When many real estate professionals think of marketing they think of items like getting an ad in a magazine or newspaper.  Some even consider taking out a small billboard or bus bench as a form of marketing.While these may be considered marketing items for many professionals there are some substantial challenges with them.  Popular traditional forms of advertising like magazines, bus benches, or worse yet telephone booths can have the following challenges:

Expensive to start with
Expensive to test with until you get a winning ad
Difficult to track it’s success (how many eyeballs looked at your ad? or called?)
Sometimes you can get these forms of marketing/advertising to work, unfortunately by the time you get them to work you might have already spent an entire commission!  There are free methods that you can put into place for marketing for your real estate business that DON’T involve traditional practices like door knocking or cold calling.Consider the following two items that you can put into place immediately with no out of pocket expenses.

Social Networking
Craigslist
Blogging
Social networking can help you to establish a powerful referral network (or grow your existing one stronger) while Craigslist will allow you to reach eager buyers who are often searching daily to find the right home.  Before you start with either Craigslist or Social Networking, I invite you to consider the following to achieve success.Have a PlanToo often because something is “free” there is little thought into the approach that one should take.  Your time is extremely valuable!  Create a basic plan that outlines how much time you can invest, what your goals are, and even what tasks you need to accomplish to make your marketing work (meaning it needs to generate leads). This plan doesn’t need to be fancy, it can be as simple as 1 page, just write it down and put it in front of you so you know what you are tackling.Give Your Plan Time To WorkTrying Craigslist for a couple of days or Social networking for a few days isn’t going to give you a chance to succeed.  Give yourself a week or two to really put your plan into action.  If that is posting ads to Craigslist consider setting a goal of the number of ads you will post (like 50 or 60) before you make a change.  Setting a specific timeline will help you to get your real estate marketing done efficiently as you reach towards your goal.Document Your ResultsToo many people launch new marketing and when it doesn’t generate sales, they simply state “it takes time”.  While some marketing does take time, it is important to hold any marketing you do to a standard.   When an ad, website, or your time on Social Networking isn’t generating any calls or prospects it may be time to cut that activity.  Count the number of emails and phone calls you get from your efforts.  After your ads are generating leads then track the number of appointments and closings from those.  After just a couple of months you will be able to see which form of marketing to invest more time in!Most of All Take ActionWhether you decide to jump into Social Networking, Craigslist, Blogging, or another type of FREE marketing make sure to hold your results accountable and give yourself a chance to see your success.  Discover how to get your Real Estate Marketing generating leads and closed trasactions today with our free Marketing Ebook.

There are some very concrete steps the dedicated investor can take to put them on the road to success in property investing. This is not brain surgery; in fact, it’s not very difficult at all. If you’re prepared to dedicate yourself to following a few simple guidelines, you could find yourself on track to making your real estate investment dreams come true.Let’s take a look at some of the key points the pros consider essential to success in the field of real estate investing:-Execution-Support Systems-MarketingFundingIt’s All About ExecutionThe fact is, nothing happens until you decide to execute. You know what you need to do, now you just have to get off your butt and do it. Like most other endeavors in life, procrastination is a success killer. You can do all the homework, read all the best-selling real estate investment books, attend all the seminars, and listen to all the experts, but if you don’t get out in the real world and execute what you’ve learned, you will get nowhere fast.Support SystemsMany real estate pros say that a smart use of time and money is to establish a support system. This can be an informal relationship with a mentor – someone you know who has been successful in real estate – or establishing a formal relationship, for a fee, with an acknowledged real estate pro who teaches students the ins and outs of real estate investing.Your support system, whether an informal one with an acquaintance, or a paid relationship with a successful real estate pro, will go a long way towards helping you overcome the common and not so common issues all real estate investors encounter as they go about making their living.Typical real estate investment support systems:Informal MentoringIn this type of support relationship, you are using the advice and guidance of an individual who has demonstrated success in the area of real estate investing. Typically this person is an acquaintance, usually a friend or relative. Make sure they have what it takes to teach you what you need to know. Otherwise you’re both wasting your time.Professional MentoringA top real estate professional can provide invaluable help, not only to the beginner, but also to folks who’ve been at it for a while but would like to enjoy a little more success, or simply want to dust off and improve existing techniques. Some of the things you can expect in this paid relationship should include the following:Live coaching – This is a tremendous help and can take a couple of different forms:One-on-one – Talking one-on-one to your coach during a regularly scheduled phone callGroup – Interacting with your coach in a group environment via a format like Google Groups, or individually via live chat.Financial advice – Your paid real estate coach should be able to provide you with financial advice. This would include details on working with the following:-Private lenders-Banks-Other sourcesMarketingPostcard Marketing – This is a great way to market your real estate investment business. You can unleash an aggressive postcard campaign targeted to the following recipients:Private lenders – these are the folks with whom you have already spoken and now you want to move the ball down the road.Motivated sellers – the people who have hot properties.Real estate agents – Realtors are a great source of help and information.Finding deals off market – Using direct mail, scripts, dialogs, postcards and other methods optimizing efforts to find off market deals.Marketing to general population of private lenders – this would be a dedicated campaign to contact potential private lenders and investors.Marketing to select private lenders – Targeted to private lenders who are pre-disposed and ready to do business with you. If you’re raising money for yourself, you want private lenders who are pre-disposed and ready to lend to you.FundingFunding for your deals is one of the most critical elements in all of property investing. Whether you have already established relationships with a range of funding sources like private lenders, banks, credit unions, and other sources of funds, or you’re trying to establish those relationships, it’s important to learn more about this important task.Private Lenders – These are the individuals with whom you should be trying to establish a business relationship. They make a wonderful resource for borrowing money to buy investment properties. Be sure to familiarize yourself with the laws applicable to marketing to private lenders before you begin.One of the advantages of many private lenders is they are asset-based, rather than credit-based lenders. This means that as long as your deal is solid, your credit score is not as important as it might be with credit-based lenders like banks.Institutional Lenders – Banks, credit unions and other institutional lenders are credit-based lenders, meaning they are much more concerned about your credit history than the typical private lender. In order to borrow money from them you must demonstrate an excellent credit history and a solid track record of paying your bills.It can be much more difficult to get funding from an institutional lender because of their rigid, credit-based lending policies. Many property professionals try to avoid this route and focus on establishing and maintaining relationships with private lenders.