In one of three short ads launched last week by Apartments.com, a woman donning bright-red lipstick and oversized eyeglasses interrupts Silicon Valley maverick Brad Bellflower (played by Jeff Goldblum) as he begins to deliver the company’s tagline, “Change your apartment…”
“Yeah, yeah,” she says. “Change the world.”
Spot title: “Earth”
The interaction, though brief, carries the same weird and futuristic design that has made the company’s past marketing efforts so memorable, but this time there’s a self-assured twist. Wrapped into Bellflower’s response — “I guess our slogan is catching on” — is the story of CoStar’s Apartments.com overhaul.
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From 2014 — when the D.C.-based real estate company and marketing provider acquired the site — to now, Apartments.com has doubled its brand awareness and now attracts the highest number of unique visitors and page views among its competitors, according to comScore.
“We established ourselves as the most trafficked apartment listing site in the course of less than 8 months in the market,” said Becky Carr, the chief marketing officer of CoStar.
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Building on momentum from its “Movin’ on Up” Super Bowl ad and past marketing campaigns, Apartments.com will release 10 ads total throughout 2016 syndicated across cable, sports, primetime and social media platforms.
All the spots were directed by the talented Bob Odenkirk, also know as Saul Goodman or the lovable but flawed Jimmy McGill. The “Breaking Bad” and “Better Call Saul” star came to the director’s chair ready to pump the ads full of creativity and humor.
This wasn’t the first time Goldblum and Odenkirk had worked together, and Carr describes the on-set dynamic as having an “incredible chemistry.”
“With Bob, the camera’s rolling almost all the time,” Carr said. “I will guess that 30 percent of what’s in the final cut was ad-libbed; it wasn’t in the written script. And that’s the beauty of working with geniuses like Jeff and Bob. You know, it went from very conservative to the most outlandish and everywhere in between.”
“I have to say the final product that everyone will see on television has [Odenkirk’s] fingerprints all over it,” Car added. “He was absolutely brilliant in making sure the messages that we wanted to convey were done so in a very humorous way.”
The 2016 campaign targets a broader audience, too. Consumers are still of great importance, of course, as seen in the spot “Bundle of Joy” featuring a family who receives a special stork delivery. This year, however, the company’s message speaks to small property owners (see: War Room) who might be looking to reach more renters.
Many of these property owners might not be aware that listing on Apartments.com is free just like Craigslist, Carr said.
Spot title: “War Room”
Fulfilling a promise to consumers
Innovative marketing can bring customers to a product or service, but it doesn’t always mean they’ll come back. Carr credits the ability to offer consumers “the best experience, the most variety, and the best tools to make an informed decision,” as the keys to giving 21st-century home searchers what they want.
Spot title: “Bundle of Joy”
By providing information upfront about pricing, amenities, proximity to shops and restaurants and swiftly removing listings as they become unavailable, visitors can trust what they see at face value and side-step the phone calls and other elements that make the rental (and homebuying) hunt so tedious.
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In honor of National Apartment Housing Day, Apartments.com has also launched a new landing page for small property owners and a blog featuring lifestyle content.
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