Insights

Brands’ marketing moves must balance quick and engaging with deep and meaningful in an ever-evolving business landscape.

The marketing song remains the same: connect with audiences with content that makes a lasting and impactful impression. Yet, many business factors affecting brands can be dizzying in their dynamics, including consumer behaviors and tech advancements. Good marketing strategy is finding a way to align all the moving parts to reach that main objective.

That’s why it’s critical for branding professionals to stay on top of the latest marketing trends. Want to do more in 2024? Forbes counts down the top 5 marketing trends for the new year:

1. Conversational Marketing & AI-Driven Interactions

Waiting in line at the ol’ customer service desk in many ways seems like the Stone Age. In the era of smartphones and Siri, today’s consumer wants answers now. Catering to the immediate gratification consumer universe, conversational marketing “is poised to redefine customer interactions,” according to Forbes. AI-powered chatbots and virtual assistants allow brands to instantly engage consumers, addressing their informational needs and advancing their purchasing decisions. Through speed and personalization, such conversational marketing tools elevate the customer experience, which increases satisfaction and ultimately conversions.

2. Virtual & Augmented Reality Integration

The global virtual reality (VR) market is expected to grow from approximately $60 billion in 2022 to more than $435 billion by 2030. The possibilities are, well, virtually limitless for brands using VR and Augmented Reality as they continue to push to create captivating, immersive experiences for customers. One innovation allows residents in senior living communities to revisit their childhood home, wedding location or other special place from their past. Brands will increasingly incorporate these technologies into their marketing campaigns as VR and AR hardware become more accessible, Forbes notes.

3. Sustainability and Ethical Marketing

“From eco-friendly packaging to fair trade sourcing, marketing in 2024 is as much about values as it is about value,” writes Jennifer Gaier in Forbes. Increasingly, it’s not enough to do well with modern consumers; brands must do good by them as well. As reflected in the heightened corporate focus on ESG (environmental, social and governance), consumers these days go deeper beyond the sale or a campaign to what matters most to brands and how they regard and support things like environmental and social responsibility. Sustainability and ethical marketing are a smart way to grow meaningful connections with customers as well as the bottom line.

4. Hyper-Personalization Through Big Data and Analytics

The days of shotgun marketing are gone, and personalization and customized experiences are in. With so many ways to collect customer information and better and better processing technology, such as machine learning, brands better be taking advantage of Big Data and analytics to fashion “hyper-personalized marketing strategies where content, product recommendations and even advertisements are customized for individual consumers.”

5. Video Marketing and Short-Form Content Dominance

The fact that the number of U.S. households owning television sets grew from approximately 8,000 in 1946 to 45.7 million in 1960 is an old school, yet still very impressive confirmation of the power of the visual medium. In new school marketing, TikTok, YouTube Shorts and similar short-form video platforms are elevating the dominance of video. Used for more than just ads, “the ephemeral nature of this content, combined with its engaging visual appeal, aligns perfectly with the dwindling attention spans of modern audiences,” asserts Gaier.

“When your name means unlimitedness, you’d better be ready for new trends and challenges,” said Vince Vitti, infinitee’s VP, Employer Branding. “As brand makers, storytellers and creative advocates for your business, we’ll be there every step of the way to help your marketing team view challenge as opportunity and something new as a chance to improve.”

Social media posts should spur the moment while also being designed and executed in support of strategic brand goals, including audience engagement and customer loyalty.

What if you had a one in a hundred chance to catch your target audience when they're on Instagram? Research showing that users spend an average of 12 hours on the social media platform or about 1% of their time each month should make one thing clear to marketers: it’s really important to post when your top users are online to maximize engagement and ultimately increase conversions.

"Timing and consistency are the unsung heroes of social media success. Even the most compelling content deserves the spotlight at the right moment. In our experience, it’s not just about creating content, it’s curating moments that connect with our audience. Something that sticks with us constantly is “It's not just about what you say; it's about when and how often you say it.”

