This post is part of a series of posts on the benefits of property management software. For an overview of the benefits of property management software, see Property Management Software: Why You Need It. Need help choosing? See How to Choose Property Management Software: 11 Tips.
People are online all the time searching or shopping  for something…and that includes apartment rental opportunities and people to manage the rental homes they own.
A marketing website gives you the ability to present yourself professionally to the world.  Whether it’s showing off your leasing opportunities to attract new tenants, or showing off your company’s services to attract new rental owners for new business, it’s important to have a public website for these folks to land on so they can learn more about what you have to offer.
Your Public Website
Online property management software can offer you a public website that can be completely built out for you (usually for an added cost) or is already partially built for you, but easily customizable (often included in the subscription price).
A public website not only helps increase your public profile in a professional looking way, but also provides a much easier searching and shopping experience for prospective tenants or rental owners interested in what you have to offer. Get more leads through rental listing searches on your website, the ability to apply for an apartment and pay and application fee online, document sharing, and online contact forms all hosted on one site.
Even better is that while you’re providing a great search and shop experience, the features on the public website will tie in with your property management software, so you can really save time and increase efficiency in your leasing efforts and and vetting leads for more business.
Easy Rental Listing Syndication
Tired of posting all those vacancy ads to multiple sites? Create searchable rental listings from your property management software that automatically get pushed out to your public site quickly, using the pictures and descriptions already tied to your properties in the software. Some software will even have options like easy Craigslist posting or automatic rental listing syndication, which will push those listings out at the same time to other advertising sites, like Zillow or Trulia, without you having to do much else.
Customizable Rental Applications
Do you still have piles of paper applications that you sort through to vette your tenant candidates?  Having a customizable online application available for prospective tenants to submit will bring all their information over to the admin side of the software in an organized, paperless, and easily searchable way. It can also help you collect your application fees a lot easier by collecting those through electronic payment at the time the application is submitted. If they don’t provide payment information, the application doesn’t go through, warding off the tire kickers who are applying for the sake of applying, saving you the hassle of having to accept every application that comes your way, fee or not.
An Online Contact Form
Having your time sucked up by applicants and prospective rental owners on the phone? An online contact form will gather leads for you, but will also help keep informational requests from flooding in on the phone or through your answering service. Those questions all get captured in one place to help you manage how and when you’re responding.
Enhance Your Existing Website
Already have a marketing website that you love? Property management software’s public websites can be linked in or integrated with your existing site, so you can keep what you already have, but get the functionality that is linked into the software itself. Just like U2, a lot of people still haven’t found what they’re looking for. Putting yourself out there with a public website will help them find you.
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