I was reading Nima's post about thank you cards and it got me thinking. Jonathan Washburn and I were talking one day about effective ways to thank a customer and market to them at the same time. We started kicking around the idea of gift cards. Now someone let me know if someone is doing this, because we came to the conclusion it is a great idea and we would love to try it. 

Why wouldn't a company like Home Depot or Bed Bath and Beyond open up a promotion where those of us in the business of houses can co market with them. They are in the business of selling things to people who own houses and we are in the business of helping people own those houses. It would seem like a natural fit for big corporations like this to allow us to co-brand ourselves with them.

Giving a client a thank you card with a $100 (or maybe more for the big shots) gift certificate to Home Depot would be a decent enough idea. What if you could give them the card, for the same $100, but the card had your design or logo on it. So instead of  something with them on it, why not something with us on it. I know that I would be much more inclined to give a gift like that if the client could see Brio as they spent that $100.

It gets Home Depot exposure because the client usually ends up there spending more than $100 and it gets the agent exposure because the client gets to remember who helped them be able to spend all of their disposable income at Home Depot.

I just wish Eagle Hardware hadn't sold to Lowes or I would have them doing this for us today.  

Just a thought, and like I said, if you've seen this, please let me know.

Bob

I am glad that ActiveRain made the first post about our integration with the ActiveRain network. When we first approached them about integrating our Brio Home Search with the site I wasn't exactly sure of the terminology and how they would apply it to make things work. Luckily for us, Matt and the gang are brilliant at what they do.

initially this is a little bit of a change in how our company operates. Up until this point, our agents have always been able to grab leads from our client management system based on the areas they know and work. However, there are  a few drawbacks to this approach. The first being that sometimes agents grab leads in some areas that they don't know very well just because the client happened to be looking at a high value home. By allowing our agents to sponsor different neighborhoods, we can assure that someone looking in Wallingford Seattle will be put in touch with an agent who knows Wallingford. 

It will be up to our management to make sure that the agent sponsoring a certain neighborhood is in fact knowledgable of that neighborhood. One way we can do this is to encourage our agents to really get to know the neighborhood they are sponsoring. The blogging tool on ActiveRain allows our agents to put that knowledge on display for potential clients visiting our site. 

As we work the bugs out and really get the process streamlined, I will make sure to keep those of you who may be interested updated on the progress. Of course, the ActiveRain guys do a fabulous job of this as well so I am sure they will be one bob and weave ahead of us to the punch. Luckily for all of you, when they punch they usually deliver the blow with so much more detail and insight (even if it needs to be explained to the rest of us).

Thanks ActiveRain, you have really given us a tool that our clients can benefit from.

Bob