and found long letters sell better than short letters.

The next step is to write from the prospect’s perspective, not about what you can do. “You could slot any real estate agency’s name into that letter or marketing brochure and it could equally apply to what they think about their services. There is no point of difference and it’s all about us, us, us,” Mr Rolls explained. Define the agency’s point of difference and explain exactly what that means for the prospect. “They don’t care what you can do. What they care about is what you can do for them,” he added.

Bold any key benefits and offers, because that will still grab the attention of those who won’t read the whole letter, but just scan the major statements. Always put a PS on the letter - or 2-3 if necessary – highlighting the most important points. “Research shows that after the headline, the PS is the thing that is read more than any other part of the letter,” he said.

Mr Rolls has studied the book Tested Advertising Methods by John Caples, who he considers to be one of the all-time greats of copywriting. “He tested and measured every ad and every letter that he wrote for years and came up with lots of little things that make a difference,” he said.

Try this

When sending a letter never just assume it is going to work, even if you have followed these rules. The campaign must be measured. Here is an example suggested by Mr Rolls:

Send a letter out to 500 people. If you get two responses that is a 0.4 per cent return. “That’s not bad, because you will only get small returns of 1-2 per cent, so 0.4 is not atrocious, but it’s not a great response”. Then send the same letter to another 500 people, but change the headline. If you get two responses from the first 500, you might get four responses the second time. It’s only two extra responses, but you have doubled the response rate. This means you’ve halved the cost of that particular advertising method. Previously you had to send out 1000 letters to get four responses, now you only have to send out 500 letters to get four responses. Then change the offer and send another 500 letters out. “Over a period of many months, you can get a letter that instead of getting two responses when you send out 500 letters, you get 10 responses. Once you’ve got a letter to that standard you just keep using it forever and ever and don’t change it,” he said.

“Advertising is not about creativity, it’s about science. It’s about researching what works and what doesn’t and testing it and measuring it in sample groups and generating records of response,” Mr Rolls explained. And he should know - the Queensland property management business signed up 876 new properties without one cold call or knocking on one door last financial year.

 


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Chris Rolls, Writing killer prospecting letters