Long-time real estate weblogger Jim Duncan moved to a new brokerage recently — Nest Realty. As a part of their launch, they’re building custom real estate yard signs, the prototype for which you can see above.
Jim asked for my thoughts on the signs, and I’m going to go into this at some little length. All of this touches on the stuff we’ve been talking about since last week.
First, I think these signs are striking, very interesting graphically. The grid layout is sweet and fine, a very clean style of communication.
Second, I want that middle sign to be a hell of a lot bigger. My guess is that it’s 18 x 12, a very common size for real estate signs. We do our middle sign at 24 x 36. Jim’s sign is in much better taste than ours, but I need for people to know that they’re seeing a custom sign, so I think I need to grab them by the throat.
Third, my belief is that for custom signs to work, they have to have that paragraph of small text we use on our signs. The marketing objective of the signs is to stop traffic, not simply to promote a fleeting awareness of a home for sale among passing drivers. We’ve been using that paragraph of small text from the beginning, long before it was possible to make custom signs. We know from hours of observation that people slow down, stop, read the sign, take the flyer — all because they had to slow down to find out what that small text was saying.
There are some nice marketing ideas at Nest’s main web site, and the site for this particular home is worth a look. The HDR photos are incredible, and I want for them to be a lot larger.
This is a case where I don’t find the web presentation of the home to be at all satisfying, and that’s another one of the points that I hit all the time. We know from talking to our open house visitors that people will spend hours at a single-property web site if you give them hours of content to review.
I think the salesman’s job — and I’m talking now to the other thread — is to make the product irresistible: To present it in such a way that buyers can’t bear not to own it. This is what happened to you, in advance of every big ticket purchase in your life, and this is our actual job as marketers.
Meanwhile: I like these signs, and I like the kinds of chances Nest is taking. Well done.
John Kalinowski says:
Congrats Jim, from one custom sign guy to another! I agree with Greg that the sign should be bigger. Ours are also 24×36. The font for your price should be way bigger, along with the agent’s name and phone number. As a matter of fact, why have that info on a separate rider? Just put it on the custom sign panel. Anyway, welcome to the club!
March 23, 2009 — 9:38 am
John Kalinowski says:
Jim: Here’s a link that shows one of our recent signs, and actually, we just put this home under contract!
http://www.liquidbluerealty.com/our-listings/berea-54-baker-street/custom-yard-sign/
March 23, 2009 — 9:42 am
Mike says:
I have been doing custom sign for just about a year now.
I don’t know if bigger is necessarily better. When I see signs with multiple riders and stickers on the arm it begins to look bad in most cases in my humble opinion.
My sign did cause someone to slam on the brakes which is great. Either way the first step is to try these new things.
My most recent listing was a referral from one of those listings and it was a conversation piece.
March 23, 2009 — 10:27 am
Jim Duncan says:
Thanks, Greg. They’re our first attempt, and I expect they’ll get better.
I agree that the contact information needs to be bigger, but the price needs to stay on the rider … God knows what’s happening in our market today!
March 24, 2009 — 4:14 am
Robert J Thiessen says:
I would love to have the ability to insert the photos and text then email it to sign guy without needing a bunch of different software programs to buy. Is that possible?
BTW…I understand the reason for separate rider… for price reductions. Greg’s is at the bottom.
March 24, 2009 — 4:17 pm
Joshua Hanoud says:
Robert – just have the sign-guy do the design template for you, then email him photos & text and say “make this one using the same template”. Sign guy buys all the software, you email photos & text, he sends you a proof before printing, no?
March 24, 2009 — 7:10 pm
Steve Hysinger says:
I live in the Texas hill country near Austin and have yet to see this type of sign. Very interesting concept. Thanks much for the information.
March 25, 2009 — 12:43 pm