Apartment Marketers, How are your Craig’s List Ad’s performing?
Perhaps a better question would be, How do you know if your Craigs List Ad’s are performing?
At The Urbane Way we are big believers that there is a direct correlation between our web site traffic and physical traffic, or Guest Cards, which is how most apartment marketers gauge leasing leads. We have determined that in order to sustain occupancy in the 98% plus range for our fourteen community portfolio we need to drive (10,000) unique visitors a month to our UrbaneApts.com web site.
All Craig’s List Ads Are Not Created Equal
Our on line magazine create the most buzz for us and keeps us ranking high in local apartment searches. However, Craigs List is our our #3 driver of good quality traffic to our web site.
There are several schools of thought about “how to” create effective Craigs List Ads, but one thing is for certain, they DO NOT all perform the same. We have not had good luck with any of the template sites. The ads look really cool, but are not effective.
What Works Best
What seems to deliver the highest result is an organic based ad with clever copy and good photos. We typically post six to eight ads in the AM and again in the PM, seven days a week. In the last thirty days that effort has garnished over (3,000) unique visitors to our web site, making Carig’s List our 3rd highest yielding leasing lead resource.
What is your best practice Craig’s List tip, we would love to hear what is working best for you.
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 inEntrepreneur Magazine and Business Week Magazine
Eric Brown
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 Urbane Media, 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 Urbane_Media on Twitter. Eric also writes regular articles for the following publications; Multi Housing News Social Media Examiner Search Engine Guide
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Eric we have noticed this very same thing. No templates, some pics… good solid title; that’s what works best. We played around with including a link to our website in the ad and sometimes have removed it. When it’s in our web traffic goes up exponentially. The con with this approach, for us, has been that the phone rings less. Phone calls are typically better converters.
Eric, how many units are represented in the 14 communities?
Hi Patty,
We do Craigs List Ads for about 7,000 units all totaled,
We have noticed that posts made between 7 and 11 pm in the evenings on Avg get more than double the page views and click throughs to our website than ads posted during daytime hours!