LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Apartments.com, powered by CoStar, yesterday launched a groundbreaking advertising campaign featuring actor Jeff Goldblum as Brad Bellflower, the eccentric Silicon Valley Maverick and visionary futurist behind the all-new, completely redesigned Apartments.com. Developed by agency of record, RPA, the strategy for the campaign is to position Apartments.com as the ultimate ally for apartment searchers, with more listings than any other apartment-listing website.
Using a Web 5.0 look and feel to emphasize the benefits of the new Apartments.com experience, the integrated campaign thematically leverages the lofty tag line: “Change your apartment. Change the world.” to irreverently communicate the company’s commitment to meeting the needs of renters rather than catering primarily to landlords as rental websites have done in the past.
“Like any good Silicon Valley maverick, Brad’s vision for his apartment rentals website is nothing less than to change the world. But hyperbole and parody aside, finding a great place to live or moving to a new area really does change your world,” said CoStar Group founder & CEO Andrew C. Florance.
Several Apartments.com new features include custom search filters, a Polygon™ search tool that enables the user to define the area they want to search in by drawing the shape on a map, a Plan Commute tool that selects properties within a desired commute time between the rental location and a specified address, photos, video walk-throughs and detailed neighborhood information.
An expansive, year-long national, regional, local and hyper-local media buy is designed to reach 95 percent of target audience 18 to 49 years old, delivering more than 3 billion impressions, to create awareness and excitement for Apartments.com and increase website traffic.
“Apartments.com is determined to communicate with every renter in the country. Jeff Goldblum perfectly portrays Brad, an over-exaggerated tech powerhouse, to capture attention for Apartments.com—the best apartment site on the market—while establishing the website as a trusted resource that will ensure people find the place they’ll love,” said Joe Baratelli, CCO at RPA.
TV launched yesterday during “The Walking Dead” with 30-second “Launch” (as well as online only :60 version) and continues with an onslaught of buzz-worthy placements, with seven unique spots rolling out on more than 70 network programs and 30 cable networks, as well as during high-profile premieres and season finales such as “The Bachelor,” “Dancing with the Stars,” “Empire” and “Survivor” and MLB and NBA games and NBA playoffs.
Digital and social are deeply woven into the launch and sustaining strategies for Apartments.com, including extensive investments in search and high-impact homepage activations across CNN, Gizmodo, Lifehacker, Yahoo and YouTube.
Through partnerships with leading digital publishers such as Buzzfeed, Gawker, The Huffington Post and Wired, Apartments.com will create highly shareable custom content that will be placed natively both on the sites and throughout social media.
In addition, Apartments.com will launch the Brad Bellflower character across Facebook and Twitter, allowing Bellflower to flex his maverick muscles in the digital environments he knows best. Across each of these platforms, Bellflower will showcase his myriad worldly insights using meta native formats like image quotes, tweetstorms and screenshorts—following the style of other Silicon Valley titans.
Widespread out-of-home on bulletins and posters, rail/subway stations, wrapped trains, transit shelters and street kiosks will feature Brad Bellflower spouting Apartments.com truths—“We put the .com in apartments,” “Need a new place? Surf the apartminternet.” and “The Most Polygonal Search Online.” Customized local radio, TV and outdoor advertising will be targeted to Atlanta, Baltimore, Charlotte (N.C.), Chicago, Dallas, Detroit, Los Angeles, Hampton Roads (Va.), Houston, Nashville (Tenn.), Minneapolis, New York, Philadelphia, Phoenix and Washington, D.C.
Apartments.com plans to reinforce the consumer campaign with the most aggressive search engine marketing (SEM) program in the apartment industry, along with a major business-to-business campaign introducing the new website features and advertising model to the trade audience, apartment owners and property managers.
About RPA
RPA, headquartered in Santa Monica, Calif., is a leading independent full-service advertising agency, whose mission is to unlevel the playing field for their clients. RPA has a proven track record of building brands while building businesses into positions of category leadership, and has been rewarded with many long-term client relationships because of it. RPA’s client list includes American Honda, ARCO, Los Angeles Clippers, Dropbox for Business, Farmers Insurance Group, Intuit Small Business, La-Z-Boy, Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino and pivot TV. For more information, visit http://www.rpa.com.
About CoStar Group
CoStar Group, Inc. (Nasdaq:CSGP) is the leading provider of commercial real estate information, analytics and online marketplaces. Founded in 1987, CoStar conducts expansive, ongoing research to produce and maintain the largest and most comprehensive database of commercial real estate information. Our suite of online services enables clients to analyze, interpret and gain unmatched insight on commercial property values, market conditions and current availabilities. Through LoopNet, the Company operates the most heavily trafficked commercial real estate marketplace online with more than 9 million registered members. Apartments.com is a premier online apartment resource for renters that matches apartment seekers with great apartment homes and provides property managers and owners a proven platform for marketing their properties. CoStar operates websites that have over 19 million unique monthly visitors in aggregate during January 2015. Headquartered in Washington, DC, CoStar maintains offices throughout the U.S. and in Europe and Toronto, Canada with a staff of over 2,400 worldwide, including the industry's largest professional research organization. For more information, visit www.costargroup.com.
About Apartments.com
Apartments.com (http://www.apartments.com) is a leading national apartment Internet listing service drawing on millions of rental units from CoStar Group's extensive database of commercial and multifamily properties, managed properties and user-submitted listings. By incorporating the most relevant information and services to renters, including current availabilities, rental rates and fees, rich neighborhood content, customizable search filters and tools, professional photography, walk-through videos and 3D tours, highly visible ads, powerful filters and search tools, Apartments.com creates easy access to its listings for 100 million renters searching online for great rental homes. Renters are able to access Apartments.com via a responsive website and iPad, iPhone and Android apps. Providing unmatched exposure for its advertisers through an intuitive name, strategic search engine placements and innovative emerging media, Apartments.com reaches millions of renters nationwide, driving both qualified traffic and highly engaged renters to leasing offices nationwide. Apartments.com also owns rental website Apartment Home Living (http://www.apartmenthomeliving.com), a leading social media apartment website distinguished by a "live for fun" community experience, proprietary lifestyle matching and local living guides to help renters find their perfect place to live.