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Let's Work Together Here....IM How to Monetize--for College Town- Aparment Rentals

by Sean A McAlister
11 replies
Hey Warriors...

I have been beating my head against a wall trying to optimize a "monetizing" situation for the town I live in.

A big college town with pretty decent specific searches for apartments.

Now...this could be a good thread for others who live in or around a big university.

There is no real competition from what I have found maybe one or two sites and they do not have all of the apartment complexes. Only the ones that they they got paid to create a site for.

What are some idea's for monetizing this.

I was entertaining a idea of a rating system....once the site gained momentum kids/renters could maybe post on the blog. Not sure if this would backfire.

The competitor has a nice clean simple page with necessary info and a video. The video has some fancy music, some aerial photography and an apartment virtual tour. Of course the owners paid for that ....and I do not necessarily want to get into all that work....I would rather provide a link to that site.

Any idea's here....or is this a dead dog?


Thanks
Sean
#aparment #college #hereim #rentals #town #work
  • Profile picture of the author ahuddy
    Sounds like this idea could work out. Use it as a rating site like you said. Include pics of the building and apartments if possible, size of apartments and price. Length of contract required, down payment needed. Then make it possible for current renters to rate different aspects of the apartments. Give contact info for people interested in renting. You could start out by listing some of the apartments around you then try to sell others a listing on your site for a one time or monthly fee once your site grows enough.
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  • Profile picture of the author Tina M. Rideout
    I would think you would be setting up your site like a biz directory. Apartment listing etc.

    You could monetize the site by adding affiliate links to products that college students are interested in, example music, electronics, school supplies, etc.

    Add interesting fact based articles relative to your area, example team sports events, upcoming college news. etc.

    As I am in the process of adding this type of information to my biz directory.

    Tina
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    • Profile picture of the author Sean A McAlister
      Originally Posted by ahuddy View Post

      Sounds like this idea could work out. Use it as a rating site like you said. Include pics of the building and apartments if possible, size of apartments and price. Length of contract required, down payment needed. Then make it possible for current renters to rate different aspects of the apartments. Give contact info for people interested in renting. You could start out by listing some of the apartments around you then try to sell others a listing on your site for a one time or monthly fee once your site grows enough.
      Do you think you would have to ask permission first? I could not see how.
      The only issue i could see is misquoting rental information or something like that.

      Also, bad reviews could present a different spin and possible upset some of the commercial property owners....although that would spark more traffic to the site. Not to mention keep the land lords in line...hmm

      Originally Posted by Tina M. Rideout View Post

      I would think you would be setting up your site like a biz directory. Apartment listing etc.

      You could monetize the site by adding affiliate links to products that college students are interested in, example music, electronics, school supplies, etc.

      Add interesting fact based articles relative to your area, example team sports events, upcoming college news. etc.

      As I am in the process of adding this type of information to my biz directory.

      Tina
      True....the links are a good idea! Do you think the biz directory would msh well in a blog format??

      creative juices starting to flow here
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    • Profile picture of the author edynas
      Banned
      Do some offline legwork. Visit all your local big landlords/renting agencies and try to make a deal with them. Deal would be something like they can list the houses/appartments for free and when you find a renter they will pay you a commission. Make sure they undestand that you have the knowledge to make a website that will attract the right kind of people plus they have nothing to loose.
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      • Profile picture of the author edynas
        Banned
        Just saw the commission a landlord has to pay to rent.com (eBay) when they find a renter. It's $389 ( Rent.com: Learn about Success Fees )

        So this confirms my idea....goto all the landlords, get to know them and strike a deal with them. $200 - $300 commission if you can fill an apartment. Start with those that already have a listing at rent.com
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        • Profile picture of the author edynas
          Banned
          Some more ideas for you to consider

          -use Google maps (HousingMaps)
          -put the visitor in a funnel

          Funnel...you know they are looking for a new appartment/house. Make a checklist with everything you can think of that involvs mooving. next make that checklist online and let them anwser the questions like

          Are you moving the boxes yourself?
          -yes
          -no

          If they answer yes ask if they will need to rent a large van.
          With no show them movingcompanies

          -do you need movingboxes
          -new furniture
          -diy equipment
          -paint, wallpaper etc

          you can make this interactive by using the answer to show the info/links etc based upon what they answered. If you got really volume in visitors etc you can do the same as with the landlords and try to contact local painters, contractors, trucking companies, moovers etcetc to sea if you can make a deal with them

          Sorry for 3 replies but this was part of one idea I am still playing with for over a year now. Making a one-stop-place for all things related to finding an appartment/house and next try to monitize it to the max by providing helpfull info on all related things.

