This brochure was 2 pages. 1 photo of the front of the home with the Agent contact. The other the basic text MLS printout.

Perhaps it was because it was a vacant home. Either way it had nothing appealing nor exciting for the buyer to remember the home.

Today we will focus on marketing expenses with Sam Miller, a Top Realtor in Mount Vernon, Ohio. Click here to go to his site: Sam Miller

Nellis: “Sam tell us where you focused your marketing to increase business”

Sam Miller: “I had doubled my real estate sales volume in a single year by doing some creative print marketing. I ran some very creative eye catching advertisements that caused people to call us. The campaign was a huge success.”

Nellis: “Indeed if you doubled your business in one year that is very impressive. Were you able to follow up the success the following year?”

Sam Miller: “I really wanted to take that exact concept and try to double our business again. I increased the frequency of the ads and made the ads bigger, better and I spent nearly twice as much that second year on marketing.”

Nellis: “So what happened? Did you see the same results?”

Sam Miller: “Unfortunatley no, I did about the same amount of business as the prior year but I had DOUBLED my advertising expense and reduced my profit. What I hadn’t realized is that I had already reached the peak for print marketing the first year when I doubled my business and adding more print advertising wasn’t going to increase the number of inquires I got so sales didn’t increase.”

Nellis: “Is there a pivotal lesson you learned about marketing or expenses?”

Sam Miller: “The real lesson learned was that I should have been tracking the results from my marketing much closer because I could have saved a lot of money and effort. Today there is nothing I do that is not tracked and everything gets an ROI evaluation (Return on Investment).”

Nellis: “Sam I loved the phrase you used earlier about effort can you explain it?”

Sam Miller: “I now always run an ROE (Return on Effort). ROE is not something discussed often in real estate but evaluating a return on effort is super critical so that you are not bogged down doing non productive activities.”

Sam Miller, thank you for sharing about Money Lost with large budget print advertising and a glimpse of how to find both time and money with a deeper look into ROI and ROE.

Sam Miller has served the residents of Ohio for many years with a complete team that can help serve you today… Go to Apple Valley to find out about one of the communities that Sam’s team serves.

We use some basic criteria to establish Money Lost or Money Found:

1. How much was spent on a monthly or annual basis?

2. What was the ROI (Return on Investment) within 6 months or a year?

3. What was the experience for the Realtor & the client?

4. Would you encourage others to participate in the same program?

This week we bring you an example of Money Lost by Debra Davis. Debra is a Realtor located in Snellville, GA – her website is www.FindAtlantaHomes.com

Debra referenced a company that she used earlier in her career when looking to bring in more leads to her Real Estate business. The company was www.FavoriteAgent.com

When asked about the cost Davis stated that it was $250.00 a month plus a $50.00 minimum for leads. We asked what her ROI was on the investment. She replied that the “leads” were not the quality that she expected for a service that demanded such a premium each month. Debra Davis went on to state that her experience was not good with this company and she would not encourage anyone to use the service/vendor to increase their profitablity.

Debra Davis continues to run a successful Real Estate business in Atlanta, Georgia. Find out more about Debra on her website!

Thank you Debra for giving us an example of Money Lost…

James Nellis

These are the issues that hit every small business owner. Money that is found and money lost… Money found is based on smart decisions that give you a minimal return of double or triple the cost of the investment. Money lost is the painful trial and error found by most business owners when an idea (costly idea) goes bad…

One example of Money Found OR Money Lost is below:

Shopping Carts: $7,500 for 6 months (3 stores) or $15,000 a year.

This is for the advertising rights on the individual shopping carts at a local Safeway or Giant. The idea is focused on Name Branding and securing new business. We did get acknowledgement from our clients and nice comments from them but we tracked ZERO direct return from this investment.

This type of advertising resulted in Money Lost. We now consider it “EGO” branding… it did not secure as new or more business but it did lighten our wallets every year. Make sure as 2009 approaches you look to secure Money Found and not Money Lost.

James & The Nellis Group