Archive for the ‘Apartment Website’ Category

An Apartment Marketing Site is not Equivalent to a Great Website!

Sunday, October 4th, 2009

Why would a great website not necessarily make an effective website for an apartment community?

Prospective renters don’t consider renting apartments in the same way they look at purchasing a good book, a computer, or perhaps selecting a dry cleaning service.  There are some similarities.  Once a consumer purchases a computer, they are commited for an extended period of time to make use of the product along with its weaknesses and strengths.  However, a computer is a decision that is not impacted by many external factors.  Choosing a computer doesn’t create a need to know where you will go to the doctor, or how far it is to the grocery store, or where the nearest fast food may be, etc.  On the other hand choosing to rent an apartment can and should raise all these issues for prospective multifamily residents.

While over 50% of apartments searches begin on line and over 70% if they  are moving in from out of town, as individual complexes achieving Internet visibility can be tough.  This has led many apartment communities to conclude that they do not need a website.  Instead they rely on the ILS community to provide web visibility.

Allowing the ILS to be your initial Internet contact is a reasonable approach to gain access to consumers, but it is not reasonable in a world where the consumer increasingly would like to make a decision without speaking to anyone that this is all the consumer will seek to know.

Consumers and therefore renters are seeking providers that will show them what they need, clearly explain what their service offers for their need, and allow them to purchase without further use of their time.  The ILS is not and should not be positioned to do this for you.  As the apartment manager, operator, or  owner, you are uniquely positioned to provide robust and compelling community information.

Because of this the website for an apartment community is NOT equivalent to a typical “great” website.  Because of this, the Apartment Marketing Site is a bit different animal.  First, there is no need for glitzy high cost web design for a strong multifamily community website.  The key is well organized information that allows the consumer to fully understand the services, shopping, sites, etc. that the community offers.

Posted in Apartment Management, Apartment Marketing, Apartment Marketing Website, Apartment Website, Find Renter, Find Renters, Find Tenant, Help Rent Apartments, Help Renting Apartments, Hispanic Market, Housing Market Facts, Marketing Apartment, Marketing Apartments, Multi-family Renting | No Comments »

Deflation – Apartment Marketing and Operations

Saturday, October 3rd, 2009

Today, Bloomberg ran an article that states an expectation of deflationary pressure throughout 2010.  The principal driver behind this conclusion is the weakened employment environment throughout the United States.  As a results as owners and managers we have to consider how this effects are operations and asset choices.

From a leasing perspective, this is extends the pressure households are under to accept living situations that were not acceptable in the past.  Rebuilding America’s wealth means lower fixed cost choices for a large percentage of us.  Owners should be considering rental options that will reduce tenants total cost of living decisions.  Our affiliated properties have been developing fixed income solutions and solutions to increase the tenant density in our units taking advantage of our generally abundant parking, often good access to public transportation, and other factors supporting this.

From an operations perspective, we must be reviewing our labor costs and assure that we remain competitive.  Additionally, as a sector that is likely to  recover more quickly in this economy, we may have talent opportunities that don’t often exist.  Also, expect and pursue significant reductions in costs for supplies and contract services.

As potential property investors, good deals today must offer extremely strong fundamentals as market conditions may continue to erode property values over the next 24 months.  And, for properties already owned, lower leverage is the choice path.

Posted in Apartment Acquisitions, Apartment Evaluation, Apartment Investing, Apartment Management, Apartment Marketing, Apartment Marketing Ideas, Apartment Purchases, Apartment Tenant Qualification, Apartment Website, Finding Good Tenants, Finding Renters, Finding Tenants, Get Good Tenants, Get More Renter Traffic, Get Tenant, Get a Tenant, Getting Good Tenants, Getting Tenants, Help Rent Apartments, Help Renting Apartments, Leasing Management | 1 Comment »

Great Post by Scott Schneider – Is Your Internet Sales Strategy Broken? You Can Fix It in 20 Minutes.

Wednesday, September 23rd, 2009

I was recently in the market for a 2010 Honda Odyssey, fully loaded plus options.  My wife is expecting twins in February, and along with my 2-year old, we would soon outgrow our old vehicle.  The difficult decision to buy a (gulp!) mini-van was made; we settled on the Odyssey and figured out what options we wanted.  Being a member of the internet-savvy generation, I started by getting online price estimates from Autobytel.com and Edmunds.com and also researched what others were paying for the vehicle.  The only decision left was where to buy it.  I hope the next part will shock you into action…

I began by sending an email to twelve local Honda dealers, thinking I would find the one that offered me the lowest price and use that as a starting point for negotiations.  I was very surprised when only nine of the twelve dealers had valid email addresses listed on their website!  Even more shocking, of the nine dealers who got my message about buying a new car, only FOUR responded!  I replied to all four with a few clarifying questions, of which only three followed up.  I ended up purchasing my very expensive mini-van from one of those three dealers.

It’s amazing to me how quickly those three dealers increased their odds of making the sale from 1 in 12 to 1 in 3 by doing only the bare minimum of what is expected of any sales team.  Here I was, a prospect who had already done all his research, didn’t need a test-drive, didn’t need to discuss various options and features, and wasn’t going to take a long time haggling over price – and 75% of the dealerships I contacted never even got a chance to make the sale.   The similarities between purchasing a car and leasing an apartment are many.

Is your Sales team missing opportunities?  You should be able to complete these steps in 20 minutes or less to make sure you don’t have cracks in your Internet Sales strategy:

1. Review every page of your website to ensure the contact information (phone and fax too!) is up to date and that none of your pages are broken.

2. Test any automated contact forms on your website to make sure they work properly.

3. Send a test email from your website to each listed email address and make sure they work properly.

4. Clearly define whose job it is within your organization to respond to emails and how often the email inbox should be checked.

5. Clearly define a follow-up strategy for all email/internet prospects.

6. Determine how you are going to audit your organization’s adherence to Internet Sales procedures. This should include scheduled website testing from steps 1-3.

Don’t let your competition get the jump on you just because they remember to answer their email!

The original article can be found at: Multifamily Insiders

Posted in Apartment Marketing, Apartment Marketing Ideas, Apartment Marketing Website, Apartment Website | No Comments »