Owner Case Studies
Christi Samuelian
Webmaster/Internet Marketing Manager
Windsor Property Management Co.
4.30.2009

Windsor Internet Marketing
Internet Marketing
Future:
Search Engine
Unit marketing,
Company Website
Marketing
ILS/ Ad Source Tracking/
Social media,
Windsorcommunities.com
(SEO/PPC/
Craigslist Measurement
Mobile marketing,
Google Maps/
Yahoo Local) Video, Sales funnel

Setting the Scene
Windsor Communities

35 properties/12,000 units
Windsor Marketing Department

Wouldn’t that be nice!
Decentralized marketing – most happens at
regional/property level.
My role - Internet Marketing Mgr/Webmaster
Part time Webmaster, part time project manager, part

time trainer, part time administrator, and part time
marketer.

Choosing & Prioritizing Marketing Initiatives
Challenge: Choosing/Prioritizing Mkt
 
Initiatives:
There’s only so much
you can do in a day! Grassroots successes.
Knowing one’s
How to choose and
prioritize initiatives while: limitations.
Keeping up with the Trends/big picture.

industry.
Good buzz.
Working with what you

got.
Not getting overwhelmed.


Grassroots Marketing Ideas
Case Study – Craigslist.org

Windsor at Brentwood (RI) - cut all print
advertising in lieu of Craigslist ads saving over
$10,000/year while increasing traffic 30%.
Level One – Ad Source Analysis Report
Windsor at Brentwood - 4/08
Craigslist - #1 source of leads
Cost/lead = $0
Good idea!

Grassroots Marketing, cont.
Discussed at National
Operations Conference,
assembled training guide,
worked class into training
curriculum, mandatory
training for managers,
reinforced message to
regional staff.
Initial results encouraging:
3/09 - #2 Internet source

producing leads via phone
calls. Outperformed all print
ads and ILS.
Leads to appointments

conversion - 48%.

Prioritizing & Choosing, cont.
Recognizing our limitations.

Important initiatives that we will never have the
time, manpower, or expertise for.
Search Engine Marketing (SEO/SEM).
Problem – How do we get on 1st page of search engine

results for our metros?
Answer – Readjust our expectations, revamp our SEO

efforts, and get creative.

SEM, cont.
SEO

30000
Is changing constantly, and
28000
need a company with
26000
expertise to navigate through 24000
it. 22000
20000
Outsourced since 2005.
18000
Link building, coaching

16000 2005
sessions, quarterly progress 14000
meetings, reporting. 2007
12000
Website redesign – Assisting 10000
 2009
8000
us through the process to
6000
ensure new site is optimized
4000
and will not lose rankings
2000
once we launch.
0
Tripled web traffic from # of
search engines as a result of Visitors
efforts started 4 years ago.

Search Engine Marketing
Encourage property-level efforts:

Use property URL everywhere (ads, email signatures, etc.).
Google Maps/Yahoo! Local - Improves your local search results & is free!

SEM, cont.
Pay Per Click (ppc):

Contracted 3rd party (Reach Local) to manage
campaigns.
Enables us to run a portfolio-wide campaign with
minimal set-up hassle and maintenance.
And…we get on the 1st page of search engine
results for local searches.
Result - 1st place placement for local

searches, increased numbers of leads, and
improved SEO for those properties.

PPC Results
Generates leads.

As with any advertising, works better
for some properties than others.
2008 - averaged more leads/month
for 4 properties than did some of the
top ILS that we list all properties on.
Increased web traffic.

30% of new web traffic generated by
Reach Local.
In one instance, increased web traffic
by 1000 unique visitors in 1 month!
All properties are still registering over
1000 visits/month.
Huge bump in Google organic traffic. As

Reach Local traffic increases, so does
Google organic traffic.
50% of web traffic - Reach
Local/Google combo.

Traditional SEO
3rd page placement for 1
optimized phrase

PPC / Reach Local
1st page placement for over
1000 keyword combinations!

Tracking & Measurement
Google
L1 Analytics
Google Anlytics
L2L
Lead2Lease
PMS (MRI)
L1
Lead
PMS – All leads.
Aggregator –
Calls, emails, w
L1, 60% of
alk-in traffic.
calls taken on-
site, misc.
emails, walk-in
traffic.

Tracking – Putting It All Together
Property wanted to cancel an ILS.

“We actually cancelled with X after reviewing our leads/leases obtained
from them and decided that this was not an effective traffic source for
our property. Our account ended with them as of 2/22/09. I have
attached our traffic report for the last 6 months showing only 2 leads
and no leases from them.”
Response after reviewing their L1 reports:

“I ran your L1 Activity Analysis report since 9/1 (below), and you were
getting some decent traffic from them. The phone leads handled by
L1 for the past 6 months converted to visits set at the highest rate of
any of your other ad sources (85%)! I also ran your STATS report,
and it shows X generated more phone calls for you then some of the
other big sites like X, Y, and Z.”

Summary
There is only so much time in the day!

Have to pick and choose.

Keep your eyes and ears open.

What are your properties doing? Use their
successes and build out portfolio-wide.
What are your comps doing and what are the
industry trends emerging?
Recognize you can’t do it all. Outsource where you

can and use available tools at your disposal.
Track and measure efforts.

Take small steps and do what you can.