It can be all too easy for marketers to treat social media posting as merely a box to check on a to-do list or to schedule content based on some conventional wisdom on the daily calendar, but in the business of connection, it’s critical to do all you can to connect with your most important followers. HubSpot delves into why it's important to post to Instagram at specific and consistent times.

Increasing Engagement

The global average Instagram engagement rate is nearly 6%, according to 2023 HubSpot research. The software company likens engagement on the platform to throwing a rock in a still pool. Your brand wants staying power after the first ripple of immediate likes, comments and saves after posting. The next wave comes from Instagram features such as Favorites, Search and Videos, each interconnected but with its own independent algorithm. Posting at the right time helps beyond the immediate marketing moment.

For one of our clients, Tanger Outlets, a 2023 objective was to provide their audience with information on deals, savings, and promotions. Our strategy was focused on ways our audience could earn even more discounts strictly through social in an interactive way. Last year we introduced “comment to like” on Tanger’s Instagram and Facebook platforms which included copy that mentioned “Want XX off? Comment “YES” to learn more”. Once our audience responded in the comments, we would then send them a link that provided information on how to get more savings at their favorite stores. This kind of approach increased overall engagement but was also something we have adopted in our strategy moving forward.

Building a Loyal Audience

Marketers know that customer loyalty is not like flipping a switch; it takes time and effort to build. The timing of your social media posts factors into this important effort because setting expectations for your target audience and being consistent with your timing and touch helps build relationships. Followers who see that your brand wants to engage and, in addition to high-quality products and services, can count on that effort will keep it top of mind, making them more likely to develop devotion.

“Recognizing when your demographic and target market are most active online is crucial to building a loyal audience. It's not just about being present; it's about being present when it matters most to them. By aligning your content schedule with their online habits, you create a dynamic connection that resonates, engages, and leaves a lasting impression”.

Again with Tanger Outlets as an example, we are constantly monitoring when our audience is online, what content they are responding to, etc. It is our goal to understand our audience on a deeper level, so we can better understand their behaviors and what they will engage with.

Keep Time on Your Side

So what is the best time to post on Instagram? Posting between 6 and 9pm and 8 o’clock in particular on Friday (followed by Saturday and Wednesday) is optimal, according to 2023 HubSpot research.

But the real answer is perhaps one that the checklist marketers don’t want to hear: it depends. When is your audience online? Obviously, it matters the industry you’re targeting and whether they’re east or west coast. As Hubspot reports, people in financial services are easiest to reach on Instagram on Sunday nights while workers in agriculture are more available on Saturday mornings.

“From post timing to trying out different features to even testing new Instagram algorithms, let’s not lose sight of the fact that content quality is still essential — content is king,” said Tori Alexas, one of infinitee’s Brand Managers. “Once we get content to the high brand standards of utility and appeal, then we optimize with Instagram tools and tactics, including, of course, timing that caters to our target audience.”

The creative and analytical sides of marketing must come together to raise the standards of messaging, experience, values and culture in support of brand value.

Business has always been about how much you put in, but even more so what you get out of it:

Return on Investment. Yet, with marketing’s role to, so to speak, set the scene for sales, the connection from inputs to outputs has been traditionally viewed more as a dotted line. In a world with no shortage of metrics and pressure to produce though (combined with economic anxiety), how can CMOs prove brand worth?

“At a time when being able to demonstrate impact is more important than ever, the ability for marketers to quantify the value of the brand they’ve built can serve as an asset in difficult discussions with the C-suite, all while also serving as an indicator for the health of the business,” writes Deloitte Digital’s Maggie Windsor Gross and Mark Singer in Forbes.

