Over the last 20 years, social media has taken its place as the leader of all marketing. Whether a photo platform like Instagram, a video platform like TikTok, or even a microblogging platform like Twitter, social media offers an idea to its audience about what they want, often without the audience’s knowledge. However, social media is no longer an outlet for random and thoughtless media; marketing through social media takes consideration and care. This may be why Property Management often leaves social media in the dust. Property Managers struggle to find time for social media and often express difficulty in consistent, creative content. However, with some principal rules, and some creative freedom, property managers will find that social media is any industry’s game and helps with resident growth.
Rule 1: Find your Target Audience
When you begin establishing your social media, the most important thing you can do is understand who you are speaking to. For property management, this means finding what age group, what income level, what marital status, etc. your current and desired residency falls under. There more you can know about your audience, the better you can speak to their desires and what will show them that your property is the place to be.
Rule 2: Establish your Brand
This should come as no surprise; your brand should be clear as day throughout your social media. Your properties should have their logos, colors, and even font present on their platforms, to the point that the audience could identify the company both online and offline. Putting a small logo on your photos and videos is sometimes all you need, and other times, a graphic following your colors and font is the perfect addition. For each post, you may need to decide what works best, however try to always have your brand visible. Not only will it help identify your posts as the move through the feed, but the consistency of the branding will stick with the audience more and more over time, so that they find themselves considering your property when they need a new place or are giving a recommendation to a friend.
Rule 3: Be Consistent
Consistency is important, not only with branding, but with the overall rate of posting, and sometimes even what you are posting. If it helps, make a schedule of how often you can post. It can be as little as twice a month, but in most cases, once a week will bring the most success to your company. Consistency in content will come from what you want to show off most in your property. If you want to show off the property, then many of your posts can be photos of the amenities and rooms. If you want to show off your events, then post live content and event recaps. Show off your staff with Employee spotlights, ot content of office work. Every property should be posting a little bit of everything, if possible, but make sure that the most important property qualities are highlighted the most. When you have some consistency to evaluate, look through and see which posts are the most successful and determine what adjustments need to be made through them.
Rule 4: Get your Residents to do the work
Whenever possible, incentivize your residents to follow you, share your page, tag your property, etc. You will find the best way to do this for your property, but you can start with a giveaway – offer to enter a resident’s name if they follow you or post a photo from your property and tag you, or something that would link their followers to you. Another way to get your residents involved is to have your posts include them – reach out to some residents and ask if you can photograph/film them with a quote about their experience at your property and tag them with their permission. Their involvement on your page in addition to the chance to share their thoughts will help the residents feel like they are part of a caring community.
Rule 5: Add Videos
When TikTok started gaining height popularity in 2018, the social media game had a whole new avenue of content thriving for the viral world. Video content has become a key to media marketing both as people and as a business. The hard part, for most businesses, is knowing what videos to make. Aesthetically pleasing videos are always a good content option. For property management, this looks like unit/property tours, or showing off amenities through clean and silent videos with medium bpm music. These videos should bring romanticism and desire for a beautiful living situation. Alternatively, if you want a more relaxed and fun perception of your property, you’ll need to give your staff some exploration freedom. The “fun” and “upbeat” video content is constantly evolving and will offer great value if you are paying attention. Let your staff take control by being the stars of these videos and using inspiration from what the hottest trends are now. Of course, you should hold them to certain guidelines about how you want your brand to be viewed, but once established, let your staff make videos that they would enjoy making. Many of today’s trends gain popularity because they show people enjoying their time and being their authentic selves, so allow your staff to do the same.
Social media is a great marketing avenue and can be done right from your office. Following these rules is a great way to start that social marketing journey as they aim to increase resident growth and bring in more residents. Every property will have its own style, their own content and their own successes and that is ok. It’s important to keep up with it and keep looking for new ideas.
