Why Your Database Isn't Responding to Your Emails

What’s the number one reason your database doesn’t respond to the messages you send? Emails, texts, all of it. We’ve heard agents use the phrase “my database is dead” plenty of times.

But here’s the reality. It’s not a dead database. The messages are just not compelling.

Agents will pay to have someone create a generic email that gets sent out, saying, “Here’s how you can bake this XYZ recipe” or “Here’s how to get ready for spring cleaning, yada yada yada.” The reality is, when you think about your database differently, all of your results will change.

The dollar email test. Here’s what we personally did. We decided that whenever an email is sent to our database, it has to pass one test. Would somebody pay a dollar to open it and have that information?

Not ten dollars. Not really expensive. Just one dollar.

If the answer is no, the email sucks and needs to be deleted. That has to be the thought process whenever you send an email. Something somebody would pay a dollar to know.

Once you understand what homeowners, potential buyers, and sellers actually want to know, you can speak directly to them. Here are the three things that have worked for us across our markets in Virginia, Maryland, Washington DC, Delaware, and Pennsylvania.

1. Home value. When you send out information, let them know what their home is worth. That’s a huge key. You can also tell them what’s selling in their neighborhood.

My mom saves the postcards from agents who send what’s selling in her neighborhood. She knows the data because of those postcards. And honestly, if I wasn’t an agent, my mom probably would work with the guy who sends the postcards, because she’s always talking about them.

That agent added value. Are we doing that for our database?

2. What’s going on in the market? Can you give some sort of information like a cable news channel would? This is what’s happening with mortgage rates. This is what’s happening with inventory.

Right now, buyers can get better deals than they’ve gotten in a long time, but the market is still strong, so sellers are still getting great prices for their homes.

The catch is that you’re using words that not everybody will necessarily understand. So then you say, “What does this mean to you?” That’s the part that makes the difference. Translate the market data into what it actually means to the reader.

3. Your vendor list. This is the crazy one. The craziest part of all of this is that what sellers and buyers want more than almost anything else is to know they have access to your vendor list. That you have a guy or a girl, that you have somebody who can do their thing.

We’ve got a massive network, so we’ve never had a problem with that. But we had a conversation recently with a friend who said she never really understood why this mattered, because her husband always had a buddy who did everything.

He was an extrovert who knew everybody. Then her husband passed away. And she said, “I don’t have a buddy who does every single thing.”

That conversation stuck with us. A lot of people don’t have that buddy across every single trade. So when you can offer this to the people in your database, there is so much value there.

The takeaway. Share what’s going on. Make sure they know you have a vendor for them if they need one and that you are their person. Help them. Give them an email worth opening so they don’t just X out every time. Calling and adding value is the whole game.

One of the things we’ve learned is that originality is forgetting who you stole it from. So if we can help you become super original, we’re happy to do it. If you’d like to see what we’re sending out to our database, the whole playbook of what’s getting responses, Book a Call, email us at ChrisCraddock@ChrisCraddockLeadership.com, or visit chriscraddockleadership.com for more. You can also watch more on our YouTube channel.