The two opposing camps within marketing, the creatives and the analytical, must find common ground to prove brand worth. Stronger together, armed “with precise, data-driven insights that emphasize brand impact and how brand investment lifts every part of the company,” they’ll be able to stand that ground versus the C-suite and any other critics. According to Deloitte Digital, they can do so by using the following marketing benchmarks: Values Alignment, Experience Satisfaction, Message Memorability and Share of Culture.

Values Alignment

More than three out of every four consumers (76%) would refuse to buy from a company that supported an issue conflicting with their beliefs, one study found. That’s the importance of Values Alignment, which when achieved can send a brand’s customer loyalty score substantially higher than industry averages. It fuels the trust part of the marketing-sales funnel that leads to bottom line results. “Research shows brands that do best here are purpose-driven and are unafraid of taking a stand on social and societal issues,” asserts the Deloitte Digital team.

Experience Satisfaction

Did you know that 32% of all customers would stop doing business with a brand they loved after one bad experience? And, as you’ve probably heard, unhappy customers will tell twice as many people about their bad experience as completely satisfied customers will tell about their positive ones. Not surprisingly, Experience Satisfaction, the second marketing benchmark, is vital. “The brands that perform best are human-first [rather than digital-first],” writes Gross and Singer.

Message Memorability

Like traditional brand trackers, this benchmark measures how quality content connects with the right people at the right time in the right place. Combining creativity and calculation, top brands performing well in this metric convert up to 75 out of 100 customers, showcasing full marketing-sales funnel performance, according to Deloitte Digital.

Share of Culture

This final metric prioritizes brand interaction and participation with customers. Companies that take part in extensive and inclusive cultural conversations with consumers broaden those relationships and elicit deeper feelings from them. That leads to staying power and, as Gross and Singer state, a new marketing channel: word-of-mouth recommendations.

“Since branding has been our thing for more than 31 years, you shouldn’t be surprised to know we’re brand defenders as well. That means showing the branding goods but also the gains,” said Amy Norton, Infinitee’s Director  of Strategy & Accounts. “With a reputation of combining a creative, personal touch with measurable results, we can elevate your game and boost your brand’s worth.”

Marketers seek to balance the ‘wow factor’ in today’s digital world with the tried and true principles of effective customer engagement.

Digital marketing is changing at the speed of technology. Advancements such as generative AI, virtual and augmented reality, social commerce and others have brought about a revolution in how businesses interact with customers and how personalized and immersive marketing experiences can be. By understanding and maximizing these movements, brands can elevate customer engagement and increase conversions.

Noting there isn’t a single solution that covers all scenarios, Newsweek focused on the following emerging digital trends that can help propel marketers ahead of the competition.

Virtual and Augmented Reality

Think of the typical car dealership glossy brochure. Now think of being able to virtually step inside your dream car model – from the comfort of your own home – and inspect its features and even do a simulated test drive. Which marketing experience will resonate more? The one with more vroom (and VR room!).

Marketers know the more captivating and immersive the experience the better, and virtual and augmented reality are revolutionizing the way to achieve that with customers. “Although it may seem distant for small businesses, global brands are already capitalizing on these opportunities,” writes CEO and branding expert Erica McMillan.

Generative AI

Marketers should already know about generative AI’s various timesaving capabilities, from automating daily tasks to generating ads or content. But McMillan, noting the “significant shifts in consumer behavior” in this area, raises the possible concern of the target audience using the same tools, like ChatGPT, thus pulling from the same Internet-scoured data.

“Businesses and marketers must elevate their content strategies… [by] providing unique perspectives and expert insights that cannot be easily duplicated by generative AI tools,” she wrote. “The focus should shift towards delivering value-added information that's derived from hands-on experience in the subject.”

Social Commerce

Integrating shopping with social interactions on social media platforms offers much greater connection than traditional online methods, including sales-only siloes elsewhere in the e-commerce realm. Brands can leverage captivating photos and engaging videos like always but with the personal, emotional and quite valuable stamp of approval from one’s social media followers, i.e., friends. One marketing guru noted that 90% of folks trust peers on social networks while only 15 to 18% trust brands.

