Over the past couple of months I have participated in four trade shows and expos around the country to expose and promote LVDM to the buying public.
Jerome and I were at the "Mexico Expo" in San Diego, CA the end of February. It was pretty disappointing. A one-day event that was designed to showcase Mexico real estate developments. I do not know all the reasons (slow economy, bad press, poor marketing) but it was very poorly attended.
I next had a booth at the "Adventures in Travel Show" in Washington, DC in March. While the Cherry Blossoms were coming out, buyers were not. Another low attendance event. We saw no more than 3000 people come through, and I got just a few leads.
April (the month, not my wife) found me at three different events. Two weekends ago I was at the "Atlanta Journal Constitution Second Home Expo" in Atlanta, GA. Perhaps as many as 3000 people showed up and in spite of promoting a giveaway of two free rounds of golf at Campestre, got a small number of interested people. However I did get a couple of very strong leads.
Next it was the "Luxury Real Estate Spring Conference" in San Diego. This is a trade group of high-end brokers, brokerages and developers. I learned a great deal about the market around the world, and while there are weak markets, there are also strong markets. More on LRE later.
This past weekend I had a booth at the "Escapes! Second Home Expo" in The Woodlands, a wealthy suburb of Houston, Texas. Again there was a lower than expected turnout, but I found strong prospects. I learned that there is a strong tie between Houstonians and an interest or knowledge of San Miguel de Allende and Lake Chapalla. I know where we will be holding events once we release those two LVDM resorts.
What I have determined over the course of these events is that we need to forget about the expos and trade shows for right now. They are just not effective. Rather we will be focusing on creating and holding stand-alone events with key real estate brokers and key associations in key cities in the US and Canada. Focus is the key! As well we have no doubt now that we need to accelerate our attention to Canadian buyers.
I learned many new things about Canadian buyers and they are not exactly like US buyers. And none of them is like Mexican buyers. I will post later on what I learned about Canadian buyers.
As a result of these experiences I am revising my marketing plan for the US and Canada, and will also be creating a "Fly & Buy" program for qualified buyers
Readers - please post comments and thoughts here about marketing, Fly & Buy, markets you believe are stronger or weaker than the norm, sales techniques, and most of all feedback you are getting from people - sales agents, prospects, family members, etc. - outside of the LVDM family.
