First Things First
“We think if we’re going to be neighbors, we should talk with the neighbors first,” said Jeffries. “Before the design stage started, we invited some city officials, some architects and some of the people who are important to the neighborhood and who care about the neighborhood to an ‘envisioning’ meeting.”
The group started by reviewing the history of the neighborhood, what was there, what was gone (and missed) and what they wanted to retain — or lose. They moved on to the present — What’s here now that we like? And finally, they asked participants what they wanted for the future — Who do they see living in the neighborhood?
The group recalled that the site for the planned apartments was on what used to be called “Auto Row,” named for its auto sales showrooms and garages. That’s why the front of the new building used lots of glass with panes that suggest garage doors.
But involving the community had benefits beyond suggesting appropriate design possibilities. “There was not a single complaint during the design review process,” said Jeffries. And this is in a community that tends to be suspicious of development and picky about the details. “There was only one letter to the editor [of the neighborhood paper] that raised some objections,” she said. “And in the next issue, one of the people who’d been at the envisioning meeting wrote in to answer those objections.”
The 'Connector' Campaign
Once the company had neighborhood input, it could plan the project. But Jeffries and Murphy didn’t wait for the building to go up before marketing it.
“We identified about 50 people who know and interact with a lot of other people,” said Jeffries. “We call them the Connectors.” These were the coffee shop baristas, the hairdressers, the bartenders — people who spent time in places where lots of other people tended to congregate.
“Then we mailed them the magnets.” The magnets were five refrigerator magnets that looked like typewriter keys with the letters p, r, e, s and s in a chunky type font.
“We didn’t explain, just sent the magnets,” said Jeffries. Two weeks later, they followed up with a mailing of cardboard tubes, each holding a black T-shirt with the Press name, same type font, same lack of explanation. Within days they saw people wearing them in the neighborhood and heard people asking each other, “Did you get one? What are these? Who’s sending them out?”
Finally they sent out their brochure and an explanation — but not just any brochure. They hired a local photographer and had him shoot candid shots of real people (and the occasional dog) doing what they do in the neighborhood — shopping, sipping coffee and hanging out.
One shot was of two denim-clad 20-somethings walking, holding hands and also holding the head of a mannequin. The brochure copy was minimal, but the message was clear: this sort of quirky fun stuff happens on Capitol Hill, and if you lived at Press Apartments, you’d be in the thick of it. A few pages of floor plans and more photos followed, with no comment (except a “woof” from the final dog photo).
That’s when Jeffries and Murphy went live with the property’s Web site. On the site, they encouraged people to e-mail “Press Girl” with their questions, and to check out the Web camera to see the construction progress in real time. Even before ground was broken, Press Girl (Megan Murphy, in real life) developed a following. “Some people checked in every day,” she said. And the Web cam page recorded more daily hits than any other page in the corporate site.
The Proof Is in the Leasing
By the time the company was ready to allow people to “pre-register for the opportunity to pre-lease," there were more than 100 people who’d shown interest in being contacted.
“They started getting anxious,” said Jeffries. “They’d seen the floor plans and already had picked their units.” This was all the more remarkable because the Seattle market at that time, in Jeffries’ words, “was struggling.”
Other properties were giving new renters up to three rent-free months, and free parking for a year. “We gave nothing away,” said Jeffries.
The apartments were 100% leased in five months, and the building has stayed full, with a waiting list. All this without running any ads.
The total cost of the campaign, including the salaries of the two marketeers, was $88,100 — peanuts compared to the big budgets that some developments devote to marketing a new property.
“We think people are over-advertised-to,” says Jeffries, who cites a statistic that says that each day we are exposed to about 10,000 marketing messages in one form or another. “We wanted to do something different.”
But just because this campaign was a bit wild and outlandish and worked well, it doesn’t mean that the same approach will work for the next project. “You always have to know the people you’re targeting,” says Jeffries, “and talk to them the way they want to be talked to.”
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