The interactive nature of social commerce is so important. By allowing customers to ask questions and otherwise engage with brands, a powerful connection is made where customers build confidence in purchase decisions while companies glean valuable insights to better understand the market.

“Going for the home run, so to speak, with AI or virtual/augmented reality tools is important because as marketers we should strive for what we call ‘limitless possibilities’ with the brand experience,” said Vince Vitti, infinitee’s VP, Business Development. “But given engagement realities like 72% of consumers having used a voice assistant, let’s also make sure our singles hitters – voice search, chatbots, live chat and messaging apps – are aligned and primed to keep people engaged and enjoying their customer journey with the brand.”

While marketers rush to embrace the advantages of the advanced technology, they should also study the catches and liabilities.

Imagine if your marketing team had a tool to quickly devise 10 or more ad angles for a video shoot based on customer reviews or one that could read thousands of those reviews and speedily summarize the testimonials for optimized customer service response. Imagine no longer. Generative AI is here to help generate large volumes of content in seconds and reduce monotonous tasks and other busywork.

But before you go thinking that the technology will be your everyday failsafe “easy button,” be sure to know the bumps and risks along the robotic road. Generative AI brings with it content and even legal concerns set against the battlefield backdrop of human worth versus technological advancement.

“There has always been a tension between the art and the science of marketing and creativity, even when the technology was much more rudimentary than that of generative AI,” Jay Pattisall, a vice president and principal analyst at Forrester Research, told the Wall Street Journal. “Machines in whatever form simply just can’t replace or replicate human creativity. That was true then, and it is absolutely true now.”

Eyes to Optimize

Generative AI definitely can help creative professionals in marketing and advertising come up with ideas and work more quickly, saving valuable time. Audience segmentation, customer service chatbots, programmatic advertising, SEO and e-commerce are other key uses for which companies are leveraging the technology.

On the content creation front, Wesley ter Haar points out that generative AI helps marketers “visualize and test out different concepts at speed. You can also easily swap out different elements — like changing the background, changing characters — at any point in the production process without having to go back to the drawing board,” said the digital advertising and marketing services executive, adding that AI may also help brands battle “creative fatigue.” And weariness from tedious, rote tasks, such as analyzing those aforementioned customer reviews, can be greatly reduced as well.

When AI Turns Unnatural or Even Unlawful

“I’m not laughing with it — I’m laughing at it,” Mint Mobile’s CMO said about the AI ad featuring actor and part owner Ryan Reynolds. Yes, while many pros rightfully court the potential for the technology to boost advertising through automation, there is still a disconnect. Pattisall points out that while generative AI’s ability to write prose has turned many a head, it is still only generating output from data and not originating thought or expression.

It’s been said that our potential for innovation, problem-solving and growth is only as good as the data we collect. AI’s definitely got the data collection part down, but what if the information is incorrect, biased or copyrighted?

AI users should be watchful for this possibility and mindful of the inherent risk of sharing such data in a customer-facing way. Marketers should know the data sources that train their generative AI models. Such major concerns, along with the question of who owns an idea originating from a machine, led ter Haar to say, “I’m sure the lawsuits will be extremely interesting.”

“AI definitely piques our firm’s ‘limitless possibilities’ mentality and dovetails with our constant striving to leverage innovative tactics for our clients, but we also must realize that it’s an evolving technology that requires smart, grounded planning and due diligence,” said Tim Patton, CEO at infinitee. “For more than 31 years, we’ve been balancing that ‘art and science of marketing and creativity’ and can do so for your brand.”

Though small and silent, quiet rooms can raise an apartment community’s profile while boosting its multi-use advantage.

In a marketing world of constant striving for bigger and better engagement, ‘quiet down’ isn’t a thing, but in the apartment sector quiet up just might be. Quiet rooms, spaces that can be isolated from larger multi-purpose or community rooms, could be the newest must-have for multifamily owners and operators looking to boost a community’s amenity profile and ultimately fuel sales.

