Renters rely on internet listing services (ILSs), social media, online reviews, community websites and in-person tours during their search for a new home. In this real-time digital age, multifamily marketers must allocate resources to software and tech tools that can help them manage the entire renter lifecycle, not just the acquisition of leads.

This starts with building a future-proof marketing technology stack.

A Customer Relationship Management System

A Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system is the first, and arguably most important, type of software that apartment communities should implement. A CRM creates a comprehensive database of renter data, including lifestyle, demographic, preference and past rental data.

Managing your customer information with a robust CRM can lead to more targeted and effective marketing campaigns. Targeting based on these insights can help you better resonate with your audience and increase your closing ratios. For example, rather than sending a mass-marketing email about the pet-friendly features of your community to someone who doesn’t own a pet, your team can target only those who have shown interest in pet amenities.

A Marketing Automation System

Once you’ve got a centralized CRM in place, you’ll want to integrate it with a marketing automation system.

Marketing automation software is a necessary tool within modern marketing organizations. It provides a centralized way for marketers to manage renter communications for their entire portfolio and across a multitude of online and offline channels. It also tracks online behavioral data. Marketers can use this data as an additional layer for more advanced renter targeting.

This tool is also critical for aligning your marketing and leasing teams. It offers your leasing teams transparency into how prospective renters and existing residents are engaging with your digital assets, such as emails, web pages, floorplans, pieces of content and more. This gives your onsite teams intel about each person with whom they engage, helping them craft more relevant and memorable interactions.

A Multi-touch Attribution Approach

The last piece of the puzzle in the future-proof marketing technology stack is a multi-touch attribution reporting tool. Multi-touch attribution is essential in apartment marketing because it gives marketers insight into how different programs influence every step of the renter journey, not just the single event that creates a known lead (a phone call, text, form submission or email).

Single-touch attribution methods assign all of the credit to a single event, missing all of the activity that leads up to the first lead outreach and everything that follows it. Conversely, multi-touch attribution credits value to each touchpoint in a renter’s decision-making journey on a weighted scale. The average renter will engage with you many times before making a decision, and many of these influential programs may not be credited if you’re only using a single-touch attribution model.

Because this approach measures how renters shop across channels, it empowers marketers to better allocate their budget to tactics that influence leasing decisions.

The Core Stack

The combination of a CRM, an integrated marketing automation solution and a multi-touch attribution tool is the basis of what modern multifamily marketers need to optimize their marketing efforts and measure ROI. If marketing leaders are not quick to implement these tools, they can easily fall behind. Owners and operators that build and leverage this technology stack first will benefit from a competitive advantage over more traditional PMCs.