I happen to love apartment community pools, and with newer properties, they often do a great job at "wowing" any person who comes to take a look.  At least, that is what would happen if their pool was the only one in that market.  But as we all know, many of our comps have beautiful pools too!  So if everybody has an attractive pool, how does that change the impact on the prospect?

The pool, as it turns out, has a direct link to our online marketing.  People are visual creatures, as Instagram and Pinterest can attest, so the first thing they will often look at is the picture of the community.  So now we have a choice - what picture do we use for our communities?  Well, an extremely large percentage choose the picture of their "sparkling pool".  This means that individually, a community can look attractive showcasing one of their most attractive elements, but when lumped together with several other properties, you get the effect seen on the right.  They are all attractive pools, and even though they are not exactly the same, they haven't differentiated themselves at all!

Considering how many people start their search for an apartment online, it is probably the most important element to your marketing.  And yet, the solution for many communities is to do the same exact thing as all their competitors.  Maybe I'm crazy, but that seems absolutely insane to me.

I recently came across this post, "My friend took a photo of her house every 10 seconds for 2 hours the other evening. This was the result."  Here was the image:

What a dramatic picture!  I could easily envision a similar nighttime picture of a community with a star-streaked sky above, and how much that picture would stand out!  Imagine scrolling down a list of apartment communities on an ILS, thinking, "pool, pool, pool, sign, pool, WOW - THAT LOOKS AWESOME!"

The night sky is just an example - there are plenty of ideas out there from pictures of pets, residents of the community, parties you have thrown, aerial pictures from a drone, etc.  I remember imploring the communities of Houston to get professional pictures done when it snowed one year, because THAT would make an impact!  If you have a whimsical culture at your community, you could even have a picture right now of Godzilla tromping through the community to coincide with the movie release.  Each one of these would be incredibly unique, interesting, and immediately put your property on the "short list" of communities the prospect will want to ultimately see.  The only thing I can recommend is that they are done by a professional photographer.  If these are the most important elements to your marketing, a pro will make all the difference in the world!

I would love to hear some stories from you all!  Have you used any unique pictures in your listings to drive interest?  Link to them below!

UPDATE:  Found a really neat nighttime picture with the moon traveling across the sky.  (source)  Obviously, this is a skyline picture, but hopefully it inspires a creative approach for your apartment community!