Quiet rooms are designed for small meetings, work requiring calm and concentration, video or conference calls, student tutoring, playing board games and hosting private luncheons and dinners, even wine tastings, reports Cooperator News. They also provide an alternative from one’s residential unit or community density.

Design of the Times

Near, adjacent to or a part of a larger multi-purpose space, quiet rooms should be separated from the bigger area with walls and a movable door. Sliding doors allow the space to be added to the greater communal room as needed, and glass ones allow residents to see if someone is in there, according to design firm principal Marilyn Sygrove, adding that a large flat-screen TV, a round table and chairs for work/study and gatherings are popular furniture components for quiet rooms.

There’s value in variety, of course, but for apartment communities looking to separate themselves through their amenities offerings it’s also about maximizing space, including reviving dead space, and complementary design. Future-proofing is difficult; incorporating multi-use spaces is a good hedge.

With the goal of carving out more work-from-home locations, Greystar redesigned a fitness center in San Diego to add three “Zoom rooms”: one a quiet room accommodating two people, a small room that can be used for video calls and another like the second, only larger. “Being able to pivot is important. You can’t set a design three years ago and not be able to move as the market moves,” Raul Tamez, Greystar’s senior director of development, told the National Apartment Association.

Some Restrictions May Apply

Like any shared apartment amenity, there must be rules. Just as Bob can’t have a raging pool party at all hours of the night and Becky can’t take over half of the clubhouse with her cosmetics business, the quiet room must come with its own checks and balances and regulations to serve the interests of the whole community. Obviously, scheduling through an efficient reservation system is key with a shared resource.

CN brings up another possible point of contention: should quiet rooms be child-free zones? While scheduling is important no matter what, Sygrove recommends an adult supervision requirement as a happy medium. That way, children can enjoy the space provided it’s an overseen activity such as tutoring or a family board game night.

With the post-COVID getaway mindset from crowds to the outdoors, suburbs or merely one’s home office, quiet rooms just make sense. Heeding the pandemic lessons, apartment owners and operators can come up big by accommodating for smaller groups.

“’Quiet please’ isn’t just a request you hear at the library or movies, it’s a reflection of a fresh personal need in the multifamily sphere, a new meaning to being a part of an apartment community,” said Michael Rivera, infinitee’s creative director. “From quiet rooms to your next amenity play, we’re ready to help your company make some marketing noise.”

Marketers have a direct, impactful way to engage their target audience, but there are many ways to fall short on e-marketing open, click and conversion rates.

How important is email marketing? Despite a recent doubter trend, the numbers confirm that it’s still a powerful, direct-to-audience tool. After all, 99% of consumers check email every day with it being by far the preferred way to receive updates from brands, reports Hubspot, and 73% of Millennials hold email as the preferred mode of communication from businesses. Two out of every five B2B marketers say e-newsletters are “most critical” to their content marketing.

With that said, how important is it to get email marketing right? Let us count the ways… companies get it wrong.

Not Defining the Goal or What Success Looks Like

To be impactful with e-marketing, you must first be intentional. Companies should have a clear picture of what they want to achieve or the “why” of the email, according to Search Engine Journal. Sending out an e-blast meant to drive audience interaction warrants different email copy, call to action and other components than one meant to get leads. Know the end goal and plan backward so that your marketing funnel is as streamlined as possible.

You can't really know where you are going until you know where you’ve been, it’s been said, and the wisdom applies to e-marketing as well. We must measure past performance, i.e., evaluate the road traveled, to be able to chart the best course ahead. From click-through to conversion rates and unsubscribes to unique opens, there are many metrics by which to measure success. E-newsletters have different objectives and thus different key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure that success. For example, the success metric of a welcome email would be open, not conversion, rate.

