WHAT! NOT TOURING WITH THE PROSPECT, YOU CAN’T DO THAT!
Well, we are, we are sending prospects out on their own to tour our apartments. In our trek to enhance the concept of a Centralized Leasing Center at Urbane, we are testing a new way to tour apartments and we have coined it “GO SOLO”. It works like this; The prospect meets at Urbane Underground first to go over their living space needs. For folks who have never experienced the Urbane Underground it is pretty “Interesting and Entertaining” and sets the tone for a fun encounter.
PROVIDE FREEDOM AND CONTROL
Urbane will undoubtedly be criticized by some folks for this new approach, however from our initial feedback, the prospects LOVE THE FREEDOM AND CONTROL. We are only a few weeks into this process, but several interesting things are being to surface. We needed to make the process super easy to follow, and we have. It needed to be fun and entertaining, which it seems to be. But most of all, it needed, must, absolutely had to provide Value for the Prospect. Based on our Net Rental Numbers, It has!
THERE ARE BENEFITS TO GOING ALONE
This isn’t a new idea. The car dealers stopped riding around with you for a test drive years ago. Then, the test drive turned into; Take the car for the afternoon! Why is that? Salespeople get in the way and it is uncomfortable. Going Alone allows the prospect to sit on the floor. Come back later in the day, or the next day. Bring over a friend, their mom or dad, boyfriend or girlfriend. They can measure for furniture, and just plain “test” the new space they will be calling home soon.
MORE BENEFITS
While we are still figuring out more and better ways to smooth out and Enhance the Leasing Experience for our Urbane Prospects, there are inherent benefits for us too. We have reduced staff. Our cost per lease has gone down. The amount of tours we can do has gone up. The amount of time the leasing consultant has to do quality follow up has gone up.
We will keep you posted of the progress, success and challenges encountered.
Eric’s background is rooted in the rental and real estate industries. He founded metro Detroit’s Urbane Apartments in 2003, after serving as senior vice president for a major Midwest apartment developer. He established a proven track record of effectively repositioning existing rental properties in a way that added value for investors while enhancing the resident experience.
He also established The Urbane Way, a social media marketing and PR laboratory, where innovative marketing ideas are tested. Eric has been featured in Entrepreneur Magazine and Business Week Magazine.
You can connect with Eric_Urbane on Twitter.
Eric also writes regular articles for the following publications;
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