A Realtor wants to welcome newcomers to her neighborhood. How can she send a form letter that sounds fresh, as well as welcoming and professional?

Dear Realty Times:

I wonder if you have a form letter that I can use to send to newcomers to our community? I am at loss for words & wish it to sound welcoming but professional. Maybe you know a website I can go to for such. Thank you & waiting for your reply.

Cheryl

Realty Times responds:

Tongue-tied and in sales? Not good for your career, but we can help.

Sometimes writer's block is about having a lot to say but not knowing where to begin. So, start at the logical place.

You want to find a "form" letter that welcomes newcomers but surely you don't want the letter to appear like you've sent hundreds before.

One way to avoid that is to write from the heart. Write down everything you'd like to say in a letter using bullet points. This is how good writers organize their thoughts. If each bullet point represents a paragraph or so, then your letter will go something like this:

• introduce myself

• talk about neighborhood

• invite new prospect to visit my Website, office

• Ask them to sign up for my monthly newsletter which will inform them about local market conditions and community activities

• Offer my services if they need further resources or advice

Sample Letter:

Welcome to the Magic Kingdom, Goofy! (try to use the exact name, if possible)

My name is Minnie Mouse, and I've helped people relocate, settle, rent and sell their Florida homes for over 10 years.

The Magic Kingdom is a terrific place to raise a family, with lots to do. Here, you can work hard and play hard, with all kinds of activities for all ages from golf to go-carts.

As you explore your new home and neighborhood, there is so much you'd like to learn. Please let me help. Feel free to visit my website at www.minniemouserealestate.com and tour the links to information of interest including listings, recreational spots, moving companies, schools, crime reports, restaurants, golf courses, and much more.

If you'd like to be in the know about homebuying and selling conditions, please click HERE. Free of charge, you'll receive my monthly marketing report which includes marketing conditions, news and advice, and my personal tips for buying and selling homes. Email me your questions any time -- minnie@minniemouserealestate.com.

Please let me know if there is anything further I can do to help you get situated in your new home.

Minnie Mouse

If you do send a form letter, be sure to customize it with something from the heart, even if it's only your own signature in ink. For example, if you know your prospect has moved to a golf course community, hand write across the top -- "Donald Duck Links is having a scramble on the 10th. See you there!"

There's a reason why the letter is written to further engage your prospect. You have more to say than hello -- you have the knowledge and experience of working your neighborhood to share, so the idea is to get your prospect relying on you for information about real estate and the community. The more plugged-in you are, the more the prospect will respect you and want to engage you as their "real estate guy/lady."

Realty Times promotes you as the local market expert, and there are other estate lead generation and incubation companies that do the same, such as eNeighborhoods, HouseValues, and Realestate.com. These are also excellent sources for letters, as they are in the long-term business of helping agents attract, nurture and ultimately capture buyers and sellers.

Almost all real estate trainers, coaches and speakers produce or have access to form letters that would work for you. For a terrific list, try the Agent News columnists on Realty Times, including Joeann Fossland, Jim Gillespie, Jim Crawford, Dan Gooder Richard, and Michael J. Russer, to name a few.

You can also Google "Realtor form letters" or keywords of your choice and see which paid advertisers pop up. Some of them might also have a great solution for you.

There's also agent productivity and client management software producers such as Fidelity National Real Estate Solutions, operator of AgentOffice, Quadrant2, a new company by the original developer of AgentOffice, Bruce Peterson, and Top Producer.

Anything you say or do, in other words, should be designed to attract, nurture, and capture your prospect.

Here's why. Your prospects don't know you, but you are welcoming them to the neighborhood, which I assume is after they have moved to an apartment or bought a home. So you are really looking for some long-term nurturing here in order to turn them into a client.

That means a form letter to welcome them isn't enough. You also should have something you can give them on an ongoing basis, like a newsletter, market conditions update, community activities notice, or new listings alert - something that is real estate-related that will encourage continuing communication.

Assuming you have a way to get in contact with newcomers, through your company, local chamber of commerce, church, or some other means, you want to welcome them to the neighborhood assuming that the reason they landed there was because of what your community has to offer, so whatever letters you end up using, make sure they do the following:

• The letter should present you as the expert

• The letter should invite a continuing relationship

• The letter should be brief, to the point, and friendly in a professional way.

• The letter, even a form letter, should sound like you.

Published: October 20, 2005

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