Marketing Plan in 30 Days: Day 10

Back to Day 1

Now-a-days, many people use eBooks as a free giveaway in return for signing up for an email list.  You old-school folks will know “eBooks” by a different name – “white papers”.  It’s a short paper – usually around 5 to 10 pages – of real, honest advice for a topic your client would find interesting.  The only selling is done on the last page with an explanation of services and how they help with the topic.

1. Choosing a topic.   If you have a specialty like self-storage sales, write something a person who is selling a self-storage building would like to read I.E. “6 Tricks to Get your Self-Storage Property Ready to Sell” or “Thinking of Selling your Self-Storage Property?  8 Things your Real Estate Agent Won’t Tell You.”

If your game is more general, consider something like “3 Surefire Ways to Prepare for a Negotiation.”

2. Intriguing titles.  There are studies that show that headlines with numbers resonate the most.  “30 Steps to a Concrete Pricing Strategy” does better than “Steps to a Concrete Pricing Strategy”.

This same study also suggests shorter titles with less “blah blah” (or superlatives, if you’re into grammar) do 50% better than long titles.

Good – “The 27 Ways to Fill Vacant Retail Space”

Not Good – “The 27 Best and Smartest Ways Ever to Fill Vacant Retail Space”

3. Writing the eBook.  I won’t lie to you; writing is the hard part.  Schedule some time each day (or week) for as long as it takes to write your paper.  If you have the option, I suggest taking one day to sit in the library with nothing but silence to get that first draft done.  Taking away the outside chatter may be the only option for the ultra-busy.

4. Designing.  You don’t have to get too fancy.  A nice cover with stock photo will do wonders.  If you feel you need professional design, send to a freelancer.  You’ll be given a beautiful PDF to share on your website.

5. Lead Capture.  Place your eBook on your website with a short description and a form.  Your website visitor will fill out their information in exchange for the eBook PDF.  This is an easy and trackable way to keep track of who is downloading your eBook.

6. Advertising your eBook.  Don’t offer a link to the PDF on social media!  I can’t stress this enough.  The eBook is for lead capture, not to be given away for nothing.  Instead, advertise the link to download an eBook on your social media.  Example, “Check out my eBook ’10 Ways to Find Quality Tenants” by filling out the form: URL”  You want your social media followers to become email followers too.

Also consider advertising your eBook on mailers, ads, anything else you do to capture those leads.  “Call us Today!” doesn’t work like it used to.

7. Purchase an eBook.  No time to write?  My website packages come with an eBook!  Choose a pre-made eBook with the Bargain or Custom website packages or get a custom eBook with the Lead Gen package.

 

On to Day 11: Adverting your Commercial Listings Online