Wholesalers (and any direct mail marketers), check your data!

[David M.]

Hi Everyone!  I invest in Arizona where ownership records are public and quite easy to access.  As such, I get phone calls, letters, and even text messages asking to buy my properties for top dollar and cash.  Quick sidebar, if the same prospect receives 25 postcards from different sellers all saying the same thing, the message begins to lose effectiveness, and it might be time for the savvy marketer to move to something new.  But I digress...today was my favorite unrequested solicitation.  Quick second sidebar, since AZ property info is so open and widely available, I invested in a UPS Store mailbox for a "real street address" years ago.  Since switching to the UPS box, all property recordings point to that mailing address on public records.

So, long story long, today I received a 4" x 6" bright yellow card.  The front had the mailing and return addresses, along with a quick intro to his goal of buying houses in my 'hood.  Even a passport photo and phone number.  The back was a mail merged script addressed to my full name, and stating his interest in buying my property.  I'm sure some of you can see what's coming next, but Mr. Cash Investor wants to buy my UPS Store suite.

While this is obviously hilarious, after I stopped laughing I felt really bad for the guy.  He spent money to buy the list, print the card, and mail the card.  How many other UPS Stores did he offer to buy, or worse, how many times did he offer to buy the same one?!

As I take tongue out of check, I offer this as a learning lesson for anyone trying to break into the mailing list game or automate their existing manual mailing lists.  Often raw data includes many fields, and knowing which ones are the valuable ones is pretty much of paramount importance.  He misidentified mailing address as property address, and however many cards were in that same batch all suffered the same error, if not all time.

If you are running a business with infinite upside and potential life altering downside, take the time to make sure your data is right.  Whatever it is.  If this guy can't identify my property, why would I think he even knows what top dollar is?  Does he mess up proforma workups to evaluate purchases?  Etc.  If you are truly interested in building a brand, spend the necessary time on the details.  That's what differentiates five star properties...

Good luck!