I got a jar of apple butter on my doorstep the other day. It was from a local real estate agent who delivered this “gift” to everyone else in my townhouse community. He is also selling one of the houses in the community. It is not the first thing I get from him. I got a magnetic calendar earlier in the year, and a housing sales report too. But apple butter? Is that too much?
Can you do too much marketing? Some would argue that as long as you are getting customers/clients, there is probably not too much marketing. True…but are you doing too much to get those customers/clients? In other words, are you spending more than you have to, making each acquisition very costly?
There is no set formula to figure this out, unfortunately. And you have to accept that much of your marketing effort will be wasted, which is why it is important to figure out how much each client/customer is worth to you.
In this case, no amount of apple butter, postcards or calendars will get me to use the real estate agent. I already have a real estate agent, and that is who I will use if I ever need to sell this house or buy another. I will grant that this amount of marketing is providing HUGE name recognition. Is it promoting conversion? Not sure.
I believe that the more targeted your marketing is, the better chance you have of it being effective. In this case, the real estate agent is being geographically targeted, which may be the best he can do. His marketing may not work for me, but should he get one of my neighbors to use him, then perhaps he has achieved his objective.
When is it too much marketing? When it produces few if any results. And you get there sometimes by trial and error. What do you think makes too much marketing?
About Deborah Brody
Deborah Brody writes and edits anything related to marketing communications. Most blog posts are written under the influence of caffeine.
