How Localized Ads Can Boost Your Property’s Visibility Online to Win More Leases

In today’s digital world, it can be hard to break through the noise. With organic reach on the decline, many multi-location marketers are turning to localized advertising. As a property management company, you can increase your property’s visibility and ultimately win more leases through the use of social ads. Localized advertising targets local audiences based on proximity and interests and includes a customized message to resonate. With the increasing need of providing a customized, local experience for consumers, localized social advertising is a must for your multi-family business.

Localized Advertising Campaigns

There are a variety of advertising campaigns that your property management company can test to see which is most effective when engaging your target audience. Using location-specific targeting with any of the following campaigns will boost relevance for your audience.

Pay-per-Click Campaigns

Pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns are common when it comes to advertising on both search and social platforms. A PPC campaign only spends money when your advertisement is clicked. For instance, if you create a PPC campaign on Google, your ad will appear in relevant search results. You will only pay though if someone clicks on your ad - views are free. If you’re having difficulty deciding where you should spend your money on PPC campaigns, consider these platforms:

Facebook
Yelp
Google
Twitter
Instagram
LinkedIn

It might seem like the obvious option to use a PPC campaign when planning out your marketing strategy, but there are a few things to consider. While PPC campaigns only cost money when someone clicks on your ad, converting users from your ad to signing a lease can be a lengthy process, which can lead to many clicks from the same potential resident. In addition, you must ensure that the targeting options on your campaign are reaching the correct audience. Many industry keywords for apartment-related searches can be pricey, so being selective on the audience and the area can help cut down on some costs. When setting up PPC campaigns you can select your target audience for the campaign based on age, gender, location, demographics, and more! Location is key. If you’re promoting an apartment complex in Austin, TX you want to make sure that the audience that is seeing your ad lives in the area.

Remarketing Campaigns

Remarketing campaigns are also a great way to target potential residents and win more leases. You have probably been on the receiving end of remarketing campaigns more often than you realize. Have you ever searched a certain property online and then started receiving ads about the same property? If so, that’s an example of a remarketing campaign working its magic. Remarketing campaigns are used to show ads to people who have visited your website or social pages. Remarketing campaigns are easy to set up. Google allows you to create remarketing campaigns that can run across multiple websites. When using remarketing on Google, you can also choose the audiences based on location. Facebook and Twitter have similar retargeting options. While you can target based on location, it’s important to remember that you are also targeting people who have already seen your content. Data has found that remarketing conversion rates increase over time. The more times a potential resident sees an ad in a remarketing campaign, the more likely they are to convert.

Boosted Content

If your property management company hasn’t tested localized advertising campaigns yet, boosted content is a great way to get your feet wet. Boosting a post doesn’t require setting up an entire campaign. Through boosted posts, you have the ability to put money behind specific content that is already performing well organically and further increase its reach. While boosted posts aren’t yet available on platforms such as Google My Business (GMB) or Yelp, it does look like it will be an option in the near future. Platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram already have boosting features available. After selecting which type of content you want to boost, you can then choose the target audience. For instance, if your post is highlighting a leasing special at a specific property location, you can set the target audience to ensure that the boosted post is only being shown to those located around a radius of the property.

Display Ads

With display advertising, you attract the audiences of a website, social media, or other digital mediums to take a specific action. Display ads can promote your multi-family business through localized imagery when people are browsing online or scrolling through social media. If you’ve ever been on a website and a visual ad pops up at the top or right-hand side of the page, that’s a display ad. Display ads also appear similarly when you’re on a social platform. The beauty of display ads is that you can customize your imagery, copy, and targeting to more efficiently engage with local audiences. For instance, if you’re running a campaign in New York, your display ad might contain an iconic image of New York or a property located in the city. Local and customized imagery showcasing the local properties or communities tends to resonate better among local audiences when compared to a generic stock image of an apartment complex. Most display ads are charged on a cost-per-click basis, similar to the PPC campaigns mentioned above. Display ads can also be used for remarketing campaigns. It’s clear that display ads can be versatile - coming in many shapes and sizes - and should test imagery and copy based on location.

Tracking your Success

Whether you’ve decided to incorporate PPC, remarketing, boosted content, or display ads into your strategy, it’s important to be able to measure your success. Before launching your campaigns, you must decide what goals you have, what metrics to track, and what would make your campaigns successful. Are you wanting to increase community visibility of new or recently acquired properties? Are there a certain number of leases that you want as a result of your campaign? Once you have an idea of what would be considered a successful campaign, you can start tracking its progress and make optimizations along the way. Most platforms have the capability to track the success of your campaigns natively. For instance, Facebook has Facebook Business Manager, which will provide you with information on your campaign’s performance like cost per lead, cost per click, number of impressions, and more! Platforms like GMB, Twitter, and LinkedIn provide similar options.

Start Winning More Leases

Once you determine which types of campaigns work best for your property’s localized marketing strategy you will be on the path to winning more leases. While localized ads can boost your property’s visibility online, there are other tactics that should be incorporated into your marketing strategy as well. To manage your social content, reviews, and ads across 100s or 1,000s of properties on a single platform - SOCi can help! SOCi is the only platform built to address the three critical areas of localized marketing. For more information on how SOCi can help your property management company manage all of its properties and win more leases, request a demo today!