student housing marketing Case Study
Statehouse Tallahassee
GRO’s branding and multi-channel marketing strategy helps Statehouse Tallahassee win big in their market.
About Statehouse Tallahassee
The Story
Statehouse Tallahassee is a group of brand new luxury student housing properties located in the heart of the Florida State University campus. Statehouse Varsity is a stone’s throw away to Doak Campbell Stadium, home of the FSU Seminole football team. Statehouse Arena is located in close proximity to greek houses and other popular FSU points of interest.
industry
Student Housing
location
Tallahassee, FL
Involvement
Digital Marketing
Branding
tactics
Paid Search Advertising
Social Media Advertising
Youtube Advertising
Programmatic Display Advertising
Retroactive Geofence Advertising
opportunity
a challenging season
Tallahassee has historically been a saturated, competitive market when it comes to student living and the 2021 leasing season has been no exception. In addition, the COVID19 virus is in full effect, which has caused a significant decrease in in-person class attendance at Florida State University. Asset Living (property management company) and 908 Group (developer) knew that they needed a marketing partner with a track record of success in the Tallahassee market that also possessed the ability to quickly shift strategies depending on the status of classes or any other challenges that the pandemic would cause.
Asset and 908 chose GRO to lead the charge since the three companies together had generated huge success with a previous asset in the market, The Nine at Tallahassee. The Nine leased up to 100% faster than any other community in the Tallahassee market in 2018. The success earned the team a Student Housing Business Innovator Award for the Best Mobile Marketing Campaign.
Solution #1: Visual Identity System
Create a visual identity that projected a modern, collegiate feel that would resonate with the FSU students. The Statehouse logo features an interwoven S and H, resembling an old school letterman jacket that you would see on campuses back in the late 80s and early 90s. The spear heads on the ends of the letter S pay homage to FSU. In addition to the creation of the logo and visual identity system, GRO also created marketing materials such as booklets, banners, fence signage, sell sheets, rack cards and promotional items.
Solution #2: Digital Marketing Strategy
Develop a marketing strategy that used multiple media channels to impact and influence students while on their path to choosing a home for the Fall 2021 school year. Social media ads, geofencing ads, YouTube ads, and GMail Sponsored promotion ads would be deployed to generate top-of-mind awareness. A robust paid search advertising campaign would be implemented so Statehouse properties would be shown prominently on Google search results when FSU students and parents were actively searching for living options in the Tallahassee area.
Solution #3: Website Design
Once students clicked on one of the Statehouse digital ads, they were led to crystal clear, user-friendly websites that were set up to easily capture their information and generate opportunities.
the results
All leased up!
In just 3 months, Statehouse Arena and Statehouse Varsity have reached 80% occupancy and currently lead the FSU/ Tallahassee market. The digital marketing campaigns are performing extremely well, with paid search ads producing over a 10% conversion rate and social campaigns producing over a 15% conversion rate. The websites have proven to be highly engaging, with the average pages per session exceeding 3.5. The properties are projected to reach 100% by early 2021, which means their leasing goals would be met while only using a small portion of their marketing budget!
Google Ads Conversion Rate
Google Ads Cost Per Conversion
Social Media Ads Cost Per Conversion
Average Pages Viewed per Website Session