Is 25% penetration for social media-based apartment marketing good?

Just got a press release from Apartments.com, which had the following note:

The survey results revealed 71 percent of Apartments.com visitors are active on social media, but only a quarter use it during their apartment search.

I find it odd that they used the term "only" here. In an earlier blog by Jen Piccotti of SatisFacts, they cited an adoption of only 1.24% of prospects using social media in their apartment search! Now granted, survey wording is probably completely different, and I'm not sure if 25% indicates out of 100% or out of the 71% they mentioned previously, but regardless, that seems like a monumental leap ahead for social media apartment marketing!

Your thoughts?

To be honest I think they use the word "only" because they are trying to show that when compared to regular Apartments.com users (or all ILS ones) a low percentage of people are using social media. It's easy if you're an ILS to see it as a competitor.

I would be curious to see a new SatisFacts survey for 2010 and see what type of increase we see. I don't want to kick the tires on this discussion again but I think we all know that social media should be used for Resident Retention first and its byproduct can be more rentals. IMO of course.

BTW... I have never seen a post with over 2,000 views and over 50 comments. Wow Jen. What would be cool I think Brent would be something which showed top posts of all time, in case someone missed it. (I think with over 2,000 though in this case EVERYONE saw it.) :ohmy:

It's social networking people. It's not social apartment searching.

I'm sure there are plenty of iterations that might work, but I agree with Bill that the #1 benefit to a community directly is retention. That said, I see a lot of potential for an ILS. In other words, I don't see a person looking up a community fan page as it is now, but using an ILS app might be intriguing.

And Mark, I simply think social networking mimics real life, and in real life, people shop together. Maybe not as much for apartments, although that does happen, but online social shopping has merits in my opinion...

This is a tired discussion. The metrics to evaluate success of marketing tactics in this space are whacked, leading to such debates. Social networks (and/or the insights they offer) allow brands and consumers to have meaningful, personalized and highly relevant conversations. Anyone who doesn't see how this adds value to both marketers and consumers and asks questions like "What's the CPL for this?" or "But is this going to help my SEO?" simply doesn't get it.

If you start with the simple goal of improving the quality of the dialogue you have with consumers (which means you have to learn more about them, add more value at every touchpoint, show empathy, etc), it's pretty simple to see how social fits into your toolkit. It vexes me why this conversation always comes back to 1) some aggregate stat on social's role in apartment search or 2) some debate over whether social is for acquisition or retention.

My first thought, Tim, was that was a very strange comment coming from you, but then I saw that you changed companies! Anyway, I don't quite understand your dislike of trying to apply a stat to this discussion. Understanding fundamental consumer trends on a very new concept is still warranted, in my opinion. Even when understanding the importance of improving the "quality of the dialogue", that doesn't prove out whether prospects would ever simply make it to a community's online locations, no matter how in-tune they were with their current customers needs.

I have a tough time with data like this, because everyone has a different opinion about what "using social media for apartment search" means. Heck, we all have different definitions of "social media" itself.

While I too want to understand the fundamental shift in consumer trends, I think this data becomes much more valuable when we ask specific questions like, "Have you ever started a search for a product on Facebook?" or "Have you ever asked your Facebook friends for recommendations or feedback about a specific product?" or "Why do you continue to follow X brand on Twitter?" Then, we can really start to understand how potential customers are using these sites and how we can develop a content strategy that meets their needs. I've expanded on some of these thoughts over at MF360 if you care to dig into the rest of the data from the survey.

@Brent #1 "direct" benefit, retention? I disagree. That is a benefit, but not #1 or "direct". I have no evidence, nor know of anyone that has had more renewals as a "direct" result of social media. If anyone would like to share that story it would be great, but I think we'll hear crickets.

Your "social shopping" point doesn't jive with me either. "People shop together"??? How does that tie into having an app? The idea of people discussing their purchases, sharing reviews, articles, or websites makes sense, but I don't see how that relates to an app. "Social shopping" is sharing and networking. Not an app.

