The economic impact of COVID-19 has resulted in a change of plans for many apartment residents who had been working toward home ownership. Flash forward two years after the onset of the pandemic, and renters are still choosing to remain in their apartments. But as vacancy rates continue to drop, it’s important to stay a few steps ahead.
Property managers and apartment marketers should continue connecting with prospective renters with the goal of converting apartment leads to lease-signing residents. A robust apartment lead generation strategy means property managers will spend less time chasing prospects who aren’t serious about renting and more time pursuing those who are.
In this post, we’ll take a look at how apartment operators can use time-tested apartment lead generation strategies to keep occupancy high and the bottom line strong now and in the months ahead.
1. Apartment Chatbots
In Multifamily marketing, apartment chatbots can be a powerful lead generation tool. During COVID, chatbots have transformed from an emerging trend to a business necessity as leasing offices deal with fewer on-site staff to answer prospects’ questions.
Some apartment chatbots provide transcripts of all bot-prospect conversations, allowing human leasing agents to follow up and focus their sales outreach efforts on users who’ve shown an interest in their apartment community. Good chatbots can also nudge a prospect down the funnel by helping them schedule an apartment tour or apply for a lease.
2. Apartment Paid Search Advertising
The beauty of apartment paid search is that it’s very targeted, so your apartment ads are triggered only when a user types certain terms into a search engine. For example, an apartment community in Philadelphia could bid to reach users who type “apartments in Philadelphia” into Google. The apartment ads are displayed above organic search results, and you only pay when people click on your ads.
Once your apartment Google Ads campaign is set up, it can start sending targeted traffic to your apartment website right away, unlike other lead generation methods, including SEO, which can take time to ramp up.
It’s no surprise that 2020 has caused a shift in how some apartment marketers are approaching paid search in response to changes in work and moving habits of prospects. Read more about that here.
3. Apartment Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Simply having an apartment website isn’t enough when it comes to apartment lead generation. You have to make sure users can find your site in the vast landscape of the internet, and one of the best ways to do this is through apartment SEO.
SEO refers to the process of improving your website to make it easily discoverable by people who are most interested in your content. Apartment websites with strong SEO will rank higher in search results for targeted keywords.
An easy place to start with apartment SEO is to identify the keywords that people use when searching for your apartment community. Then you can add those terms into the content, page titles and other locations on your apartment website.
Apartment SEO is a reliable way to reach prospects, but it could take months to deliver results due to numerous factors, including search engine algorithms, the relevance of your content to your keywords, your apartment website design, your social media activity, and more.
4. Apartment Social Media
When it comes to apartment lead generation on social media, keep in mind that it’s a pay to play situation. Apartment social media marketing can be split into two key elements: organic social and paid social. Organic refers to posts published on a page and paid refers to Facebook’s advertising capabilities.
Facebook switched to its current approach starting in 2017 that emphasizes interactions between family and friends, which has weakened the reach of organic content posted by businesses. So, apartment communities and other businesses had to adjust their apartment marketing strategies to focus on apartment ads in order to build awareness, increase apartment website traffic and drive conversions.
This doesn’t mean you should forget about your apartment Facebook and Instagram pages. Having meaningful interactions with current residents and prospects can help to build community, but apartment advertising is the way to go when it comes to generating serious apartment leads.
Be prepared for anything
The pandemic taught us that it’s hard to predict what the future will bring. So staying a few paces ahead is smart when it comes to apartment lead generation. If you use the strategies we’ve outlined in this post, you should have a strong pipeline of prospects that will help you navigate any uncertainties in the future.
Since 2002, Respage has helped over 10,000 properties with apartment marketing and lead generation. With our 18+ years serving Multifamily clients, we have developed considerable Multifamily marketing expertise.
If you want to learn more, click the button below to see how Respage can help your multifamily marketing strategy.
