E-Mails and Agents

E-mail addresses on E-Flyers are often an important part of an agent’s first impression.

Most of the flyers put together by our designers include a contact e-mail address for the agent or brokerage sending the flyer out.  While superficial, certain assumptions can be made about an agent based on the e-mail address they use, and not every e-mail provider conveys the same kind of status.  Each e-mail address consists of a “local part”, the @ symbol, and a “domain part”.

Free web-based e-mail services ( with domain parts such as gmail.com, hotmail.com, aol.com and others) are free and easy to acquire, but can come off as less professional, as they are not unique to the real estate profession.  The most professional-looking domain parts are either unique to you or provided by your brokerage: these respectively speak to a high level of technical proficiency or a connection to a legitimate real estate agency.

As far as local parts go, the most professional-sounding generally consist of all or part of the agent’s name.  E-mail addresses that deviate from this are hit and miss.  We will use a made up agent named “Robert Kim” for an example: if Robert uses an e-mail like “awesomerobert2382336@aol.com” he is going to seem like a fly-by-night hack compared to the much more professional robert.kim@realtyexemplar.com.  Using elements of your own name are also good for recognition and association on the part of your clients and customers.

To summarize…

Using an E-Mail address that is exclusive to you or your profession gives you a greater air of legitimacy.  When using an e-mail provided by your brokerage, it shows your close affiliation to a major real estate company, something that a free address from a 3rd party will not necessarily confer.

E-Flyer Know How: Print Your Own Flyer!

Did You Know…

…that along with our real estate e-flyer and print services, ZipYourFlyer.com offers high-quality PDFs (Portable Document Format)?  For $9.95 at checkout of an E-Flyer or Print flyer order customers can purchase a high resolution PDF file.  (The cost is $15.00 if the order is placed after checkout). This file allows our customers to print their own flyers in-house or through another printing company.  Though the PDF file cannot be edited, it allows you to print your own high-quality flyers.

A bit about print flyers:

Print pricing is available once your order is in the cart to select the best option that fits your needs. Priority 2-3 day* shipping is included for free with all orders (as well as optional 2 day* and next day* shipping, for a nominal fee). Sometimes even such expedient shipping isn’t fast enough, and a stop-gap is needed while the flyers are in transit.  This is the ideal time for a PDF file!  With a PDF our customers can go to a local print shop (or even use their office printer) and quickly prepare some stop-gap flyers while the print order ships from ZYF.  *Note that we do not offer delivery on weekends, something to keep in mind when ordering flyers on a sensitive timeline.

A bit about e-flyers:

Remember that it is also possible to order a PDF of an e-flyer, if a large order of print flyers is not desired, or if in-house printing is preferred.  ZYF also offers a special discount on print flyers ordered with an e-flyer purchase.  Click here to view info on this and other special offers.

At this time, ZYF does not offer the ability to purchase PDFs as a stand-alone product, only as a special add-on to our e-flyer and print flyer products.

One last thought:

There is one important caveat to the PDF service! While most uses are fine and encouraged, ZYF does not allow its PDFs to be used in e-mail marketing.  Our PDFs carry copyrights, and we cordially ask that these be respected.

To see more of what is going on at ZipYourFlyer.com follow us on facebook or twitter.

ZYF Customer Service Stands Out!

What does ZYF Customer Service do to Help Me Send my E-Flyers?

When calling us for the first time, many potential customers ask the ZYF customer service representatives “What sets ZipYourFlyer.com apart from different real estate flyer companies?”

The ability to call a real, live person to ask that question, for starters!  ZipYourFlyer.com employs several full-time ZYF customer service representatives, whose chief goal (between the hours of 7:30AM and 4:30PM Pacific Standard Time) is to help our work through any problems or dilemmas they may face in our ordering process, short of actually placing the order on behalf of the customer; we’re good, but we’re not that good.  Our phone number is (888) 947-8509.

ZipYourFlyer.com has a truly excellent track record of customer service, and even if the phones are swamped we make sure to touch based with anyone so kind as to leave us a voice mail message.  Again, that number is (888) 947-8509.  For those who are not “telephone-inclined” we also offer other means to contact us.  And don’t worry: the kind souls answering our phones check our customer service e-mails regularly as well!

Just remember: we don’t give our designers phones.  We need to keep them focused on making flyers, and most of them lack the social graces necessary to interact with the general public anyway.  Fear not: our eloquent ZYF customer service representatives will tell them everything they need to know.

If things go wrong, as they sometimes will, or you just need a little clarification, fear not!  We are easy to reach and eager to help. Our growing customer service staff is available to answer calls from 7:30AM to 4:30PM Pacific Time, Monday though Friday.  That’s 8:30 AM to 5:30 PM Mountain Time, 9:30 to 6:30 Central Time, or 10:20 to 7:30 Eastern Time.