Not Knowing Your Audience

Knowing whom you’re targeting with your messaging is a basic principle of communications. But what does it mean exactly for e-marketing? Whether decision-makers, influencers or others, write for the target persona with whom you want to maximize engagement.

And know that your e-marketing audience doesn’t always want to be sold. Sending only sales-focused emails is “considered a huge mistake for email marketers, especially when you’ve just started,” according to Search Engine Journal. People want to be welcomed, interested, educated and more before they see a sales pitch. Remember the marketing and sales funnel progression — a like feeling comes well ahead of a buying commitment — and know that overselling could result in lost subscribers or low engagement.

Not Getting Interactive

Compelling copy is a must in your e-newsletter, but the offering needs much more. Personalization, participatory elements (e.g., quizzes, surveys and polls) and a prominent call to action (CTA) will help boost interactions, which include opens, clicks, replying or forwarding, and signing up for a webinar. Search Engine Journal emphasizes the importance of conversational, personalized CTAs, which, according to HubSpot, convert 202% better than basic ones.

“It sounds simple, but marketers want action, and email marketing is a great, direct way to do it,” said Amy Norton, infinitee’s Director, Strategy & Accounts. “But to get to the ultimate desired action of increased conversions, brands need to commit to interaction, which brings greater engagement, boosted metrics and enhanced brand awareness and customer loyalty. We are here to help.”

By leveraging linguistic drivers, marketers can create higher impact content that nets more than just views.

Content is king, but there’s a difference between catching people’s attention with your marketing efforts and captivating them. Increased views and clicks are good and necessary objectives, but how do marketers keep an audience engaged, maximizing focus on their content?

From brands to consumers, managers to employees, teachers to their students and on and on, the goal to gain and hold an audience’s attention is practically universal. The key is to analyze how content, including the language used, shapes and holds the audience’s attention. A 2023 Journal of Marketing study, which performed a multi-method investigation utilizing natural language processing of more than 600,000 reading sessions from 35,000 pieces of content, combined with controlled experiments, offers key lessons for chief marketing officers.

Holding Attention

What moves content consumers past the head-turned, “window shopping” stage to one of sustained attention and interaction? The JM study emphasizes the important role of emotional language and shows how different verbal features shape content consumption.

How effective emotional language is in sustaining attention will depend on the link between specific emotions, uncertainty and arousal. For example, anxiousness by nature is more uncertain than anger and will typically “increase attention and processing as people try to resolve what will happen.”

The study suggests that language channeling high-arousal emotions should sustain attention and encourage continued consumption. Using our example, anxiety checks both the uncertainty and arousal boxes while anger scores only in the latter and thus would typically score lower in eliciting consumer consumption. At the other extreme, sadness would trigger neither uncertainty nor arousal.

Two Sides of the Content Coin

Improving content creation is obviously important for advertisers, marketers, publishers and presenters, but are they focused on how to sustain attention versus merely getting it? Even some experts still think that holding people’s attention is almost entirely dependent on topic (e.g., celebrity gossip rather than financial literacy), but the study digs deeper into how language, the building blocks of content, factors into how consumers react.

“What holds attention is not always the same as what grabs attention or encourages word of mouth,” according to the study. “While more certain language can increase likes and shares, we show that emotions that make people feel certain are actually detrimental when it comes to sustaining attention… Retaining attention is a different type of engagement.”

This content reality holds huge consequence, from your company’s bottom line to the nearly $600 billion digital marketing industry as a whole to even the enormous implications of social media’s role in the dissemination of disinformation and hate speech.

“From authors to heads of state, everyone wants, if not demands, attention, but we can’t all be the Pied Piper of persuasion, whisking away the audience to our desired place or action in one fell swoop,” said Tori Alexis, one of infinitee’s  Brand Managers. “Connection is so vital to marketers so it’s imperative to know the building blocks, most notably language, of successful content creation. And team up with a veteran partner who can help with innovative, creative, highly-engaging and high-impact marketing strategies.”

