Statistics and facts don’t mean much without a solid context. If you’re told that someone is getting a 40% result, in some fields, that would be terrible; in others, terrific. The surgeon who does a routine procedure that’s successful only 40% of the time would not create much confidence. By contrast, the baseball slugger – that bats .400 – or the sales professional that closes 40% of the first time-visitor-at-the-sales-center or community – they are rock stars.
So numbers – measurable results – matter. Reality matters.
MH – Image, Education and Results
I speak frequently with pros about marketing, sales, image, education and related. The image issue comes up routinely. “How do we get past that image, Tony?”
Success is always about a process. There is a process for this, and it works. That process is executable on the local market level. Does it work every time? No, what does in sales or marketing?
But when the process we or some others use is applied correctly, it yields a routinely healthy, profitable outcome. We routinely do non-disclosures with clients, so we need to share a national example, vs. a specific local one. Let’s tee that example up with the following…
…facts!
1 of the 6 Pillars of Successful Marketing and Sales
It will be useful for you to read the 6 Pillars of Successful MH Marketing and Sales. If you’ve not read that yet, or haven’t read it lately, please go read that again now. The article is titled, What does each Vacant Site or Missed MH Sale Cost You?
When it comes to the MH Image issue, this isn’t going to be a sexy solution, but it works so it’s valuable. Moreover, its absolutely important for the results-oriented marketer looking to attract better qualified customers to get their arms around this approach.
Concerns or Fears are Keeping Good Prospects from Buying
In round numbers, 95% of the U.S. population doesn’t seriously consider manufactured housing (MH) when they are getting ready to rent or buy their next residence. That’s a true opportunity in disguise.
That doesn’t mean the masses don’t think about MH at all. What it means is among those who do know about ‘mobile homes’ or ‘trailers’ (their words), they dismiss a serious consideration of MH. Why?
In a phrase, there are outdated concerns and/or fears Americans have. Until those concerns or fears are routinely addressed, the numbers who are truly shopping for MH will stay very low.
The first half of the article below is about a specific story we ‘released’ for the media. Both mainstream and social media have picked it up See the first part of this article, linked below, on results for:
“Keeping the Home Fires from Burning: Fire Safety and the Modern Manufactured Home”
Once you’ve read that, the facts from the same search result below will make sense. In fact, you should be impressed.
Let’s recap, so you’ll be crystal clear.
- We publish a story on com on manufactured homes and fire safety. Keep in mind, that in almost any city or town in America, x times a year, the local news reports some ‘mobile home’ that ‘burns down.’ So needless to say, when we publish a fact-based-report on how MH is as safe or safer than conventional housing, that’s good for all in the industry. So the above is link you and your team need to save and share. Because you will over time encounter those buyers who like what you have, but their fear point may be fire, MH and windstorms, or something else. The facts are on our side! Learn, use and share the positive facts!
- The article linked above automatically goes out via RSS feeds to other sites. There are dozens we know of that are using RSS to pick our stories up. (FYI – get with your webmaster, and you can get your own RSS feed by using this link below. Our content is copyrighted, but RSS is free for anyone to use.
RSS feed = http://manufacturedhomelivingnews.com/feed/ )
3. We then put out a media (press) release, plus we also do a release via our own social media network. In less than a day, using the search below and using the quotation marks that force an exact search result, we were up to 463 hits on the search:
“Keeping the Home Fires from Burning: Fire Safety and the Modern Manufactured Home”
- Within 96 hours, we were up to 4,130 exact Google Search results on that same story, using that exact same search string.
- On 11.4.2015, at about 1:15 ET, about 7 days after we published that article, we were now up to over 6000 hits! Specifically, see the screen capture below.
As we were preparing this post, Lorraine Carli with the NFPA reached out, asking to provide their take on the topic of fire sprinklers and MH. It was a thoughtful read, so sure, we published it – linked here, with our own commentary to follow. That was published around 3 PM ET. We may revisit that result later too.
Drip, Drip, Drip of Negative…or Positive, News…
Now realistically, our one article isn’t going to send droves of customers to sales centers. What it does do is give newspaper and media editors/producers a story to consider that reflects the MH realities. Perhaps before this, maybe the only thing they heard before was negative.
That’s significant, because the media editors and producers are the gate keepers to what they public sees and hears.