We’ll even do business with the good people of Alaska from 6:30 AM to 3:30 PM. For the early-birds of Hawaii and the Aleutians we can be reached from 5:30 AM to 2:30 PM.

Real people working with you: One of the many things that makes ZipYourFlyer.com work!

Getting Started…

“The secret of getting ahead is getting started.” Samuel L. Clemens

The New Face of ZipYourFlyer.com

So by now you’ve noticed that things have changed quite a bit on our website. Don’t worry – we just got kind of a facelift. We still have the same owner, same great flyers and same great customer service we’ve always had. We have added several new design templates. Be sure to check them out on our Samples Page.

We hope you find the new logo and website attractive and easy to use. This is the first step in a line of enhancements and improvements — more to come! The website is responsive, which means it will look nice and be easy to view on a desktop, tablet and smartphone.

Celebrating 10 years! Happy Anniversary to us and thanks to all of you for making it possible!

Composing Effective Real Estate Flyers – Part 2

As I wrote in the previous post, that pesky character limit the MLS puts on you really stifles your creativity.  You know as well as I do that if they didn’t put a character limit on the listing description that you guys would be writing novellas in there, some with plot twists and everything.  (Don’t forget, I was one of you and I’ve been working closely and directly with you guys for over 11 years now.)

The point I was trying to make in the last post was that you might not want to use the same listing description for the MLS and all of your other marketing, Email Flyers, Printed Flyers, Syndication, etc.  I know, you guys are really busy, and using the same one for everything is easier.  But remember, the agents you are marketing to are busy also.  Get right to the point when you are writing for other agents.  They are busy too and might not want to wade through flowery paragraphs that your potential homebuyer would swoon over.

What?!! OK…

• What do Real Estate Agents with Buyers care about when they look at a flyer? (Feel free to chime in here)
• What would a potential buyer find especially appealing about your listing?
• What does your client think is an important selling point about their house? (Be sure to ask them.)

If I had to put my finger on it I would say that the agents who have trouble here are often just unorganized with this task.  When I was a REALTOR, I did a pretty good job writing descriptions for my listings.  My trick was a steno notepad, small enough to hold and write on as I walked through the house.  (Steno Pad – for those of you under 35, it’s a small spiral notepad… Nevermind, just key it in on your IPhone)

I would start in the street and take notes.   I’d walk all the way through with my client.  I would ask them to tell me things about their house as we went.  I asked them questions and LISTENED the whole time to be sure I didn’t miss a thing:

-Great Curb appeal, corner lot, big trees, sprinklers, nice neighborhood, playground a block away.

Then I’d go inside. As I took notes about the features I also wrote down words to describe feelings I had as I walked through:

–Heavy custom front door. Big entry, soaring ceilings, warm, welcoming, nice colors, impressive….
– Formal Living Room, Big windows, bright happy, gas fp. Lots of room, would hold big furniture, would live nicely, would be great party room.
-Den-office-spare room- glass panel doors, blinds, wainscoting.  A quiet space… great for working from home.
-Kitchen (this is big – spend some time with this so you don’t miss anything) granite, hardwood floors, solid cherry cabinets, undercounter lighting, bright, big, Island with room for seating, stainless sink, fancy faucets, little veggie sink, pot filler, stainless appls stay, disposal, walk in pantry, butler’s pantry… looks like a fun place to cook – glass of wine…

You will never remember all this if you don’t write it down.

So now what?

Composing Effective Text for Real Estate Flyers

You agents are really better at this than you give yourselves credit for. BUT – some of you could use a little help. Many of you call us to voice your insecurities over what you have written in the property descriptions on your Email Flyer. Maybe it’s because you do them so often, you feel like you are repeating yourself. After all – usually most listings have 3 or 4 bedrooms, a nice master, if you’re lucky a gourmet or updated kitchen… What more could you want. I know, I know, you want to make your listing sound special, worth a look.

So you sit at your computer trying to cram all of that wonderfulness into 500 characters to fit into the MLS. Darn! That didn’t fit – so you start eliminating extra spaces and abbreviating all over the place. 4bd/2ba/LR/DR/FP/Mstr/3gar/btva/OMG!!! These abbreviations are ok I guess when you are composing something that other agents will see. After all, if they stare at it long enough, they will probably be able to figure out what the heck you are talking about. BUT – doesn’t the MLS Listing Description find its way to REALTOR.com? Don’t real live human beings, not realtors, read about your listing there? Or at least try to decipher the listing there?

That pesky character limit the MLS puts on your description stifles your creativity. How can you make your listing stand out in 500 characters or less!!

The abbreviated description you write for the MLS, what you put on an E-Flyer to market to other real estate agents and what you want on a Printed Flyer in the flyer box or write for syndication for potential buyers to see are all different from each other, don’t you think?

Wait a minute, you’re thinking. She’s not telling me I need to write different descriptions for my listing is she? Well… yes and no.

More to come.

Success …

“Success is the ability to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm.” Sir Winston Churchill