From personal to community appeal, retail owners, operators & occupiers look to leverage experiences, services and, of course, places to rise above the competition.

Oh, won’t you stay just a little bit longer? For retail owners to get consumers to stay on property more, they must identify and establish differentiators in their centers. To get that zing, you must do the fresh thing.

Despite major industry and economic disruptors in recent years, retail by and large has forged ahead. What keeps locations relevant in a time of such shifting demands and needs?

Writing in RE Business Online, Barry Caylor, vice president of business development at Outside the Lines Inc., recommends “leaning into what attributes make [retail owners] different. By continually supplying the market with fresh concepts and new ways of presenting them, landlords can keep consumers coming back again and again.” The result is greater foot traffic and increased sales for tenants, as well as enhanced ROI for investors.

Are You Experiential?

“There’s no place like home when you’re this far away,” sang the late, great Jimmy Buffett. Not that retail lifestyle centers are akin to far-off tropical destinations, but they should offer, beyond goods and services, a standout experience and unique sense of place. Yes, e-commerce has become indispensably convenient, but people still need to get out of the house, especially those of us who work, sleep, eat and parent there.

“There is simply no comparison between clicking a few boxes on a screen and visiting a beautifully designed retail center with artfully displayed merchandise that can be tried on and touched,” Caylor asserts. “Adding gourmet food and beverage options and a wealth of enjoyable activities to pass the time in between browsing and buying further enhances the overall experience. The first is purely functional, while the second is a feast for the senses.”

When sales growth and brand loyalty are on the line, retail centers and their tenants must go beyond filling a one-stop need, the mere tick on the shopper’s checklist (which e-commerce typically covers). Attractive outside gathering spaces, interactive elements, live entertainment events and retailer activations appeal to the senses and people’s social nature, adding beyond fun and stimulation a communal component and, of course, keeping visitors on site for hours at a time, thus boosting the sales of tenants.

Service – Upfront & Personal

Need that in a different color? Want to check to see how this fits? Open to alternative suggestions based on your budget concerns or even facial expression? Yeah, chatbots got nothing on in-person service.

While daily-needs retail, including service offerings, have always drawn consistent customer traffic — and investor attention — lifestyle retail centers can take that amenity to a new level, as Caylor puts it, from valet parking to foot massages and coffee. As the saying goes, people may forget what you did, but they will never forget how you made them feel. A big differentiator in today’s retail world can come from creatively “pampering and delighting” customers with a personal touch that they obviously can’t find online.

“We love that new school of retail design thought that shifts the focus from spaces to environments, customers to communities and communications to conversations,” said Marcia Homer, infinitee’s Director of Brand Management. “Our team’s belief in great ideas, personal touch and endless possibilities dovetails with that placemaking philosophy and the focus on experiences, quality services and delightful gathering places. If a job's worth doing, it's worth doing well — and fresh.”

Multifamily owners and operators are feeling competitive pressure from single-family rentals to upgrade amenity packages.

What happens when more than half of customers would rather be somewhere else? It doesn’t take John Maynard Keynes to figure out that adjustments will need to be made. There’s a new kid in town, so to speak, with single-family rentals (SFR) and multifamily, the former belle of the real estate ball, will have to up its amenity game in response.

While most U.S. renters live in high-density apartments, 51 percent would actually prefer to live in a single-family rental home, Multifamily Dive reported, citing Bethesda, Md.-based real estate consultant RCLCO’s  2023 National Renter Consumer Preferences Report. Furthermore, an additional 21% of respondents said they prefer a townhouse or duplex.

Now we understand that bigger is generally better regarding living space and household sizes only increase, but there’s more to the current SFR hot streak. Take Millennials, the largest generation in the U.S., for a big example: they are in their prime single-family occupancy years and can reap the advantages of renting, including no down payment or maintenance responsibilities, as well as an easier exit strategy when deciding to move.