I agree with Tim that this conversation is tired. People keep trying to justify it by attaching a cost per lead or lease statistic to it. That's just short sighted. What's funny is that the idea of measuring this is so that people can prove it's worth to owners and executives. However, if marketers would just present social media as "networking" vs "marketing" it likely would be more accepted. What's the value of a Chamber of Commerce membership? What's the value of belonging to the Apartment Association? What's the value of having resident parties/events? What's the value of outreach to local businesses? What's the value of going to the ball game with your local banker? What's the value of playing golf with your local insurance provider?

We justify all of these groups, activities, time and expenses without direct ROI, but once our fingers hit a keyboard or mouse that somehow changes. I'm just tired of the ROI conversation. Owners and executives have gotten where they are today mostly because of networking. Why marketers have to justify online social networking differently just doesn't make sense. It may be different, but it's much the same.

@Mark That wasn't what I was meaning - I wasn't implying that a community does some great thing in social media and their residents rush to go renew their lease or anything. I was just agreeing with Bill's assessment of the relative value compared to marketing.

Second, an app can be a lot of different things, including enhanced ways to share items with their friends and get feedback. Shoot, RentMineOnline is a social shopping app that inherently says, I shopped here, you should too, although they get a kick-back in the process.

The conversation IS tired. @Mark I think it's easy for you to forget that not everyone has people at the top who SEE the light through the trees. I'm not saying that C-levels do a bad job, I am just saying that not everyone is as progressive as some. They want NUMBERS to justify the time spent. As we all know numbers are extremely difficult (I would say impossible) to find related to social media. Believe me, I find this sort of justification short sighted but for some people out there it's the reality. "Show me how this will make me more money before I invest time and money into it." Umm.... The eternal battle between Marketing and C-level continues.

I think we should clarify that C-levels in the apartment industry have immense trouble looking past legacy metrics. This is a staid industry with extreme barriers to innovation. There are plenty of metrics-focused executive types in other industries who acknowledge the potential value in social and give latitude to their marketing leaders to engage there.

At some point, this industry has to look itself in the eye and decide if fear and ignorance are going to triumph over creativity and innovation. Start looking outside your industry for benchmarks and inspiration and you'll see the conversation evolve quickly. This has to get past just Juleen, Whaling, Brewer, Eric B, Brent W, Saar, etc banging the drum, and from what I've observed, that isn't likely to happen soon.

I say this because after several years working in the space, I have a soft spot for multifamily and want to see the industry join the "enlightened age." There is so much potential if it does. To do that, though, we gotta be honest about the situation and in my experience, there is too much time spent making excuses and chasing arguments that distract from true issues. The ugly baby is hard to look at...

Your words Tim are nothing if not blunt... and I love it. I will speak from experience here at my company and say that if we cannot show how it will affect NOI then chances are it cannot get done. I've had many arguments in here, some heated some not, and had these types of progressive ideas shot down. There's an important distinction Tim that I don't think you're making. Creativity and innovation can triumph IF you can find a way to make the numbers work.

Bottom line is I AGREE WITH YOU 100%. The one who can figure out how to crack this nut wins the prize.

@Brent That makes some more sense. I see apps helping to enhance sharing. RMO is a good example. I should have addressed Bill in my comment as well. Customer retention is a just a piece to the puzzle and isn't a compelling argument in my mind for why a business should use social media. There are plenty of other things going on.

@Bill As for making the numbers work it may just be me, but I think in most cases there should be plenty of opportunity for that. We've saved THOUSANDS of dollars by focusing our marketing efforts toward online. In doing that we've applied some of those savings into new technology, using social networks, and building more online assets. Even after investing some of the savings in these areas we still have saved THOUSANDS of dollars, but have grown website traffic year over year by thousands of visitors and increased physical traffic to the properties. One example I will share is that year over year at one of our properties leases attributed to their website for their specific property went from 3 in 2008, to 14 in 2009, and 22 in 2010.

People are so focused on ROI reflecting results attributed to Facebook directly or a blog directly, but we shouldn't expect people to lease as a result of those sources. They lease because they maybe discovered us on Facebook, a blog, or from a friend referral online, but that usually leads them to (what I like to call) our "brochure" website where they convert into a lead. That's where the credit goes and where the benefits are in growing your online presence.

Everything doesn't have to be treated like an ILS when we measure it. Those resources are designed to measure your results so they can justify their prices. Facebook is not designed that way and the lead comes differently (as it should). Ideally you lead them to your website where they can convert into a lead. I think over time we'll even do a better job measuring and monitoring those referrals, but for now I hang my hat on the fact that our website traffic and leads continue to grow. And our leads and leases attributed to "Google" continue to grow as well.

