Over the holidays, a colleague of mine shared to me an email he received from a real estate agent. As he was looking to buy a home at that time, he was both excited and amused about the agent’s response to his inquiry.
The email was a mix of email scripted responses, which was quite obvious as there was no flow from topic to topic. The agent also failed to do a grammar check, which is probably why the email went to my colleague’s spam folder.
The second part was also a confusing mess. We can safely assume that my colleague deleted this email afterward.
Rather than write an email that gets filtered into the spam folder, make your sales prospecting email stand out with these tips:
1. Although your personal email would be fine, a customized email makes it more professional. It’s also one way to build your brand as a go-to real estate professional. If your brokerage house has not set up a business email, you can get one from Google for as low as $5/mo (Php220/mo) or $50/year (Php2,200/year).
2. Make sure that the person you are pitching your email to could be a great client in the future. Getting leads from your published listings is one thing, but partnering with a online real estate marketplace will have more fruitful results. Online marketplaces have programs in place (that real estate professionals can subscribe to) that would separate actual homebuyers from those who are just surfing or scouting for info.
3. Your email should be short and sweet (3 sentences maximum). Email readers, especially those who access them via their mobile phones, have very short attention spans. Aside from answering your client’s inquiry, state what you want from your client in very clear terms.
Your subject should also be written like a response to your client’s inquiry. If you are emailing a cold lead, your subject title should be a personal and intimate response to your client’s problem.
For example:
- Bad: “Makati CBD Prime And Luxurious Project”
- Very Bad: “makati condo for sale”
- Good: “Response to your inquiry about Makati CBD condo”
- Very Good: “Robert, here are three properties in Makati that could be your next home.”
4. Your greetings should also be personalized. After all, you will be communicating with an actual being, and would probably meet this person for coffee, talk to this person more about buying his dream home, accompany this person for viewings, and (fingers crossed) welcome this person on moving-in day.
5. Acknowledge the client’s question and provide an answer immediately, including actions taken. Busy people like concise emails, because they always, ALWAYS get to the point. Email readers do not need stories, unless its chismis or about their coworkers or friends (which is bad, by the way).
6. Practice operational excellence by anticipating your prospective client’s need. Your papogi points are usually article links, photos, or videos that would still serve your client’s need. So unless that video shows some data how your video on why my colleague should invest in Makati, by all means include it in the email.
7. Your closing remarks should be designed as your call to action (CTA). Although “Best”, “Respectfully”, “Regards”, and similar ending remarks should be fine, you aren’t that close enough to impart that kind of greeting to a person you haven’t met yet (technically) (e.g. Let me know, Hoping to hear from you soon). Moreover, make sure that the client can easily comply to your CTA.
8. Treat your email signature as your online business card.
Naturally, you want to establish early on that you are a legitimate, real estate expert, and most importantly, a real person. The often-ignored email signature would be a perfect way to introduce that idea to your prospective clients.
Here’s how to automatically set a signature on all of your emails in Gmail:
On your inbox, locate the gear icon on the top-right portion of the page and click Settings;
- 8.1 Insert your professionally-shot profile photo to let your clients know the face of the person behind the email. If you don’t know how to use a photo editing app or software, just have one taken at a photo studio and get the raw file.
- 8.2 Put in your name and your contact information, including profile or business links. If your name is unpronounceable (and refuse to change it), you can show clients how to say it phonetically (e.g. Tchyla (Tai-luh) Lim). Because clients will have difficulty remembering Saoirse (SEER-sha), Nikolaj (Nee-ko-LY), or Eian (EE-yan) if they do not know how to read or say their names. If they do after, you will be that much more memorable too.
9. FYIs/Postscripts (P.S.) always stand out. Basically, you can use the postscript as a final plea to the client to contact you. You can reiterate his main problem that you are offering to solve and marry it with a hook (see below).
10. You can exercise your skill in operational experience by giving something of value for free. A downloadable form or guide would be an awesome welcome gift to your prospective client. If your client does not reply on your first email, he or she will still be able to recall you if you gave him something of help or of use.
