It is almost as constant as the holiday itself; I always know we are going to have a backload of advertising issues when we come back from a three day weekend.
So why don't we advertise? Quite simply because nobody is reading. Check out the Sunday paper (in my case it happens to be the Intelligencer) and you can tell right away that many businesses have learned over time that readership is low. The only ones who insist on being a part of the paper the day before Memorial Day are the big-box stores, and that is because Memorial Day happens to be one of the biggest retail days of the year (sort of that uh-oh moment when you decide you need new flip-flops and a styrofoam cooler). Certainly not the time when you are going to get into an important decision about engaging a Realtor or picking your next house.
Nevertheless, the weekend after always presents unique challenges. First, we often have a slew of open houses. People who sit one every other week meet up with those people who need to have one because their sellers don't recognize what I said above about activity and think we need to do something. So we end up using more space to present our opens. Second, we have more new listings and reductions than usual, because we didn't have an ad to present them to the public. Finally, and this one is unique this year, we have a new merger to announce and new offices to present to the public.
To top it all off, we have a short work week and very little time to get our Sunday ads together. Definitely some midnight-oil time for the marketing department at CBH.
Why do I tell you this? Because I want to make sure everyone is concious of what you are asking for. If you want to have an open house but you don't have an agent yet, perhaps this isn't the week to try to pull it together last-minute. If we have to pull an open at the deadline we don't replace it, and that valuable space gets wasted. If you're taking a new listing and you don't have your photos/ad copy to your admin already, don't expect to see it in this weekend's paper (and don't promise that to your clients). Finally, if you are listing a house for your family/best friend/dearest client who doesn't particularly care whether they are in the paper this week or next (or if they are in the paper at all) don't insist that we get them in this Sunday just because you want to look like super-agent to them. All that is going to do is make your admin's life more miserable (which probably isn't going to win any points for you).
I will make the decision on ad size later today based on discussions with the admins and the ownership. We don't want to buy newspaper space without reason, because as many of you know newspaper space is getting more expensive and the effectiveness continues to decline. I would much rather use that money on more productive endeavors - but as I said I will look at all variables and present my recommendations to the owners later today.
Here's to a great week!
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