Sure it's not traditional and it may be a shift in thinking, but too many marketers are operating in fear. Whether that fear is in change from more traditional forms of marketing, fear of failing, fear of the unknown, or just fear of standing out and being different, people just need to get over that. Our industry is one that has been built on conservative finance and is also limited by fair housing regulations. It's in our nature to "play it safe". I'm not saying "throw caution to the wind", but this is marketing. It's time to shake it up in this business. Take a little bit of risk. Stop acting like a commodity that only sits on listing sites right next to all your competitors. Show that you are a unique brand. Prove that you can stand out from the crowd.

OK, that is all.

LOVE your comments Mark. Don't forget that you are preaching to the choir. "Sure it's not traditional and it may be a shift in thinking" that sums it all up. I want more than anything to be able to SHIFT thinking to what you describe. Think outside the box, take chances, DO SOMETHING DIFFERENT. It's Marketing led by metrics instead of ideas. Alright.. the horse is dead I'm moving on.

Bill, if you want it and you know it's the right thing to do, then why not just do it? What's really stopping you? Lead the charge, but go all in! The metrics are still there, but you have to make it happen.

Tim. You are SPOT-ON. Period. You need to be speaking more about how this is a tired conversation and pushing your message about how the industry needs to move beyond the staid walls. We are both in the same world of new product development and sometimes you can lead a horse to the water, but as you know, you just cant get it to drink. I believe that there are camps in our industry that push the innovation ticket, yet are lost with how to actually use it (in party b/c many arent trained beyond the hardcopy manuals that say to get a lease do point 1...2...3). There are others that push the innovation, but then get circumvented by internal teams above/below that drive status-quo. And finally, there are others that simply are just status-quo. What this industry needs more is a good kick swift in pushing for innovation, disregarding the need for initial metrics and set their own internal benchmarks simply by stating did it work or not? Sometimes success is in simply TESTING.

Mike I think you are right. If people in our industry are seeking social media benchmarks then you have to fall into one or two camps (or be happy working both camps as you should in the end).

Camp 1: PPC/organic search to FB/Twitter/Linkedin/Blog/YouTube/other social network page to lead
Camp 2: Engagement to testimonials to resident retention

Most people are in camp 2 as the cost of engagement is low (typically done internally with autoposts, etc). Camp 1 people are those that have actual ad dollars to spend to design develop their pages and actually make their social media work like a true marketing platform. It can be done, it doesnt take time. It takes commitment of dollars from corporate do camp 1. Still new, but that is the way this industry will head.

Let me ask all of you have you ever really utilized "social networking" on and off line? Have you had conversations online to eventually follow them up off line? You know really socially networking with people & your customers... Why are we so hung up on metrics for a tool used to talk with people? Do we constantly obsess and fill others minds with useless statistics when we have conversations with our customers on the phone or attend outreach events? Once again all we want to do is to connect and talk with others right? I am so sick of those throwing crap on my plate about metrics, ROI and on and on of useless data when all I want to do is use social networking as an opportunity to talk with more people and strengthen my relationships with them that I never could do before. Since using social networking our business relationships and ability to reach, connect & touch our customers has only gotten stronger, so if you ask me this is a WIN for me, for the customer & the trust our customers feel of the business. I am so tired of everyone trying to over analyze something as simple as just having relationships with people on and off line.

I don't worry what others are doing because for me social networking has introduced me to many of my customers online and then when we meet off line all the awkward feelings are eliminated. It's like we've been dating you know like match.com and then we meet in person and our personalities already conncet. We've become friends, so now they share suggestions, ideas, frustrations and then there's just conversation you what people with emotions do. My suggestion is stop being a robot, stop being a nerd hiding behind numbers and star being real! That's how you gain trust, value and confidence and I am sure when you reach this level you will always be 100% occupied with reservations and ambassadors praising your name without you having to dig, search & analyze data for them just to like you!

