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“99% of advertising doesn’t sell a thing.”

Sounds like something a local real estate agent might say after paying for yet another ad that didn’t produce, right?

You might be surprised to learn that the quote actually belongs to David Ogilvy, legendary founder of one of the world’s largest and most successful advertising agencies.

Yikes – if a man regarded as a giant in the ad industry is so negative about advertising’s success rate, how should you feel?

The Bad News is the Good News…

There is an upside here. If so much of the advertising in your local market is ineffective, you can gain a significant edge on your competition by having a better local advertising strategy than other agents.

Advertising vs. Advertising Strategy

Notice that I said a better advertising STRATEGY, not simply better advertising. There’s a big difference.

A better ad might get you a few more leads in the short term. A better advertising strategy can help you to have a consistent, meaningful message in your advertising, and will position you to get more business from your local market on an ongoing basis.

With that in mind, here are three tips to help you define your advertising strategy, and put it into action:

1) Have a Strategic Objective In Mind BEFORE you Advertise

Advertising for the sake of “building awareness” is probably the fastest way to flush your advertising dollars away.

Before you even think about buying an ad, you must have a strategic objective in mind – after all, why should you pay for any type of ad unless it helps you to reach your objective.

Here are just a few questions that you might ask yourself before placing an ad to help define what you want your advertising strategy to do for you:

- If I could be known for just one thing in my local market, what would it be?

- Which part of the local real estate market is not currently well serviced by other agents? Is there potential in this neighborhood/age group/demographic profile?

- Which part of the local market is emerging and might be a driving force for sales in future years?

- What’s changing in my market right now – immigration, aging population, young families moving in, etc – and how do I capitalize on the change more effectively than my competitors?

If you can answer even some of these questions, you will probably be on your way to identifying the basis for an advertising strategy.

For example, you may determine that based on trends and current prices, your market will become increasingly popular with first time homebuyers. As a result, your strategic objective may be to use your advertising to become recognized as the local expert in serving first time homebuyers.

2) Have a Specific Objective for Each Ad you Place within your Strategy

With a clear objective as part of your advertising strategy, you can now think about investing in ads that support your objective.

Here’s a tip – you can create advertising that generates an immediate response while also serving to build your brand in a particular market.

Continuing with the above example, if you ran a series of ads in the local newspaper offering a free “First-Time Homebuyers Report” available from your website, you would actually be running a direct response ad (aimed at getting people to download the report) that also delivered a brand building message (the message being that you are the agent for first time homebuyers to call because you are the expert in that field).

You can measure the success of the ad by looking at the number of downloads from your site while the ad was running – since generating downloads was the specific objective of the ad. If the ads don’t generate enough downloads to justify the cost, pull them or change them. Ads are only valuable if they get you closer to achieving your strategic objective.

3) Be Consistent

All of your advertising (online, print, directory, flyers, etc) should be similar in both style and substance within your advertising strategy.

Yes, a consistent look and style for your ads is important to help you get recognized in a competitive market.

But even more important is being consistent when it comes to the messages in your ads. You can’t buy a Yellow Pages ad that promotes you as the leader in client service, and then advertise your “low low price” in the local newspaper, and then distribute flyers that try to promote you as the family real estate expert.

Your messages can’t conflict! Again, here’s where an advertising strategy comes in. With a strategic objective in mind for your advertising, you will be able to focus your advertising dollars on communicating a single, clear message to potential clients about why they should call you.

An Advertising Strategy is Critical to your Success

If Mr. Ogilvy was right, then most of the advertisers out there in your real estate market are getting it wrong. This creates a huge opportunity for you to use an advertising strategy to drive business and outdo your competitors.

- Have a Strategic Objective for all of your Advertising – Know what you want to say about your business, and who you want to say it to within your local market.

- Have an Objective for Each Ad – Measure each ad’s results against the strategic objective you are trying to achieve – if you don’t, how will you know if the ads were successful or not?

- Be Consistent – Make sure all of your ads are focused on helping you reach your strategic objective by communicating a clear message to the market.

Advertising can be a tough game, but so can real estate. And in both cases, those with a well thought out strategy will almost always succeed over those that don’t have a plan.

