Christi Samuelian, Webmaster/Internet Marketing at Windsor Communities, presents a real case study on Windor's online marketing and operations efforts. “Am I falling behind?” These peer case studies will highlight the marketing efforts made by different-sized companies with differing resources and profiles. Presenters will share the story of how they got where they are, what they do, and where they hope to take their efforts to attract and transact with renters online.

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

2. 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

3. 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.

4. 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.


5. 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!

6. 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%.

7. 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.

8. 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.

9. 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!

10. 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.

11. 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.

12. Traditional SEO
3rd page placement for 1
optimized phrase

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

14. 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.

15. 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.”

16. 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.