Hey Kim...my company does this for a living for hundreds of communities and other companies in various sectors (doing it for over two years now). We not only build the tools to enable our clients to conduct offline conversations, we actually have tools that enable them to converse and segment their fans beyond direct commentary.
Not only that but we have actual benchmarks through our apps that clearly demonstrate what is working and not working. Tools exist, we've stayed pretty quiet for a couple of years on behalf of clients, but are now scaling a number of our apps to the industry at large as I am happily seeing others ready to take the next step.
online/offline is essential. you have fan page reciprocity outreach programs (aka cross promotions) just like you would when you do physical outreach. nothing is different about social media promotion marketing to outreach promotions that apartment communities deploy.

markjuleen.com/2010/12/09/social-media-r...ill-discussing-this/

OK, I turned it into a video blog rant. Fun stuff everyone!

I love the discussion - we just struggle with c-suite agreement on ultimate goals and what niche of the mix soc. media is filling; all of our associates love participating with residents and prospects with social media tools. They just want to know what it's going to do and the answer is, "whatever you want it to do and be."

What is the real story - there are over 30MM rental units in the US - are there good numbers about how many communities, developments, etc., have a social media platform in place right now?

I can't find a solid resource to even extrapolate an estimate.

Take care,

-S

For those that are tired or frustrated with the conversation: It's tiring for because you may already see the value and wonder why others don't. It's understandable, but try to see it from the non-techie view of management/staff/executive. They are so busy running the day to day that its hard to keep up with new ways to market and particularly technology. It takes time to use or be involved in online networks as well as learn how how to be a part of them so that they benefit your bottom dollar. Therefore, because they're so busy, it may require additional staff or hiring third party vendors to do it for them. Well, these non-techie community marketers need to explain to the people who cut the checks, why they need to spend this additional money. It's a hard sell when you don't really know what it does or how to use it but everyone is telling you you're missing the boat. We as vendors have to do a better job of understanding their limitations and helping them see the value in Social Media, Internet Marketing, etc., so that they can start benefitting from them.

Fot those that don't quite see the value yet: Check out the YouTube video from Socialnomics called Social Media Revolution. You'll get a good idea of the importance. Also, social media is not only about networking, its about web presence. You (your community or company) want to be in as many places as possible. That being said, everywhere you are you need to be communicating quality content that the reader/user wants to read. Quality content in more places = more customers. This works two fold. First you have more places you are now participating in, but you also create links back to your community or company website. This is a totally different topic (web presence), but within the realm of social media. However, in short, more links from other outside sources like social media sites or blogs back to your site give your website more authority. This helps your Offsite SEO, which helps your community's website get closer to be found by others when searching on google. Over simplified, but wanted to throw in there that Social Media is much more than FaceBook and the like. And it's not about offering your product but about Quality Content (eg. How to Save on Your Utility Bills). For those that are still on the upward battle of the Social Media learning curve, try reading 1. Socialnomics, by Erik Qualman and Social Media 101, by Chris Brogan. These will help you get started. Good luck and please let me know if this helps.

Chris Perez
ReachLocal - Internet Marketing Consultant
Please note, the postings of opinions on this site are my own and do not necessarily reflect those of ReachLocal, Inc., its management, employees, clients or publishers.

It's rather condescending to assert that you need to look at it from the "non-techie ..." point of view. There are plenty of tech-oriented executives (myself and my boss included) who are taking a "go slow" approach to many forms of social media. Perhaps the real issue is that execs know that some marketers (not all) can spend and spend and spend and don't always evaluate the cost side of the "cost benefit analysis" and/or don't quantify the benefit side. Fuzzy words like "help SEO" don't mean anything to an exec--techie or not.

My advice for any marketing you believe in--establish metrics that are meaningful to the execs and show them that there's a payoff, not just a belief and/or a herd mentality.

I'm sorry you feel that way, as it was not the intention. You're absolutely correct, metrics are an essential part of evaluating all efforts. However, I don't think executives are the problem here. While you and your boss are more technologically or internet savvy, which helps your organization make better decisions. I was referring to other side of the spectrum that isn't quite as informed, hence the posting of their question on this forum. I agree the heard mentality is not a great place to make decisions from and was not suggesting it was. But rather to become informed through reliable facts, resources and proven metric results.

Please note, the postings of opinions on this site are my own and do not necessarily reflect those of ReachLocal, Inc., its management, employees, clients or publishers.