New to direct mailing in So Cal - Looking for input

[Chidi Dillibe]

Hello all,

I am looking forward to doing some small direct mail campaigns (No more than 300 letters at a time for now) in cities I believe could have distress potential local to me. I live in Whittier, CA and would be looking to mail in Montebello, Norwalk, Downey, Pico Rivera and potentially the Pomona area. I have already created a mailing letter using my own handwriting font (Shout out to Calligraphr.com). I'll probably either grab the lists from Propertyradar or Listsource.

Am I missing anything?

Has anyone of you recently done some campaigns in these areas? If so, what was the result like?

I'm all about learning and i'm sure there are some critical things I can incorporate that i'm simply not aware of. Please chime in!

Thanks as always.

Chidi

[Nabil Suleiman]

@Chidi Dillibe

I would choose a very very specific area you want to market to. 300 is not very many mailers to send out (which is totally ok to start), but it makes your range of homes relatively small. I am assuming the 300 was based on a per month and not a per week schedule. If I assumed incorrectly then please let me know. 

Next, you are in heavy competition with a lot of people in So Cal, so keep in mind that it may be many months before a lead calls you, if they do. There are many success stories, but also the ones I hear from sometimes didn't get a response for 13 months (this is one example) but they continue to send out mailers to the same farm over and over. Meaning once you choose your 300 homes to market to, keep sending them to the same farm and don't give up. Sometimes (most often) the giving up can be financially motivated, which I understand but that leads to the next point. 

If you are looking for a way to double up or less expensive strategies you can also door knock the same neighborhood you are sending the mailers out to. (this may help you choose the area because for me I don't want to go too far from home if I am door knocking). But the time dedicated to this and the 99.9% No's you receive can break many peoples motivation. Remember why you are doing this...

Lastly, find a REI Meeting in your neighborhood and start networking/ starting conversations about your goals if you haven't already.

Good Luck.