MMB Blog

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Is your marketing budget gone but you still want to celebrate all of the year-end holidays with a bang?! Here’s a list of 5 inexpensive ways to throw the most amazing holiday events this year:

Follow these steps for the least amount of spend for the most amount of fun!

  1. Host a Hot Cocoa Bar with all of the fixings: sprinkles, marshmallows, syrup, candy canes, and anything else you can think of. Bring out all of your holiday mugs so they can all enjoy the experience. Each of these items can be purchased at your local store for around $1 for an entire package!
  2. Create a beautiful invitation on your computer and e-mail it with a list of Christmas Carols and the words for each song. Meet at the office or a central location and spend the evening having the least expensive event of the year! Hey, throw in some caffeine and sing the night away! Coffee houses offer a traveling carafe for under $20.
  3. Host a philanthropic event such as a sock, toy, and/or food drive. If you sign up with a well known brand, a lot of times they will provide you with free barrels and advertising materials.
  4. Do you happen to have a maintenance guy or friend who will be willing to dress up as Santa? Host a Santa “Meet & Greet” for the kiddos and offer pictures using your cell phone. Most phones these days take amazing photos and there are apps to help you edit the imperfections out. Try a few out in advance to find your favorite. Lastly, post the pictures to your social channels and have all the participants tag themselves!
  5. Host a scavenger hunt to find ingredients at neighbors’ homes to create some type of desert at the office— cookies and brownies are pretty easy. The winners get to hang-out while the losing team has to create the treat for everyone.

Don’t forget to invite everyone you know, not just the residents… The more, the merrier!

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Roll Out The Furry Red Carpet!

Black and white cat in a tshirt laying on the red carpet

According to the 2020 American Veterinary Medical Association pet ownership survey, most Americans consider their pets to be family members, and this trend will continue. For dogs, the number is expected to rise from 86% to nearly 96%, and for cats, from 80% to 84% by 2030! Not to mention, the number of multifamily properties with pets are currently more than double the number of those with kids. If a community is not pet-friendly, they lose half their potential renters. So, let’s use these numbers to our advantage and pamper these pets and make their parents (aka owners) happy.

Offer Pet Concierge: 

For pet owners who spend most of their day working, a multifamily property that provides in-home services like pet sitting, dog walking, training, feeding, or grooming for dogs (and cats) is a great amenity to provide. 

Negotiate Pet Care Service:

You could partner with your local VCA Animal Hospital as an amenity for residents. Some perks could include a first free wellness exam, 10% off veterinary services, and home delivery of pet food and medication. 

Create a Digital Pet File:

Okay, so we know we are all tired of creating and utilizing new spreadsheets so let’s go about this a different way. Let’s ask our Leasing Consultants to work on creating a digital file on their slow days/season (perhaps Sundays or winter) of all the community pets to include their pet unit number, application, picture, favorite treat, birthdate and whatever other fun details you can think of.

Engage in Pet Experiences:

Now, with this new information at your fingertips from the digital pet file, future marketing will be super easy! You could host monthly pet birthday parties or send them their favorite snack on their special day.

Oh, and we’re not stopping there… (Be sure to check with management first) Don’t just “wow” the prospective resident with fridge treats, “wow” them by inviting them to bring their pet on the property tour and keeping treats in the model for them and stopping by all the pet friendly amenities!

The opportunities are all out there for you to grab!

Now, here are some great ways to market your pet friendliness –

Ask MMB to Include them in your Virtual Staging Images: Make sure to include a food bowl, a pet bed, or toys somewhere in the home.

Run Social Advertising Ads: Target ads to pet-owners using pet-centric photos and if your budget allows, use tools from the social platform to target this specific demographic.

BYOB: Okay so most of us have heard of “Yappy Hour”, so play on that similar concept by changing “BYOB” to “Bring Your Own Buddy” and allow prospective residents to bring their pets with them to an Open House. Be sure to spell out the acronym in all advertising to avoid any confusion. “Wink, Wink”!

