Seth Godin just highlighted the story of how Glass House Denver sold ONE HUNDRED AND FORTY MILLION DOLLARS worth of condos using permission based marketing.
1. We placed a site sign at the construction site directing people to a website (not the one that exists now).
2. At that site, we ran a short slideshow of what I would call benefit pictures - no renderings of a pool, just a guy sitting by a pool.
3. Once the slideshow ended, we offered people a chance to "get on the list" for more information.
4. When we had permission from these people, we began updating them on our progress once a month, including revealing in more detail each feature of the building.
5. By the time we began the next step, over 5,000 people (I can't remember the exact number) had signed up (85% saying they were recommended by a friend.)
6. About 500 of those people had come by our office and REALLY expressed interest/granted permission.
7. We had about 45 cocktail parties for those people, about 15 at a time, at a restaurant in our neighborhood. In essence, we invited them in for drinks. We brought no collateral. No models. Instead, we just spent time with them. Answered their questions. Filled them in on the details that mattered to them.
8. Then we created a private website for those people who had expressed interest answering the most common questions we had heard in our cocktail parties.
9. From there, using a system that met some pretty stringent real estate law requirements, we offered those people who had expressed the most interest in Glass House an opportunity to purchase.
10. We're moving the first people in and are completely bought out - 389 residences before the completion of construction in a market that is decidedly not booming. (Don't get me wrong, this was a good building priced well in a great location. But, our marketing was the x factor in making it work.)
Here's the big lesson that you need to get. Your lists (friends, customers, prospects, influencers, bloggers) are your greatest asset. Small lists of strong relationships can be just as valuable as large lists of weaker relationships.
But regardless, there is gold in them there hills. Go mine it.
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