Giving Away Free Books - My Journey To Real Estate Millions?

by Austin Lon
(Lehi, Utah)

Growing up, I looked up to my Dad. He was/is an epic salesman. He's sold cars, tires, records, large metal shop tools, you name it. He was even named Subaru Salesman of the Year in 1978.

I was very familiar with a lot of his marketing experiences, and tried to put them to use for myself in marketing real estate.

He'd told me about a time when he'd put together a "Free car shopping guide"- this was before the internet, and there wasn't a lot of information for people wanting to comparison shop cars. This was back in the late 70s.

He shared that he'd advertise his free car buyer's guide in the classifieds, get tons of calls, and, knowing that these buyers were interested in purchasing a car, he'd have a ton of leads each week to sell Subarus to.

I knew that I couldn't just put together some photocopied magazine articles about real estate for a "Home Buyer's Guide" - so I bought about 20 basic Home Buyer's Guides from Barnes and Noble.

I offered this book, which cost me $10 each, for free through the local classifieds.

I gave them all away, one at a time, and met some new buyers, and got some buyer's agreements signed. I delivered them all by hand. Some as far as two hours away.

I got the leads - but I learned that having the leads is only PART of getting deals going, and I just wasn't the salesman my Dad is.

$200 was a cheap lesson. I learned that I really needed to work on my sales skills once I had interested parties. An important lesson learned.