What to Do in the First 6 Months

The Art of Selling

Sometimes a home just sells itself. But most of the time, you’ll find that you must put a lot of hard work and effort into marketing and selling a home. At the heart of a successful home sale is a well-thought-out marketing plan.

Following are some tips to develop an effective marketing plan for your listing.

• Write a brief property-marketing plan that includes specific objectives (for example, receive an offer on the home within 45 days at 90 percent of list price), and an advertising plan that covers how and how frequently you will promote the property (open houses every week, classified ad weekly, mailing to top-producing sales associates, etc.).
  
• Compare the home to similar ones on the market and identify its unique and most desirable features. Take photos of the home's best features, and use them as a starting point for your marketing approach.
  
• Review the audience demographics of various media, and use that information to best match the likely demographics of potential buyers for the home.
  
• Make a schedule for the property marketing activities throughout the listing period.
  
• Set a reasonable budget based on the activities detailed in the plan. The more costly the home, the more expensive it may be to market because a high-priced home demands top-of-the-line marketing materials.
  
• Set up systems to track the "pull" of your various property-marketing efforts. One simple method is to ask those who call or view the home how they found out about it.
  
  Property Marketing Options
  
  There are three primary marketing venues for you to promote your new listing. They are:
  
  Advertising
• Yard signs
• Classified advertising
• Display advertising
• Radio-TV advertising
  
  Promotions
• Marketing brochure/flyers
• Property information sheets
• Web site listings
• MLS listings
• Broker-salesperson mailings
  
  Personal Selling
• Public open houses
• Company and sales associate tours
• Broker open houses
  
  To learn more about each of these different types of property marketing, click here .