It all comes down to how you differentiate yourself. If everyone is pulling the same list from ListSource, sending the same yellow letters, and talking about "all cash offers."
Then you're no different from the other 100s of investors who've already sent them the same letter, with the same marketing message. I differentiate myself in all the marketing I do because I already know that potential sellers have already seen it a thousand times.
Out of every 100 bandit signs I get 20 to 30 calls. How? I make a much stronger offer then "I buy houses" and I niche it out. If I know an area has a lot of tax delinquents, that's what my bandit signs targets. If I know an area has a lot of older people who with a lot of equity, then that's who I target.
And the same applies to direct mail. I don't do direct mail anymore but when I did one way I differentiated myself and got a higher response was with a Dollar Bill sales letter. It was a typed letter, no logo, and had a real dollar bill attached to the top of it.
The letter started like this
Dear John,
As you can see I've attached a dollar bill to the top of this letter. I have done this for two reasons.
First, to be completely transparent I really needed to get your attention because what I have to say might be the most important thing you read today.
Here's why...
It worked for me, it might work for you. You just have test, test, test until you find what works for you.