Imagine MH locally (in a market like yours), regionally or nationally forging an educational campaign that provide one, two or more ‘good news about manufactured home’ reports weekly. Over time, ou’d see a growing number of more qualified customers. This isn’t theory, it’s reality.
This plan works.
Stop and Think
There have been some market based efforts, but nationally for some 40 years, MH has failed to do a meaningful image/education campaign. We launched MHLivingNews.com as a key element supporting the image/education of manufactured housing. We’re doing something unique, unlike anything else out there before. In the first year alone, we blew past 250,000 then 500,000 then topped 1 million visitors on the website. That’s reality.
There are lots of nice websites out there! Many have FAQs, etc.
But our sister site is a third party MH Living/Lifestyle/People/News site, and that hits a nice chord with the public.
We don’t – nor should your team – fear the facts about MH, because the more you know, the more you fall in love with just how amazing a value the MH product is.
Sharing Reality, Will Make You More Sales Over Time
Some are forwarding these posts via Facebook or other social media. Some are putting up RSS feeds (see above, our content is copyrighted, but the RSS feed is free).
In A Perfect World…
The more others share or directly support our efforts and/or use our services – (websites, video, marketing, sales recruiting, training, coaching, consulting, etc.) – the more fuel we can add to this public education and information outreach.
Will that sell more homes?
It is already closing sales, when pros like you learn how to use the information on this site to your customer’s advantage.
When we TEAM up, T.E.A.M. = Together, Everyone Achieves More. A steady stream of positive media stories on MH will over time yield a more positive image for our product.
That in turn will result in more sales, because let’s be honest. Our value is real! What we need are more customers who see the real value!
And customers learning about that value through mainstream media, the more who come to our MHLivingNews.com website through RSS, or back links, or social media, the more MH sales will take place.
Beyond Google alerts picking up our news release, below is a partial list of the media sites that picked up Jan Hollingsworth’s story on MH and fire safety, all in under a day.
- WAFB
- com
- NewsChannel6Now
- 14News
- MSNewsNow
- HometownStations
- NewsChannel10
- Fox14TV
- CBS8
- K5TheHomeTeam
- KFVS12
- HawaiiNewsNow
- KIIITV
- ToledoNewsNow
- KLNTV
- KLTV
- KMPH
- KNDU
- TucsonNewsNow
- 19ActionNews
- TulsaCW
- ABC40
- KSLA
- KSWO
- KTEN
- KTVN
- KUAM
- KUSI
- Fox5Vegas
- NewsWest9
- KXNET
- CW15KXVO
- KXXV
- CBS19TV
- NebraskaTV
- WAFF
- WALB
- WANDTV
- WAVE3
- WMActionNews5
- WBOC
- WDRB
- MyFoxChattanooga
- WECT
- 14WFIE
- WFLX
- WFMJ
- WFSB
- CBSAtlanta
- MyGTNTV
- CWRichmondTV
- FoxCaronlina
- ErieTVNews
- WISTV
- WLBT
- WLTZ
- WMBFNews
- WMCTV
- WOIO
- MyFoxNepa
- WOWKTV
- WRCBTV
- WSFA
- WSFX
- CBS3Springfield
- WSMV
- WTHR
- MyFoxTallahassee
- WTOCTV
- WTOL
- WTVM
- Fox8Live
- Fox19
- WXTX
- CBS46
- NBC12
- KCENTV
- KEYC
Remember. As – or more – important as the public reading this, is the fact that a news editor, news desk, or producer looked at the release, and decided to publish it. That’s important. The more that happens, the more often that happens, the more we can influence the influencers.
Educating
- the media,
- policy makers,
- informing MH industry pros,
- MH home owners and
- educating the public at large….
…these 5 legs of the stool all make a difference over time. A one legged stool is hard to balance. 3 legs, better. 5 good legs can be amazingly stable.
While it took decades of neglecting informing the public about the MH image, a few years of good efforts would yield an ever larger pool of ready, willing and able MH buyers.
Fire, wood image
Take away people’s fears and concerns about MH, and you’ll see more cash and good credit customers over time. Its about win-win, no game playing needed.
That’s just part of the reality-based plan. This works for those who do it properly.
We’re sticking to it.
How about you? Ready to do some part of this? Ready to reap the rewards of changing the image so you get more and better qualified buyers in your market(s)? ##
