Marketing company launches Welcome Home Organizer

Dennis Marsh founded Ovation Marketing LLC in November. Its latest product, the Welcome Home Organizer, is a house-shaped box that is being given free to homeowners who close their purchases with Hogan Land Title Co. Advertisers can place their names on the outside of the box or on dividers inside the box, which is designed as a storage container for home-closing papers or other important paperwork. Inside each organizer is an envelope of coupons and special offers from local companies.

“Obviously anything service-related with a home is perfect for it. But what I’ve found is that it’s almost perfect for any individual company out there, because it’s not like … you look at the advertising and it’s gone the next day or thrown in the trash,” Marsh said. “The idea behind it is that it’s designed to remain in the house as a functional type of an item, being the organizer,” he said.

“People can hold whatever they want to. They can use it for whatever. It really doesn’t matter, but the important thing is that it stays in the home,” he said.

Advertisers on the box being distributed by Hogan Land Title include SS & B Heating and Cooling, DeLong Plumbing, Modern Exteriors, Carson’s Nursery, Culligan Water, Domino’s Pizza, Wonders of Wildlife, Brentwood Center, Benton Blinds and some Branson attractions.

Marsh originally intended for the idea to be used by Realtors, to help them keep their names in front of clients.

“But that got to be a little bit unwieldy because of the different things that Realtors do with their giveaways and the things that they give to people,” Marsh said.

Enter Hogan Land Title. Marsh approached Keith Chaffin, vice president of Hogan Land Title, about getting involved and distributing the Welcome Home Organizer.

In exchange for being the exclusive distributor of the Welcome Home Organizer, Hogan Land Title had to lend a hand to Habitat for Humanity, which received a $500 donation.

“For Hogan’s part of it, there’s really no cost from my standpoint … . The original idea was (that) for their part of distributing it, they would donate money to Habitat for Humanity,” he said. “They donate to Habitat for Humanity, and then they distribute (the Welcome Home Organizer) through all eight of their locations. It’s a nice thank you for doing business with their company,” he said.

“This is a yearly program through Hogan, and they have actually signed up for another year … because we really just started distributing in August. So that will run for one full year, and then they’ll do another box, and the quantity is based on how many closings we estimate that they’ll be able to do over the next 12 months,” Marsh said.

Michelle Goddard marketing director for Hogan Land Title, said Realtors generally choose which title company they want to work with.

Her job is to make sure the Realtors want to choose Hogan Land Title, and she said that the Welcome Home Organizer has been a good tool for that.

“I’ve had great response from my Realtors. They love the idea that it gives their clients a warm, fuzzy feeling. Because what we’ve done is collected over $1,500 value in gifts or coupons … and it is given to the new home buyer at the end of closing with all of our legal documents inside … ,” Goddard said.

Per an agreement Marsh made with Hogan Land Title, he won’t make the organizer available to any other title company in the local market, but it looks like he’ll get his wish to do a Realtor-specific box.

“I actually have plans for another box that’s going to be distributed through Murney Associates,” Marsh said. That box will be open to new advertisers, Marsh said, but he’ll give clients who’ve participated in the Hogan box first dibs.

While Marsh declined to provide the advertising fees for the organizer, he did say that they were fairly low for the first box, since it was a new product. For future boxes, the rate will go up.