While working in the direct mail industry for a company whose clientele was 75% real estate, I witnessed the production and distribution of more than 70,000 real estate marketing pieces each week.

A common but unfortunate trend I noticed was the overburdening of marketing messages. In other words, many of the marketers wanted their messages to do more than they were capable of doing.

I'll elaborate. But first, a quick marketing primer:

Creating an effective marketing message usually calls for a three-step approach. You must define your audience, your goal and, ultimately, your message