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Struggling to come up with apartment marketing ideas?
You’re not alone.
Many apartment marketers find it difficult to come up with ideas that will actually generate leases.
The hard truth is that there's no silver bullet when it comes to marketing your community effectively.
Just like your apartment community, everything from the online tendencies and preferences of the renter personas your targeting to nearby competitors are all unique.
You may get lucky going off of industry research, or sticking to the , but there's no guarantee that the marketing channels and/or specific tactics that worked for one apartment community will work for another.
However, there is a long list of creative and innovative ideas to market your multifamily community, plus some tried and true tactics that have been effective for decades.
We’ve put together this amazing resource to help apartment marketers reach more renters. Below you’ll find a huge list of 40 apartment marketing ideas to grow your community.
Regardless of your budget or location, you’ll find plenty of tactics you can implement in our list.
You may want to bookmark this page to refer back to the next time you’re looking for new ideas to market your apartments!
Pinterest and Instagram are great apartment marketing tools. Add pictures of your available units to both social networks and encourage people to contact you to setup a tour.
You can also post furnished pictures (idea #18) to make the images more appealing.
Social media advertising is an excellent property management marketing strategy for companies that want to run ads even with a modest budget.
You can get started with as little as $5 per day, and the costs are far lower than other advertising.
You may want to bookmark this page to refer back to the next time you’re looking for new ideas to market your apartments!
This marketing tactic combines online and offline apartment advertising. If you’ll be doing an open house to fill up some vacant units, promote it using Facebook Events.
Create a public Facebook event with an eye-catching cover photo and promote it all over social media. You can even run Facebook Ads to your event for more exposure!
Learning how to use Twitter Advanced Search is very valuable. You can narrow your searches down by Tweets in a specific area, which allows you to find local prospects to connect with.
Let’s be honest, most online apartment listings are pretty generic. They list details about the unit and community, and that’s about it.
Instead of sticking to the script, put your creativity to work and make your listings fun and entertaining. This will help you stand out and attract more renters!
Musician Jonathan Mann went as far as making a music video when he was looking for a roommate for his apartment. It was creative to say the least.
Let’s look at a few stats:
If your company isn’t making SEO a priority, you’re missing out big time!
Read this post to find out how to dominate local SEO.
We’re huge proponents of blogging as an apartment marketing technique. Businesses who blog receive up to 67% more leads than those who don't. Read our post on blog topic ideas to get started.
If you need help getting started you can always contact us for a consultation.
Find locally-focused blogs and ask if they’d be willing to accept guest posts. Doing a search such as “Boston blogs” will give you a good list of sites to reach out to.
Here’s an excellent resource to learn the ins and outs of guest blogging.
Turn your website into a hub of information about your city or neighborhood. You could have a map with local hot spots or blog about local events and news.
This will attract local search traffic and boost your SEO.
These aren’t reviews in the traditional sense. What we’re talking about is creating “Top 10” lists of different types of business in your area.
For instance, you might have “Top 10 Italian Restaurants in Las Vegas.”
Often times, people will search for the best local businesses when they’re contemplating moving to a new area.
Is your apartment community listed on all of the major directory sites? Verifying your location helps your local SEO and can bring in new leads from people searching for apartments on these sites.
If you want to save time, you can use a service like Yext, Moz Local or UBL to claim your business listings automatically.
Did you create a listing on Apartments.com a year ago and never visited it again? There’s a good chance your rental prices, amenities and other details have changed since then.
Keeping your rental information up to date helps your listings stay fresh, and eliminates calls from people inquiring about outdated information.
Your apartment listings don’t have to stop at Trulia and Craigslist. There are a lot of specialty sites that allow landlords and property managers to advertise.
For instance, George Mason University has its own off-campus housing search engine where landlords can list their rentals for students.
Here’s a creative apartment marketing idea your competitors definitely aren’t doing.
When renters move out and it’s time to turnover the apartment, create a Snapchat story showcasing new renters moving in to their new home.
Video marketing is extremely effective.
A great way to get started is to record current tenants giving a review of the property.
Video testimonials build trust with prospective renters and are more powerful than written reviews.
Another great video marketing tactic is to create videos with DIY tips for renters and upload them to YouTube on a regular basis.
Your videos don’t have to be quite as long as this one. Two or three minutes should be good enough.
User generated content is content created by your audience.
You can start a branded hashtag and encourage tenants to use it when posting pictures of your community to social media.
Start an apartment decoration contest on Instagram.
Have tenants post pictures of their apartments using a branded hashtag, then allow everyone to vote.
Not only will you build your social following, it also helps with tenant retention.
Here are some great tips for running your own Instagram contest.
Think you have to spend tens of thousands of dollars on a PR firm to get press? Think again!
Sign up for HARO (Help A Reporter Out) and get daily emails from writers and journalists looking for experts to include in stories they're writing for small and major publications.
Best of all, it's completely free to use!
When people come in for an apartment tour, let them know you provide discounts if they're willing to check-in on Facebook while they're their.
This will let their friends know they've been there and gives your apartments social proof.
Does your city have middle school or high school sports teams? There’s a good chance they accept sponsors to help pay for uniforms, refreshments and other costs. A lot of charity events such as 5K runs accept sponsors as well.
Donating money to support local events is a fairly low cost way to promote your apartment community while showing your support for the neighborhood.