Post Pictures of Pets on Social Media: Businesses that use pet photos in their content see an increase of 295% overall engagement, with an 89% increase in comments and 15% increase in likes.

Run Pet Contests: Residents and prospective residents can participate in giveaways such as a photo contest to promote awareness of your pet-friendly community.

Partner with a Pet-Influencer: You will find new reach when promoting to an area untouched by your typical efforts.

Email Pet Ad Campaigns: Create outgoing follow-up e-blasts for prospective residents that have pets and you can take it a step further by creating lease renewal e-blasts offering a pet-centric renewal offer. For example, offer a carpet clean with pet deodorizer, pet door, and/or a pet first-aid kit.

Be fun and engaging: Humorous and relatable content goes a long way in retaining customers and creating a brand people trust.

Don’t Forget: Make sure to include pets in your branding – include pets in any manner that you are able to. Include them in social media posits, your website, in your collateral, Tik Tok videos— the sky is the limit!

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The Sales & Marketing Funnel

man in black suit jacket sitting beside a couple

What’s a Marketing Funnel, what are the different parts, and how do you measure if it is working?

The sales or marketing funnel is a set of processes that a prospect/customer takes, guided by the marketer, to become a customer/repeat customer.

At a high-level, the acronym “AIDA” represents the different steps to the funnel:

A.I.D.A.

Awareness: Make the prospective client “aware” of the product

Interest: As the prospect moves down the funnel, catch the “interest” on how your offering could solve their problems and fulfill their needs

Desire: At this part of the funnel, the client has decided this product will meet their needs.

Action: At the end of the funnel is where the client decides to make the purchase or not.

  1. A.I.D.A.

To measure the funnel is working you could use the following metrics to measure this: 

Customer lifetime value 

Cost per acquisition/lead 

Close rate per channel (referrals, website, SM, etc.)

Progression and the conversion rate (As the customer/client moves through the funnel this would be the result of the conversion ratio).

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New Build-to-Rent Single Family Homes in Demand

house being built

The concept of building real estate to rent has been around for quite some time.

However, building new single-family homes for the sole purpose of renting is something new and enticing. Real estate investors and developers are jumping to the opportunity created by housing shortages and to fill the increasing economic demand for build-to-rent single-family homes

During an interview with CNBC in 2019, the executive vice president of SVN/SFRhub Advisors described how much money is ready to be deployed into build-to-rent housing: “We’ve got clients, multiple, well over a couple of billion dollars-worth of capital looking to place in this space.”

Over the next few years, SVN plans to acquire up to 6,000 single-family and build-to-rent homes for its clients. SVN isn’t the only company doing this. Toll Brothers announced a “$60 million joint venture to form a build-to-rent company, according to CNBC in 2019. Additionally, Lennar is experimenting with build to rent communities.” 

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Influencer Marketing Should be at the Top of Your List

Man behind camera

Influencer Marketing will become commonplace as SEO or any other marketing tool. In 2022, even above short-form video marketing, 34% of marketing professionals plan to invest in influencer marketing. Also, out of the 57% that already use influencers and believe in its effectiveness, 46% of them plan to increase investments in 2022.

How have influencers become such a widely used marketing tool? Well, influencers often know what they are doing on the platform they are engaged on. They already have followers that find the information they provide as valuable and have become masters at their craft. Think about it, have you ever wanted to know about the reviews on a website, are they actually true? How about this… you are scrolling through your social media feed and find a video of someone credible (instead of just some angrily written essay, or a few adjectives based off a promotion of 50% if they left a review). In addition to the credibility, they just bought that new water bottle you wanted to know more about, they have a quirky-yet engaging personality, mix in some catchy music in the background and “Voilà!”, you are now sending a request to follow them on Instagram and looking for more endorsements!

If you are interested in trying out an influencer in your own industry, start with a micro-influencer. These social media promoters typically have a following of thousands to tens of thousands (which isn’t too shabby). They usually are part of a specific niche of thought leaders and because they are everyday people their following is more likely to trust their opinions and recommendations.