December
Fishing the new-resident
pool
New residents offer an attractive—and
potentially lucrative—customer base for massage therapists
and spas: They’ve left behind trusted services and familiar
businesses and must start from scratch to establish a network
of service providers in their new community.
An often-cited marketing
statistic says that new homeowners purchase more products and
services in the first six months after moving than an established
resident spends in two years. And according to the National Association
of Realtors, in 2003 the average homebuyer was 40 and had a medium
income of $66,000.
In other words, they’re
hot prospects.
Tapping into the new-resident
market offers an enterprising massage therapist a crack at potential
clients—and before her competitor gets to them. And there
are a slate of advertising services that want to make the introduction.
Does it work? Massage therapist
Merrill Pagaent, of Newton, Massachusetts, credits advertisements
in The Homesteader, a nationwide, monthly new-resident newspaper,
with gaining about 10 regular clients over the past five years.
Below is a sample of nationwide
new-resident direct-mail advertising services. To find others,
search online with key words “new resident advertising”: