Outreach marketing is alive and well and working wonders for apartment communities and real estate professionals everywhere. It might take a little more work and effort than you want to put in initially, but it will pay off. Outreach marketing is important just in this digital age, if not more so to help you break through the marketing noise your prospects have all around you. Listen to learn the best tips on when, where, and how to go about outreach marketing.

While outreach marketing can be intimidating, the easiest way to get started is to focus on your home turf…with current residents. They have already bought into your community. So the easiest way to turn one resident into three is with a kick butt referral program. The trick is to make sure referring is on our residents’ brain often by reminding them often. As property manager, leasing agent, leasing professionals, and realtors, a referral is as good as it gets.

Marketing your apartment community or your real estate business can be a real challenge. In today’s Marketing Home, Marketing You episode we uncover the top four marketing mistakes made in 2019 and we show simple ways to fix them in 2020. Fixing these four mistakes will lead to huge gains in time, energy and return on your investments. Tune in.

There’s something so exciting about January. Everyone seems a little extra inspired this time of year and encouraged to make steps towards their goals. There’s an optimism in the air that you just don’t get any other time of year. People setting New Year’s resolutions should inspire your team to see how you can meaningfully contribute to helping your residents and prospects achieve their goals. Seth Godin, Master Marketer and Author, speaks about how important it is for companies and brands to have a meaningful impact on people's transformation. That’s where real connections happen. 

We’re winding down 2019 (like, what?? How did this happen so quickly?) and as we always say at Sprout, this is not the time of year to take your foot off the gas, but rather keep going and finish the year strong.

We know that the end of the year can feel even more busy than usual but we don’t want you to neglect planning for this last month of the year. In fact, this is a great time to celebrate creative holidays with your residents while they’re already in the mood to celebrate. This season is also a great time to get out there and do some outreach marketing around your community. 

If you want to make your marketing efforts as easy as possible, while still being effective, then these done-for-you bundles in our Sprout Shop is the way to go. Couple those bundles with a FREE download of our Creative Holiday Calendar and you’re GOLDEN for the rest of the year.

It’s no surprise that attention spans today aren’t what they used to be. Studies say that in 1920 the average attention span was 20-minutes. Today? Eight seconds...the same as a goldfish. As a property manager trying to market your apartment community, this fact should stop you in your tracks. Breaking through the noise of day to day life is a real challenge. Twenty years ago, we were just trying to stand out from the competition with nice curb appeal and a good photo in our For Rent ad. But today’s online world has created a new set of complicated problems for apartment marketers. Your community is no longer just competing with other communities. You are competing with EVERYTHING for your customer’s attention.

Most managers would agree that a proactive marketing approach is ideal, still the large majority default to a reactive approach. Why? Often, managers start with the best of intentions to have a well-crafted marketing plan but then things happen onsite that take away our focus. Mid-month they can find themselves with dipping occupancy, unaccounted for skips, or a lower renewal rate than anticipated. In the shock and misunderstanding a hail mary is thrown in hopes it will correct all the missed goals. But let’s be honest, does the hail mary ever work?

Ever have a really big idea and then realize… oops…. You don’t actually have time to make it happen? Maybe you had the best marketing initiative planned but then that to-do list got the best of the day and you just weren’t able to make it happen. We feel you. Time-starved property managers are spread thin and often times it feels like there’s no help in sight which can have such add to the already overwhelming feeling you have on the daily, am I right? We’ve heard this same scenario from property managers all over the US and decided that Sprout can do more to help. So we did! We now have done-for-you bundles in our Sprout Shop that you can purchase and then have the pre-made bundles shipped directly to your door.

Truth time: A lot of on-site apartment marketing is done for the sake of doing something (anything) or to simply appease a corporate requirement. When we approach marketing like this, it tends to lack clarity when it comes to defining the marketing objectives. The result? A big belly flop. 👎

Let’s face it, property managers are some of the busiest people on the planet. And while you’d love to think you can do it all (and sometimes you try), you simply don’t have time for overly complicated marketing and retention plans. Most marketing never even makes it out the door because it’s too time consuming to execute. 

If you haven’t heard already, this month is better breakfast month! This is a fun monthly theme that you can use to create unique resident events and outreach initiatives, but it’s also the perfect month to push your community’s health and wellness facilities. If you’re a community that is in an area of town where fitness is the new fad, or if you have an on-site workout space that would make Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson drool, now is the perfect time to show it off! 

Building processes around basic touch points as a way to WOW your residents.

Property managers, this is for you! When it comes to choreographing the perfect Customer Experience Journey, Beyoncé has a lot to teach the Multifamily Industry. Think of this customer experience journey like a well-crafted music video. Everyone knows where to be and what to do at what time. Let’s see how we can take a lesson from Bey for our apartment communities.

Multifamily managers, this one is for you! Ditch three outdated marketing beliefs that are affecting your occupancy negatively and build stronger, more profitable customer experiences at your apartment communities.

Lauren and I love September, National Breakfast Month. It means so many things we cherish: coffee, donuts, waffles… and your apartment prospects and residents feel the same way. Here are some breakfast-themed apartment marketing and resident retention events that will start your day off right!

The location of your apartment community matters. Put it to work for you to increase your occupancy. We’re sharing some location campaigns and marketing slogans that help your prospective renters imagine living at your apartment community!

Teachers work seriously hard for the money and I LOVE giving back to them. I’m talking about pairing goodies that give back to teachers and at the same time, attract these hard working professionals to your community. So, let’s think about how you can market to teachers, school districts, and faculty staff.

Q: “Barbara, I've attended several courses that you presented. I have a question for you. With competition being so fierce, do you have any quick tips on best practices when it comes to marketing? Best, Sarah from Indiana."

Outreach is NOT walking in somewhere and leaving flyers. This is about building relationships and being a force to be reckoned with. It's not just what's in it for us as the apartment community, but what's in it for this potential business if they partner with us, And that's what a win-win partnership is about.