7 Simple Way to Up your Advertising Game

It's time to up our game in my rental market.  Rents are leveling off and ad volume is increasing.  Here are 7 simple ways I'm upping my marketing game. 

1. Professional photos

1. Potential tenants are looking for amenities, and photos showing them off.  Put your best foot forward and invest in professional photos.  In my market, it costs about $250 to fully photograph a 2-bedroom unit, inside and out.  3 ways to make the most of professional photos.

• Photograph the unit empty.
  

I don't photograph occupied units since 1) they're typically a mess; and 2) you can't utilize virtual staging (see tip #2 below).  Get ahead of the game on your next vacancy and schedule a photographer after all maintenance, repairs, and cleaning is complete.  

• Get ahead of the game.  

When you have professional photos completed, store them for use on your next turn-over.  When you get notice, you can start advertising immediately. 

• Edit!

You will receive dozens of photos from your photographer.  Pick the best photos and post those.  No one needs to see the same bathroom from 4 different angles, the hallway, or an empty bedroom corner.  

2. Virtual staging

An empty room excites no one.  Many professional photographers will provide virtual staging as an add-on to their photo services.  This costs about $50 per room.  I typically do the living/dining room/kitchen (hopefully you can leverage one photo to show more than one space), and one bedroom. 

3. Floor plan lay-outs

My property manager loves these since it gives prospective tenants an idea of the floor plan, and overall size.  No more questions about room dimensions, or if my such-and-such will fit.  Quick tip: if you have had flooring recently installed, get room dimensions for your flooring company.  Or, invest in a laser measure for quick and easy room measurements. 

There are many free, online lay out tools available.  

4. QR Codes

Use a QR code to quickly direct someone to your listing's website, or other information.   By using an on-line QR generator, you can print a QR code in any size onto a label that can then be put onto your on-site "For Rent" sign.  

5. a la Carte Pricing

I don't personally like the approach of advertising a "base" rental rate with mandatory add-ons like utilities, parking, etc.  This doesn't feel honest.  However, consumers are driven by price, and as shown by the airline industry, consumers will always look to the lowest advertised price first and consider the total price later.  If my market norm shifts to a la carte pricing we may be forced to follow. 

6. Headlining

When you read the news, how much do you actually read?  If you're like most people, you look at the photo, headline, and sub headline, and go no further.  These are the same three most valuable spaces to advertise your rental, so use them wisely!

• Photos.  

After you've gotten your beautiful professional photos, choose the most appealing photo to headline.  Which one of these ads would you click on first? 

• Headline.  

I recently saw a rental ad with the following title:

Deadbolt entry and good carpeting in one-bedroom apartment

Really?  The most redeeming feature of your rental is that it has a deadbolt and "good" carpeting?  

Spend some time thinking about the values of your target market, and what your rental has to offer.  Pick one or two of those features to headline.  A better headline for the marginal unit referenced above might be:

Safe and cozy one bedroom, affordable and available!

• Prioritze.
  

People can only remember three items in a list, on average.  That's why restaurants only have three specials - any more and you won't remember what they are.  

If you or your property manager is using a program like AppFolio, your rental listing will have many details.  However, don't lead with things like "range", or "wood flooring" in your listing information.  These items are either standard and/or required, or are obvious from the photos.  These details should be skipped or put at the bottom of the ad. 

Fill those most valuable initial details with the less obvious and valuable items like "in-unit, free laundry", "on-site secured parking", or "pet-friendly" are better uses of your first bullet points. 

7. Timing

There are known days and times that your online rental ad will garner the most traffic.

In my market Craigslist is still the number one traffic generator by far.  In looking around the internet, people who study this type of thing largely agree your ad will get the most traffic by going live on:

• Monday
  

I was surprised by this.  I would have guessed late in the week as people are planning for the weekend.  While the response between weekdays wasn't largely different, you definitely want to avoid the weekend when ad views are lowest. 

• Between 4 and 6pm

Again, I totally guessed wrong on this one - I would think morning is best.  But, most ads are viewed after working hours.  

Secret tip: this doesn't apply to blogs.  The golden hour here is Monday at 11am EST.

What are you doing to up your marketing game?