          Supose you got someone that not only get's an appartment thru your site but also decides to ask a quote for moving companies (like http://g.moving.com/) , quotes for local painter/contractor (http://www.bestcontractors.com/) and starts to shop for new kitchen appliences at amazon/ebay/buy.com thru your link...all because you know that's what's on their mind and you ask if they have thought about it
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  • Profile picture of the author getsmartt
    just a thought...

    Could this idea work with a pligg site vs a directory site? Load up all of the apartments available into pligg, the local community can rate them up and down, you can charge apartment owners extra for a featured listing?

    if you are not familiar with pligg it is an open source digg clone and you can see a new implementation in my sig
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    • Profile picture of the author Sean A McAlister
      Originally Posted by getsmartt View Post

      just a thought...

      Could this idea work with a pligg site vs a directory site? Load up all of the apartments available into pligg, the local community can rate them up and down, you can charge apartment owners extra for a featured listing?

      if you are not familiar with pligg it is an open source digg clone and you can see a new implementation in my sig

      Does pligg help with rankings?

      Pretty neat, I had never heard of it
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  • Profile picture of the author Andy Money
    Originally Posted by The IM Reporter View Post

    Hey Warriors...

    I have been beating my head against a wall trying to optimize a "monetizing" situation for the town I live in.

    A big college town with pretty decent specific searches for apartments.

    Now...this could be a good thread for others who live in or around a big university.

    There is no real competition from what I have found maybe one or two sites and they do not have all of the apartment complexes. Only the ones that they they got paid to create a site for.

    What are some idea's for monetizing this.

    I was entertaining a idea of a rating system....once the site gained momentum kids/renters could maybe post on the blog. Not sure if this would backfire.

    The competitor has a nice clean simple page with necessary info and a video. The video has some fancy music, some aerial photography and an apartment virtual tour. Of course the owners paid for that ....and I do not necessarily want to get into all that work....I would rather provide a link to that site.

    Any idea's here....or is this a dead dog?


    Thanks
    Sean
    I'm afraid of user generated content (like ratings, etc.). But then again I've never experimented using tons of traffic with something like this, so that might work if you can get enough traffic there. In my experience people aren't as willing to rate or take part in generating content as you'd imagine, which is a pain.

    I'm in Rochester currently, but back home in Syracuse the university is literally in my back yard, this is a good idea that could work although I don't know how much time or energy I'd put it into it at first.
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    • Profile picture of the author Sean A McAlister
      Originally Posted by mrsleep99 View Post

      I'm afraid of user generated content (like ratings, etc.). But then again I've never experimented using tons of traffic with something like this, so that might work if you can get enough traffic there. In my experience people aren't as willing to rate or take part in generating content as you'd imagine, which is a pain.

      I'm in Rochester currently, but back home in Syracuse the university is literally in my back yard, this is a good idea that could work although I don't know how much time or energy I'd put it into it at first.
      See that's the key....I do not want to neccessarily want to get involved with a large outlay of time with this one. But...that is what may be needed
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  • Profile picture of the author getsmartt
    Not sure about pligg ranking by itself, but there are some pretty high ranked pligg sites out there. They also seem to get quite a bit of interest from Digg when promoted as something like "New Digg clone for xyz market"

    mrsleep is right though getting people to actually vote is sometimes an issue, but you are going to be dealing with college "kids" that are used to voting things up in Digg/Youtube, so it might work out.

    There are also "star" ratings available in pligg so even if the voting is slow it is not as apparent.
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