Video is no longer ‘the new thing’ — it is the thing. As nearly every marketing article over the last few years has touted, video is a critical way to reach your target audiences, connect with them, and convert them. And it’s here to stay.
For multifamily companies, the power of video is, in some ways, even more effective. From showcasing the property and community to meeting the leasing team to helping lease units sight unseen, it’s a powerhouse marketing tool. As if the 2018 results that have been driven by video leasing aren’t enough, here are 5 reasons why video should have a spot in every 2019 budget for multifamily communities:
Higher Engagement and Retention
For a multifamily video to be impactful and effective, prospective buyers and renters must engage with it and retain the information provided. Luckily, video is one of the best ways to see higher rates on both of those factors. In fact, viewers retain 95% of a message when they watch it in a video compared to 10% when reading it in text. And with that retention, viewers are much more likely to share, like, embed or otherwise interact with the content, particularly if it’s viewed through social media. Social video generates 1200% more shares than text and images combined. If the goal is to get a message across to viewers, and, of course, when would it not be, then video is the way to go.
Stronger Emotional Connections
Choosing a new home is an emotional process. It’s going to be where a person makes most of their memories for the foreseeable future. Video is one of the best ways to evoke the kind of emotions multifamily communities need to connect with. Video offers a multitude of ways to key into those emotional pulls, like music, tone of voice, expressions, personalization, and much more. While it’s probably the property itself that will draw the prospect in, connecting to them emotionally through video can mean that feeling, and, as such, the property, stays with that person long after the tour is over. Time and again, emotional marketing has been proven to have a positive impact on consumers – real estate is a prime place to put it to work.
Better Conversion Rates
At the end of the day, the entire point of producing and pushing a multifamily video out into the world is for prospective residents to see it, learn something from it, and then reach out to the leasing team for more information. And that outreach will, hopefully, lead to a signed list. The good news is that video converts. Video on a landing page can increase conversions by 80% or more. And 64 percent of consumers make a purchase after watching branded social videos. This is particularly beneficial when working with sight-unseen prospects or pre-leasing your community. When people don’t have time to visit in person, or distance is a factor, video tours can be the lone thing that saves the deal and gets the lease signed.
It’s What Today’s Consumers Want
By 2019, internet video traffic will account for 80% of all consumer Internet traffic around the world. 85% of the US internet audience already watches videos online. Today’s prospects want video. They crave the transparency and realness that video brings. And that rings especially true for the Millennial and Generation Z demographics. They are the biggest market to hit the real estate industry in decades and video is how a clear winner in terms of how to reach them. The Millennial age group watches the most online videos of any age group out there, but the bourgeoning Gen Z isn’t far behind. Why do they watch so many videos? They prefer direct, no-fluff messaging, and with an 8-second attention span, video is how to deliver that message.
It’s Effective AND Inexpensive
All of the above points show how effective video is. But to make it fit into today’s ever-tightening real estate marketing or sales or operations budgets, there needs to be more. Video can be a ballooning budget item and cost has to fit in the budget. If done the right way, that is certainly not a problem. Hiring a professional videography crew to create one polished, professional video for a community could run anywhere from $3,000 to $6,000 or more — for a SINGLE video. Using the Realync video platform, teams have produced hundreds of videos within the first few months alone. Their videos aren’t only being used for marketing either, but are actively getting leases signed. And the cost? Multifamily enterprise communities using Realync can create as many videos as desired plus get cloud hosting, unique tracking and analytics, and the ability to host live video tours for just $4,000 for the entire year.
Video can’t, and won’t, be ignored in 2019. To not include it in a budget means being left behind by the competition. Those communities that plan to include video and deploy it correctly (strategically), will find it to be a powerful, inexpensive weapon in their marketing and leasing arsenal that will pay dividends in the end.
Want to learn more about budgeting for Realync’s video leasing & engagement solution? Contact us at sales@realync.com today.
Until next time…keep it real!
