OWNER'S GET CREATIVE WITH LEASING

MARKET FOCUS

Asset Campus Housing also focuses market-by-market on its properties. The company has a sophisticated text messaging campaign and proprietary email system that it relies heavily on to market to students who have opted in to the system. These systems allow good traceability and view response. ACH launches its email and text leasing programs on October 1st for the following year, and continually operates them until a property has met its goal.

"Some marketing might respond well to the email system that we have," says Joe Goodwin, director of marketing for ACH. "All of our advertising and any signage that we do has the text messaging sign-up information attached."

The company also uses social networking like Facebook, MySpace and Twitter as a large part of its overall marketing campaign. Every property has its own friend group. The pages are updated daily. The company has had great success using the pages to help find roommate matches as well.

ACH develops marketing plans for each of its properties based on a two-pronged approach for renewals and new leases.

"Our best approach for every property, no matter what market it is in, is word-of-mouth," says Goodwin. "That means you must provide good customer service. If that's the case, retention should be at or above the market average of 35 to 40 percent for us."

"Custom service is Number 1 in our book," adds Goodwin. "A happy resident is more likely to stay than an unhappy one. That starts with their first day at the property. We make sure work orders are responded to within 24 hours."

ACH also relies on street teams that attend local events and pass out materials on projects. The company requires its community assistants to work inside the office, as well as in the community doing marketing outreach. The company also does a lot of community building by hosting or sponsoring events, so that residents know who they are living with. At all events, residents are encouraged to bring guests. Some events have grown so much -- like Casino Night at Cambridge at College Station in College Station, Texas -- that they are known campus-wide year after year.

Source: StudentHousingBusiness.com, January/February 2010