5 Creative Apartment Marketing Ideas to Attract More Renters

The last couple of years have been all about adapting, evolving, and finding new solutions when it comes to how we market apartment communities. While the world has gone digital for quite some time, it wasn’t until the pandemic that remote lifestyles became more normalized. Today’s generation of renters is different from any generation of renters before them and we have access to insightful data on their buying habits and what they want from a rental unit. Let’s dive into 5 apartment marketing ideas that will strengthen your apartment marketing efforts from SEO to creative social media content.

Our 5 Apartment Marketing Ideas

You can use this list to navigate our list of creative ideas to boost your apartment marketing:

  1. Optimize Your Local SEO to Unleash Your Organic Presence
  2. Craft a Memorable Apartment Website
  3. Leverage Social Media Content and Advertising
  4. Create An Exceptional Experience with Your Apartment Tour
  5. Use Marketing Automation and Personalization for Smarter Leasing

#1 Optimize Your Local SEO to Unleash Your Organic Presence

You need your apartment community to show up on the first page of Google. In order to do this, you need to lock down an apartment local SEO strategy. SEO, or search engine optimization, is the practice of finding what keywords and phrases your target audience is using when they search on Google or other search engines. Knowing these keywords allows you to add them to the copy on your multifamily property websites so your sites get ranked higher on search results. We all know how important it is to be on the first page of results. These websites get more visibility and let’s be honest, how many times have you gone to the second or third page on Google?

LocalIQ conducted a study of renters and found that 93% of respondents used a search engine when looking for their next lease. 80% of respondents in the same study noted that they actually would visit three or more property websites before deciding which ones to visit in person. This shows that it’s important to be ranked higher up in searches when 4 out of 5 renters will look at multiple property websites.

Local SEO needs to be prioritized in your marketing strategy and one of the first steps you might want to take is claiming your Google Business Profile (formerly Google My Business). There are SEO strategy agencies that can help you or you could have someone dedicated to this by using SEO tools like Moz or SEMRush.

#2 Craft a Memorable Apartment Website

Once you’ve got your apartment SEO down, you need to have a property website that’s engaging and set up to collect insightful data on the prospect. There are a lot of fun marketing ideas for apartments that talk about social media, which is important and we will touch on, but another important and creative marketing idea is blogging.

Illustration of woman working on laptop showcases how these apartment marketing ideas have a digital focus

Creating and maintaining blog posts can be a lot of work but it’s worth it. According to LocalIQ’s study, businesses with blogs have 55% more online visitors than those that don’t. Writing blogs will allow you to have more places to add keywords to the copy of your website page helping boost your search visibility. There are lots of things you can write about as a property:

  • A Move-in/Move-out Guide
  • Decorating tips for specific floor plans
  • How to put in maintenance requests and what to expect from them
  • Renter-friendly storage ideas and DIYs
  • Recap of resident events
  • Local business reviews

There’s a plethora of ideas you can explore for your blog posts. If you want to go the extra mile, you can also create guest posts on local blogs to expand your reach and obtain new links to your website, which can help it increase its web authority and reliability.

This is great not just for prospects but for residents as well. Creating a neighborhood/city guide will position your property website as the hub of information for what’s in your local neighborhood. When renters sign a lease with your community, they are also committing to the neighborhood. They want to know what life is like there and if it fits their needs — whether it’s vibrant nightlife or a quiet community, this impacts renters’ decisions too.

#3 Leverage Social Media Content and Advertising

Apartment-related content has over a billion views collectively on YouTube and TikTok. That’s why social media marketing is probably one of those apartment marketing ideas you can’t skip in your strategy. A study conducted by BusinessDIT revealed that, in America, 71% of small to medium-sized businesses use social media for their marketing efforts.

Getting your property in these tags will help you meet today’s renters where they are online. A lot of fun marketing ideas for apartments include Facebook contests, but let’s be honest, Gen Z don’t care for Facebook. A lot of them don’t even have an account.

While it’s important to keep a Facebook presence, social media marketing for apartments tends to be focused on Instagram and TikTok. Luckily with Instagram, you can easily share your posts on Facebook too so you don’t have to waste energy keeping your Facebook active.

Tick Tock logo

When it comes to TikTok, a lot of the ideas of things you can blog about can easily be transformed into video content. Stay up to date on what the trending tags and sounds are as this is how you will be found.