Tenant referral programs are a very popular way to capitalize on word-of-mouth advertising.
If your current tenants are happy with their apartment, they’ll be more than happy to tell their friends. Incentivizing them by offering a rental discount will motivate them to actively promote your apartments.
You can post resident referral flyers around the community to spread awareness of your program.
When people are hunting for a new apartment, they become more mindful of “For Rent” signs around the neighborhood. Placing a banner in street view to market your apartments is an easy way to get more foot traffic.
Shop around online and at local print shops to find good deals. Don’t skimp on quality though. A well made banner can last for years, while cheaper ones won’t be able to withstand much stress without becoming noticeably damaged.
Pet friendly rentals are in high demand. If you allow pets (particularly dogs), you should promote it as much as possible in your apartment marketing plan.
Consider partnering up with local animal shelters to leave brochures or pamphlets promoting your apartments as a pet friendly community. In exchange, you can offer rental discounts for employees and customers of the shelter. You could even sponsor an event at the shelter such as an adoption fair.
This is an old school apartment marketing idea that isn’t as common today, but can still be very effective.
Ask your local grocery stores if they sell advertising space on their shopping carts.
Grocery stores are great for advertising apartments because it puts you right in front of locals every time they shop. When they start to think about moving, they’ll recall your ad and call for details.
A Chamber of Commerce is a community of local companies that work together to be the voice of businesses in the area for government policy and other issues that affect businesses.
In addition to being a part of the business community, members are also promoted on the local chamber’s website which gives you further exposure.
You can find your local Chamber of Commerce here.
BNI is a business networking organization built on the concept of referrals. Each member of the BNI group refers business to other members.
BNI has several benefits over traditional networking groups. For instance, each chapter only allows one member from each industry. You would be the only multifamily community in your group, so you don’t have to worry about competing with others.
There are thousands of BNI chapters around the world, and you can find one close to you here.
If your community has meeting or party rooms, allow local businesses to use them to host events. You can offer discounts or even let them use the space for free in return for allowing you to leave brochures at their business or other promotional items.
You could even provide a space for BNI or Chamber of Commerce meetings.
Some of you might think this apartment marketing idea is trivial or ineffective. However, here’s why it’s on the list. Pens are an extremely cheap way to keep your community in the minds of people that have come in for an apartment tour.
All of the pens in your office should be branded with the name, phone number and website of your community. Include the pens with your brochures you give to potential renters so they’ll always have it with them.
Moving companies can be great partners for apartment marketers because your customers are very similar or the same in some cases.
You’re both looking for people that want to move. Partner up to promote each other and offer discounts on both ends.
You can provide a discount for people referred from the moving the company, and the moving company can provide discounts for your renters.
Discounts for seniors, students and members of the military are very popular in the retail industry, but many multifamily marketers haven’t jumped on board yet.
If you’re in an area with college students, military or government employees, offering a discount can entice them to choose you over the apartments down the street.
Advertising in the Washington Post or other large news outlets can be pricey. If you’re looking to save some money, you can place ads in smaller local print publications for a fraction of the price.
One of the best parts about running apartment ads in local magazines or papers is they often provide discounts when they’re getting close to the publication date and haven’t filled all the ad spots yet.
Spring and Summer are yard sale season. Unfortunately many apartment renters don’t participate because they don’t have a space to sell. Start a community yard sale for your tenants, and neighboring tenants, to encourage them to come out with their stands and sell their items.
This will bring foot traffic to the property and build your reputation in the community. Plus, it’s a great amenity to offer potential renters.
Flag football, yoga and spin classes are all great ways to keep renters happy and market your apartments.
For example, Reside Living provides several activities for renters including bike tuneups as a part of its Reside Athletics Program.
Being active in your community is one of the best ways to market your apartments while doing something positive.
Encourage residents to volunteer for local programs and charity events as a part of your community’s team.
You can get custom t-shirts made for all the volunteers that include your logo. This will create a team atmosphere and promote your company.
Flyers are far from dead. This is another old school apartment marketing idea that’s cost effective and can produce results.
Look for busy shopping centers and malls near your apartments that allow you to place flyers on windshields. Then once or twice a month, place flyers on them promoting your latest rental deals.
After you’ve given someone an apartment tour, do you sit and wait to hear back from them? If so, you’re potentially losing out on a lot of renters.
Unlike the other marketing ideas for apartment communities in this list, this tip is all about following up with people that have already visited you. You should have some type of CRM setup that can track walk-ins or appointments. Make sure you’re following up to close the deal.
Apartment marketing isn’t always about getting people in the door. You have to be able to impress during the apartment tour.
Some apartment hunters find it difficult to envision their furniture in an empty apartment. As a result, they can rule out your units because the think they’re too small or not a good fit for them.
Avoid this by having staged units for people to look at. Put in furniture and household items to give renters an idea of how great their apartment could look.
Do you have space on your property that’s unused? Making it into a drop off location for Toys for Tots, clothing donations and similar programs is a creative marketing idea for apartments that don’t get a lot of foot traffic.
Contact these programs and ask about becoming a designated drop off location.
Many local coffee shops have bulletin boards where you can post your apartment flyers for free. Spend an afternoon finding out which shops allow it, and start pinning!
Ready to start getting more leases? Put these 40 apartment marketing ideas into action, and start bringing new renters in.
