How to create a balanced multifamily marketing budget: Insights from industry experts

Creating a balanced marketing budget is an annual event for multifamily marketers. While there may be few among us who truly look forward to budget season, it’s gotten much more exciting over the last decade.

With increasing access to data and analytics, it’s easier to prove marketing impact today than it was 10 years. That makes budget season a prime time to show off your marketing success and present new opportunities for the year ahead.

To help you be more successful, we’ve interviewed three leading multifamily marketing professionals who are budget pros: Anne Baum, director of marketing at Towne Properties; Tammy Yeargan, director of marketing at Fogelman Properties; and Sam Foster, CEO of PRG Real Estate.

Learn how to demonstrate that your marketing efforts not only drive revenue but also align with the overall goals of the organization. And discover budget strategies that can help you get new initiatives approved.

We’ll start by sharing Anne and Tammy’s perspective on multifamily marketing budget planning, followed by a look from Sam’s executive viewpoint.

Budget planning tips from marketing directors

How do you approach your marketing budget each year?

Anne: When we enter budget season, we start by reviewing our marketing source performance at both the portfolio and property levels. We analyze year-to-date data to determine which sources to increase, decrease or eliminate. Key performance indicators (KPIs) guide our decisions. These include data points such as cost per lease, average days to convert, shows to applications and return on ad spend.

This year, we’re adding seasonality into our strategy. We’re going property by property and reviewing lease expirations and renewal rates to build a more strategic marketing mix.

Tammy: Post-COVID, we’ve realized that a one-size-fits-all approach doesn’t work. The cost-per-door methodology just doesn’t work anymore.

Now, we focus on resident retention and seasonality, looking at revenue growth and how we contribute to our company’s net operating income (NOI). As Anne mentioned, it’s important to focus on marketing source performance. Nimble marketing sources are essential in today’s ever-changing market environment.

What other marketing expenses are you looking at when you’re building your budget?

Tammy: Beyond lead sources, we’re investing in initiatives that help convert leads faster. These include AI, diverse types of media assets and floor-plan level marketing. The prospect journey is very different these days, and enhancing the user experience is key.

At the same time, we haven’t forgotten the basics like outreach marketing and connecting with preferred employers. We’re also evaluating various community reward programs to help with resident retention.

How do you collate and evaluate marketing data?

Anne: When we look at our budget, a marketing dashboard is non-negotiable for us. It gives us the data we need for our properties and owners to be successful. We rely on a marketing dashboard that can show us how each property is doing overall, as well as show us data by marketing source across properties.

It provides a comprehensive view of property performance including leads, leases, conversion rates, return on ad spend and average days to convert. And we use it to review attribution and path data, allowing us to dive into detailed marketing source performance.

What innovations are you researching for 2025?

Tammy: Earlier I mentioned AI. We’re looking at solutions that can help set the stage for centralization. Those are at the forefront for Fogelman this year. But again, not forgetting the basics. It’s how you blend all your marketing strategies together.

Which industries do you look to for inspiration?

Anne: A trend that really stuck out to me this year was talk about brand and customer experience. An industry that’s really leading the charge there is hospitality. I’ve heard a lot of great sessions about hospitality this year. It’s interesting because brand and customer experience have been around for a long time, but I feel like there’s a fresh focus on it. I’m really excited about it.

From a brand perspective, two marketing initiatives we’re considering for next year are geotargeting and TV streaming ads. Both are trackable and can be tied back to occupancy and renewals. You can track how many people walk into your door after seeing those ads. So those are two things I look forward to bringing to life at our properties as part of our marketing strategy.

What internal research do you do to prepare for budget season?

Tammy: Our Fogelman summer road trip is essential. We visit the various regions in our portfolio. It’s what gives me fresh energy to come back and look at creative ways to support our communities. Ideation and brainstorming are my favorite things to do.

And you have to get the appropriate teams involved. It’s a collaboration as we navigate these new spaces. We’ve found more and more that our clients and ownership groups are engaged. They’re curious about marketing. They’re curious about the world of technology and AI. As a marketing team, we can’t just create a plan in a silo.

Anne: I echo that. I’m on the back end of site visits as well, and I feel inspired. Site visits remind us of the uniqueness of each property and the importance of collaboration with site teams.

You can build a strategic marketing mix using KPIs, but adding in the personal touch and specialness of each property is what’s going to take your marketing to the next level. We want to do the right things for our properties.

How do you package and present the marketing budget for approval?

Anne: For us, it’s really about collaboration. Our regional vice presidents are the decision makers for our properties. We present budget suggestions at the property level. We’ll provide our reasoning and explain new tactics. Even for things that are tried and true, we bring data and explain how it impacted our recommendations. Then we’ll make decisions together.

If we’re presenting new strategies we haven’t used before — like geotargeting — we’ll show them why we think it’s important, how we’ll measure it and how we’ll report on it. I’m excited. I love that process. That’s our key to success, having those conversations together.

Tammy: It’s important to bring awareness to marketing and how it fits into the larger puzzle for 2025. Like Anne said, collaboration is key. But you must be prepared to explain everything because marketing is a nuanced space that sometimes people don’t understand.

