From Small To BIG
The right ad campaign can transform your business.
Can the right campaign really grow your home building business? For analysis we turned to Richard Elkman, author of Building Better Ads, New Home Advertising That Really Works (fifth edition) and president of Group Two Advertising, which operates in 20 states and has earned a reputation for turning home building businesses around.
 Lifestyle ads can transform a small-volume builder’s business. Elkman says Mayberry Homes (Lansing, MI) grew exponentially with the right campaign. The company had three subdivisions under development, with homes priced from $100K to $200K. The problem was, the company only sold six homes the previous year.
“I told them, ‘You can’t afford us,’ since we typically don’t work with builders selling fewer than 40 homes a year,” Elkman recalls. “But they came back to me and said, ‘We can’t afford NOT to have you working with us.’”
Instead of the simple black-and-white ad Mayberry Homes was previously running, Elkman’s company designed a four-color lifestyle campaign, emphasizing the golf amenities of Mayberry’s communities. Mayberry devoted 1% of its projected sales for the coming year to the campaign.
“In addition to the lifestyle component, our goal was to make a small builder appear larger—so we played up all three communities in some ads,” he says. The ad campaign also piggybacked on a PR campaign for some awards Mayberry earned.
Sales took off. Mayberry sold 75 homes in the second year and 145 homes in 2005. “Builders have to remember—you’re not just selling a product. You’re selling a lifestyle.”
Interested in Group Two’s services? See www.grouptwo.com.
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