Getting a commercial mortgage for a hotel property is very similar to getting a commercial mortgage for an owner occupied commercial property with a few subtle differences. The driving force for the majority of most hotel income is the RevPar or revenue per available room. RevPar is most commonly calculated by multiplying a hotels average daily room rate (ADR) by it occupancy rate and is a key indicator of performance. Rising RevPar is an indication that either occupancy is improving; the ADR is increasing, or a combination of the two.Although RevPar only evaluates the strength of room revenue, it is typically the most relevant indicator of performance. While many full service hotels generate revenue through other means such as restaurants, casinos, conferences, spas, or other amenities the majority of hotel properties are either limited service flagged properties or limited service unflagged properties. A limited service hotel is simply a hotel with out a restaurant. Because the operating costs of the restaurant component generally run higher than that of the hotel operations, it is common for the net operating income (NOI) as a percentage of total sales to be lower for a full service than a limited service hotel. For this reason the majority of commercial lenders prefer to finance limited service hotels.Flagged vs. Unflagged Properties:A flagged hotel property is simply a hotel that belongs to a national franchise. An example of a flagged property would be a Holiday Inn or a Best Western. For the guest, a flagged property provides the benefits of a uniform standard that is upheld by the franchisor. A guest could stay in a flagged property on the east coast and could expect the same flag on the west coast to have the same standard of cleanliness and amenities. The owner of the property gets the benefit of a nationwide reservation system and marketing. For this benefit the operator is expected to pay a franchise fee which can typically range anywhere from 5% to 10% of room revenue. Because of the advantages that a flagged property has, most commercial lenders prefer to finance them over an unflagged property. Sometimes it can be extremely difficult to get a commercial loan for an unflagged property, especially if the property isn’t in what is considered a destination resort area. A destination resort area would be an area like Miami, Myrtle Beach, or Orlando FL. An unflagged property in a destination resort is easier to obtain a commercial loan on than an unflagged property in other areas of the country.Exterior Corridor vs. Interior Corridor:An exterior corridor property is a hotel property where you can actually see the door to the rooms from the exterior of the property. These are sometimes referred to as a motel instead of a hotel. The term motel is actually derived from the term motor hotel where most travelers would park their vehicle directly in front of their room. While there are disagreements between what defines a motel and what defines a hotel, there is typically very little difference between the two outside of a lenders perception.Most exterior corridor properties are older and subsequently will not have the quality of furnishings and will have more deferred maintenance than an interior corridor property. An interior corridor property is going to be more energy efficient and would have a lower utility expense as a percentage of gross revenue.Financing Your Hotel Property:When trying to get a commercial loan for your hotel property there are a few distinct differences you can expect as opposed to financing other commercial properties. A hotel property is considered special purpose in nature which simply means that it is generally cost prohibitive to convert it to alternate use. An office building or retail space can accommodate numerous types of businesses whereas a hotel property can only accommodate a hotel. Because of this a commercial mortgage for a hotel is going to be considered riskier to the lender than a commercial mortgage for other general purpose property types. A lender will mediate this risk by taking a more conservative approach to underwriting a hotel property.The loan to value (LTV) for a hotel property will be lower than other general purpose property types. For a limited service, flagged property 65% LTV is typical and that number can go down depending upon the age of the property and whether its interior or exterior corridor. The LTV is simply a ratio calculated by dividing the loan amount by the value of the property. The debt service coverage ratio (DSCR) for a hotel will also need to be higher than that of a general purpose property type. The DSCR is a ratio that determines the strength of the property or business income in relation to the proposed mortgage payment. A typical required DSCR for a hotel property by a commercial lender is 1.30 which simply means that for every $1.00 in proposed mortgage expense there should be $1.30 available to pay it. For other general purpose property types the DSCR is lower. A DSCR of 1.20 is common for general purpose property types and can go oven lower for a less risky property such as an apartment building.Because the acquisition of a hotel property under a conventional program requires a large capital injection, many borrowers prefer to purchase a hotel property by utilizing the SBA 504 program. This program enables the borrower to put in as little as 15% and still obtain a better interest rate than a traditional commercial mortgage for a hotel.