We have to be good salespeople. Sometimes it’s a hefty expense you’re presenting. But if you can show the value behind it, we often see our clients accept it way better than we anticipated.

What is one marketing expense that’s a non-negotiable for you?

Tammy: SEO. Digital marketing continues to play a pivotal role. We’re really focused on personalized and hypertargeted marketing. How can we do it better?

Anne: My answer would be pay-per-click ads. Being visible on Google is hugely important. PPC ads allow us to drive traffic directly to our website — which is our strongest asset, from a marketing standpoint.

PPC is flexible. You can move budgets up or down, and that plays well into the seasonality trends we’re looking at for next year. It’s also one of our lowest cost-pe- lease marketing sources. It consistently performs for us. You can flex it based on the needs of the property. If you have a certain unit type that you have more availability, you can switch which keywords you’re focusing on.

The data that’s available is unbelievable. I just wouldn’t go into a property marketing strategy without recommending PPC.

Budget approval tips from a CEO

Which KPIs and metrics do you look at when approving a marketing budget?

Sam: Beyond typical KPIs like cost per lease and lead, we consider human resources, ease of implementation and buy-in from regional and site-level teams. Are the projects going to require time and attention from existing staff or additional staff? And then bifurcating that, is it corporate staff time or field staff time? These factors influence my decisions on new marketing initiatives.

What does cost per unit mean to you and how do you measure it?

Sam: It’s a tough one because obviously, for a larger property, the cost per unit will be less if it’s a fixed cost. So, for smaller properties you have to pay a lot more attention to it.

In our industry, administrative and marketing spend is typically $500-700 a unit. That includes all administrative costs, not just marketing and advertising. So how does your marketing cost fit into that bucket? You don’t want to go too far past your competitors, and you certainly don’t want to underspend on such an important category.

What does your team need to demonstrate to get approval on a new marketing initiative?

Sam: Return on investment is crucial, but it’s more nuanced than just monetary ROI. We also consider the return on people’s time. If a new initiative saves time and allows our team to focus on their core responsibilities, that’s a significant ROI.

We try not to have our site teams do too much besides lease apartments, provide customer service and fix stuff. I we can give them more time to do those three things, that’s a return on investment that I value.

Why might a marketing initiative need to be reevaluated or rejected?

Sam: Even if an initiative meets all other criteria, we consider ease of implementation, time to implement and buy-in from regional and site-level teams. If those aren’t in our favor, it doesn’t really matter what it does.

If an initiative is too complex or disrupts prime leasing season, it might be rejected or postponed. Maybe it just needs to be done at a different time or we need to figure out a better path forward. Successful implementation requires support and acceptance across teams.

Why is buy-in from regional directors important for marketing initiatives?

Sam: Forcing initiatives from corporate without regional buy-in doesn’t work. Regional directors are the core of our operations, and their support and ideas are essential for successful implementation. Without their buy-in or at least their acceptance that we need to fix a problem or make a process more efficient, even the best initiatives can fail.

How do you measure the success of creative marketing initiatives like video content creation?

Sam: Video content is essential, especially for new developments, class A and luxury properties. We measure success by tracking views, engagement and conversions. It’s absolutely measurable.

And at this point, it’s just not that expensive. The cost of producing videos has decreased significantly, making it more about effort than expense. Video content is now a standard expectation in the industry. Most of your competitors have it.

When do you look at industries outside of multifamily for marketing ideas?

Sam: The hospitality industry is a major source of inspiration. Higher-end hotels are often ahead in marketing, advertising and creating experiential programs. While they may not always be more profitable, their marketing initiatives are innovative and effective.

How do you see the marketing department as part of the larger whole?

Sam: For us at PRG, marketing is a revenue-generating department, especially as we centralize functions. We’ve always believed in having the most qualified people do certain functions. It’s unrealistic to expect property managers to handle marketing along with their core responsibilities, which center around serving the people who live in each community.

Marketing is the bread and butter of rental revenue, which makes up 90% of our overall revenue. It’s definitely a revenue-generating function. It’s just a question of how you allocate the resources appropriately.

What initiatives is your team working toward for next year?

Sam: In the near term, we’re rolling out Matterport tours across all properties to provide better visuals for prospects. That will be done by the end of next year.

The larger initiative is the implementation of artificial intelligence throughout the entire portfolio. We’re currently running a test now. AI should be able to handle between 90-95% of all prospect and resident interactions. So that’s a huge initiative and, really, the future of the industry.

Final thoughts

As we’ve seen, creating a balanced multifamily marketing budget requires a thoughtful and data-driven approach. By focusing on KPIs, incorporating emerging technologies and collaborating across teams, you can develop a strategic plan that drives revenue and aligns with your company’s goals.

Remember, the future of multifamily marketing is bright, with exciting innovations like AI poised to revolutionize the industry. By staying informed, adaptable and committed to delivering exceptional renter experiences, you can position your property for long-term success.

And if you have any questions, feel free to ask the experts on LinkedIn! (Really, Anne told us we could say that. 😉)