9 Seconds to Grab Your Prospect's Attention...3 Tips to Make it Happen
Q: “Barbara, I've attended several courses that you presented at NAA. I have a question for you. With competition being so fierce, do you have any quick tips on best practices when it comes to marketing? Best, Sarah from Indiana."
Home is Where the Heart Is
I think one of the biggest factors is not forgetting what we really do in multifamily housing. I hear people say all the time, "We rent apartments." The reality is, that’s the end result of our efforts. Truly successful leasing professionals help people find their homes. Homes are the most intimate place of people's lives. It's where they make memories, it's where they raise families. During good or bad times, home is the backdrop of life.
We have the enormous privilege of helping people find their new home. Every interaction with our residents, not just marketing, but our customer service, our maintenance, every resident touchpoint stays focused on that fact. We are in the business of making people feel at home.
Emotions Drive Our Renters Buying Decisions
Now, when it comes to marketing your apartment homes, there are a few things to remember.
The key is to pull at your prospects’ heartstrings. Everybody has different heartstrings, but it's emotions that drive buying decisions. For some, it’s their children, their pets, or their careers that motivate them.
When people feel drawn to your marketing's emotional factor AND your apartment community helps facilitate their lifestyle, that’s when we’ve made an emotional connection. When you look at your competition, most of them have very cold, disconnected marketing. It’s focuses on features and amenities...BORING! So for us to stand out, it's all about connecting with our prospective renter. Look at your core demographic. What's important to them? Then deliver on that experience through your marketing efforts.
The Formula for Being Memorable with Your Marketing Efforts
Here is the secret sauce:
Combine a powerful image with a simple, but memorable tagline. This powerful combo helps expand people's bandwidth. It draws them in and makes you stand out. Check out how IKEA does this in their marketing campaign to the right. (Less words, more image...and BAM!)
At Sprout Marketing, we love incorporating this formula into our marketing and retention designs that we offer our members. Here's one example of a campaign that uses imagery that pulls at the heartstrings with memorable taglines. This helps prospects connect and remember.
Your Renters Have the Attention Span of a Goldfish...GULP!
Be quick at getting them engaged because attention spans are shrinking. In 1920, the average attention span was 20 minutes. Today, it's about nine seconds, which is the same as a goldfish. Literally, our prospects are goldfish and we have to get their attention before the goldfish (prospect) swims away. Again, that's why emotional marketing is key.
People notice and stick around for whatever interests them personally.
Here’s a quick recap:
Keep in mind that we help people find their homes, a super intimate part of their lives.
Ditch generic marketing and stick to emotional marketing by pulling at the 💚strings.
Be memorable: Powerful Image + Memorable Tagline = Marketing Gold
These are a few tips that are easy to implement when competition is intense. Keep these core principles in mind to ensure your marketing is going to stand out as unique.
Sarah, if you do that, we promise your goldfish won’t swim away to competitive waters. Go get 'em, girl!
Have a question that you would like answered by Barbara Savona? Email barbara@watchyourbusinesssprout.com.