It's really true.

As a general rule, one is just as good as another. With that said, there is a world of difference in the level of success that each investor has had pushing their specific program. But it has much less to do with their abilities than it does the muscle that goes into marketing themselves and their thousand dollar program. Because they're marketing masters, they excel at getting hapless investors who don't know any better to grab what's in their wallet and slap it down on a table in the back room of a seminar so they can waltz out the door convinced that they're well on their way to reaching their real estate investing dreams.

What the gurus don't tell you is that's also the secret key you need to unlock the potential profits of their real estate investing course. So you can either keep spending money on the latest update to their program or you can put your precious dollars to work for you in developing a marketing strategy that will allow you to unleash the power of the "secret" investing techniques that you've dropped a ton of your money on.

Don't mistake what I'm saying: It's imperative that you understand how to utilize a variety of creative real estate techniques. But nothing is more critical to your success than being able to successfully market yourself. It really is a package deal. But having an effective marketing strategy is vital. Otherwise you're as useless as a concert pianist at a flea market.

There are two directions you can go when developing your marketing strategy. The first is to chase down individual prospects in the hopes that you'll be able to sell them on you - and your way of doing business. This method is time-intensive and the cost per prospect is unbelievably high - and has not only a small likelihood of returning your investment to you, but has a low rate of return. The other is to concentrate your efforts on those who are already warm to the idea of doing business with you.

Obviously, you need to concentrate the majority of your marketing muscle on the second option. One marketing method you can implement is the use of bandit signs. The cost is very low and you have a great deal of control over type of calls you get. You can advertise for only flexible sellers or you can market to property owners in specific situations. For instance, your sign might specify that you're interested in working only with sellers who are facing an imminent foreclosure who are also willing to accept payment for their equity over a period of time.

Every caller you get won't necessarily be a golden prospect, but by placing limited information on your bandit signs about the types of sellers and properties you're interested in buying, you can improve the quality of your prospects by guaranteeing that 95% of the people who respond will know ahead of time what you want. Unfortunately, the other 5% will be the truly confused - people who want to know if you do refi loans or sell girl scout cookies.

Another warm prospect marketing strategy you can implement is one used by guru real estate investors: direct mail. While this strategy can be a minefield that can cost you a lot of money, it also does most of the heavy lifting for you by weeding out people who have no interest in doing business with you. The two most important aspects of a successful direct mail campaign are targeting to the right people (motivated sellers) and writing a good letter that succinctly describes the kinds of properties you're interested in and the kinds of seller situations you need. If you ensure that your letter is well-written and it's laced with descriptive phrases and lots of benefit-driven features for the seller, you stand a great chance of success with your campaign.

Regardless of what marketing strategy you develop, the most important thing you can do is recognize that marketing is critical to your success. I understand the arguments that you have to be able to give the seller an offer they can live with and that you have to understand creative investing techniques. I don't deny that. But if you don't have prospects that have ears to hear your offer it really doesn't matter how creative or well-written it is because you'll be trying to sell an invisible man with a hypothetical offer.

So concentrate most of your efforts in figuring out how to get warm prospects. Once you have prospects, you can crack open your thousand dollar real estate investing manual and figure out what to do next. Only then will you be able to really begin seeing your investing dreams come true.

Get started today - by developing an effective marketing strategy. So what's your game plan?