Even if some of the trending hashtags don’t relate to what you are posting or relate to apartments in general, the way the TikTok algorithm works is based on adding those tags as well as #foryoupage and #fyp in order for your video to show up on renters’ feeds. Some ideas of posts, which can be done on both Instagram and TikTok include:

  • Pet of the month
  • Meet a member of the onsite team
  • Move-in/Move-out tips
  • Resident Event vlogs/recap posts
  • Local business review

Apartment marketing needs to be more creative in order to get the attention of Gen Z renters. They will look at your competitors before making a decision so you need to make sure you stand out and really show how your community can be their future home.

#4 Create An Exceptional Experience with Your Apartment Tour

Apartment tours are a real opportunity to create a lasting impression. From the moment a potential renter lands on your website or apartment listing, you need to stand out from the crowd. Using PERQ’s AI tour manager and scheduler you can simplify the tour experience for both the renter and the property manager, for example. Your potential renters will be able to schedule a virtual apartment tour or a visit to the property at their convenience. You don’t have to get your leasing agents or property managers involved until your leads are ready to take that step.

Combining this with smart technologies like our multifamily chatbot can reduce waiting times and create an exceptional experience for your renters. But that’s only the first step of this exciting journey. Hosting open houses has evolved beyond the mere showcasing of physical spaces; it now involves crafting real experiences that leave a remarkable first impression on visitors. To truly excel in the competitive arena of real estate, property managers should consider the journey of their prospective tenants as more than just a walkthrough. It’s an opportunity to captivate, connect, and inspire.

Before you start an apartment tour, make sure you have all the apartment information at hand, learn about the neighborhood, apartment amenities and other exciting perks of the apartment complex. You will also want to think empathically to identify how these things connect with the lifestyle and interests of your potential renters. Thinking strategically and using smart marketing tactics can help you showcase what’s important to a prospective renter.

Now that you are prepared, it’s showtime! Start with a warm welcome, personalizing each interaction. Share the story of the space, highlighting its unique features and the lifestyle it offers. Incorporate interactive elements like mini activities or highlighting community amenities to engage visitors. Appeal to their senses with music, scents, and a well-lit atmosphere. Encourage questions and conversations throughout the tour to tailor your pitch.

By weaving storytelling into the tour, property managers can paint a vivid picture of what life could be like in the space. Crafting engaging activities and exploring community amenities during the tour will further enhance the experience, allowing visitors to envision a vibrant and aspirational lifestyle that goes in line with their needs. During the journey, encourage meaningful conversations and address questions in a personable manner to build trust and create an engaging experience. In this way, property managers can transform a routine apartment viewing into an exceptional and memorable encounter, setting their listings apart in the competitive landscape of real estate marketing.

#5 Use Marketing Automation and Personalization for Smarter Leasing

PERQ's chatbot using a checklist for marketing automation

In the modern world of real estate, property managers are harnessing the power of marketing automation for multifamily properties to streamline their leasing efforts and cater to the diverse needs of potential renters. This is one of those apartment marketing ideas you will probably not come across very often, but it is an innovative approach that enhances efficiency and offers a tailored experience that can make a huge difference in securing leases.

Understanding the value of your campaigns and becoming smarter about your audience can be a game changer for your apartment lead-to-lease conversion. There are several marketing automation solutions that can help with that and we’ve seen how many of our clients get up to three times more qualified leads and leases when these systems are in place.

In this article, we’ve explained what is personalization and why it’s becoming a crucial aspect of multifamily marketing. Personalization isn’t as simple as it sounds. The nurturing process has different layers of complexity, for instance, renters want properties to balance their communications and avoid spamming. Today’s renters want to talk to a person when they’re ready. PERQ installs on a property website to serve interactive and personalized experiences. This type of automated and personalized experience nurtures leads until they’re agent-ready. All the data gathered through the journey is shared with the leasing agent, who can personalize the renters’ journey even further by leveraging various insights and valuable information.

Marketing automation empowers property managers to engage with potential renters at every stage of their journey, from initial inquiry to lease signing. By leveraging data and analytics, personalized communication can be automated, ensuring that each interaction feels relevant and timely. Whether it’s sending customized property recommendations, delivering informative content, or promptly addressing inquiries, this technology allows property managers to provide the personalized touch that today’s renters expect.