Economically, the U.S. housing shortage continues to shut many out of the for-sale market. And the COVID-19 exodus away from high-density apartment living to more spacious residences in the suburbs served as a blueprint for this single-family shift.

That’s why it’s never been more important for multifamily owners and operators to stay on top of evolving renter preferences. When it comes to amenities, it’s not how many a community offers, but “whether or not they meet the needs of renters in a way that makes sound financial sense to the owner,” writes Multifamily Loans’ Jeff Hamann.

ML published its top 5 amenities to add to a multifamily property: package lockers, smart home features, green transportation initiatives, pet accommodations and the right outdoor space based on renter demographics. RCLCO’s survey found that new kitchen appliances, walk-in closets and oversized kitchen pantries accounted for the most popular unit features, while security-related items were the top building amenities: a front desk attendant or gated community and a secure package receiving system.

Amenity preferences tended to differ widely by age group — including commute distance and children's play areas — but more than 80% of all renters view green features as important, with over half willing to pay more for them, Multifamily Dive reported. Walkability to surrounding retail, restaurants and open areas gained consensus as well. Pools, fitness centers and other leisure amenities not surprisingly remain popular, according to the study.

How will multifamily owners further differentiate their product? Build-to-rent units making up 6.9% of the nation’s 2022 single-family starts is a trend that should continue, if not expand, asserts an RCLCO principal.

And on the buy side, about one-quarter of homes in Jacksonville (27%) and Atlanta (25%) to nearly one-third in Miami (31%) were purchased by investors in fourth quarter 2022, according  to data from Redfin.

“When both economic expansion and disturbance work to a real estate sector’s advantage like that of the single-family rental housing market, it puts pressure on multifamily, which has plenty of competition in and amongst itself,” said Michael Rivera, infinitee’s creative director. “Change can be daunting, but the apartment sector still has really solid fundamentals. View it as new, exciting opportunity and take it on with a marketing partner that combines a ‘limitless possibilities’ mentality and a commitment to high-impact strategies and innovative tactics.”

One can find evidence to support each side of the RTO-WFH discussion, but work-life balance should be personal and responsive.

Canceling “Summer Fridays” right before Labor Day? While a proverbial slap in the face to workers before the holiday that celebrates their year-round contributions, the timing is no doubt better than before the Fourth of July. Make no mistake about it though: Goldman Sachs’ high-profile push to get its staff to return to the office five days a week is the latest salvo in the ongoing, nationwide return to office (RTO) debate.

We’ve discussed before in this space how a major side effect of the pandemic has been increased employee flexibility as millions were forced into, then embraced remote and hybrid working. That freedom will not be easily (or ever) relinquished. Furthermore, the major labor shortage persists. According to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, if every unemployed person from Portland, Maine, to Portland, Ore., found a job, the country would still have around 4 million open positions. Work from anywhere has another connotation in this employee’s market.

Still, company bosses, office owners and pretty much any and all stakeholders in the beleaguered sector are making their RTO position heard, especially this long after the end of COVID-19. CNBC reported that major corporations such as Disney, Starbucks and BlackRock are requiring more time at the office for their employees.

As of spring, the amount of companies requiring in-office work had more than doubled year over year. Nearly two-thirds (65%) of corporate real estate executives reported that their companies now require employees to return to the office at least some of the time, up from 31% a year earlier, according to CBRE's Spring 2023 U.S. Office Occupiers Sentiment Survey.

Financial/professional services firms lead the way in that regard at 71% while tech companies are only at 56%, Bisnow reported. Of the 207 corporate real estate executives who participated in the survey, 45% want mostly in-person work, up from 8 percentage points since 2022, versus 22% who want a mostly remote work format, up from 15% last year. Although 40% of survey respondents expect office attendance to increase, more than half at big companies expect to further decrease their office footprints as leases expire.

When it comes to RTO, there’s the good, the bad and the funny. On one hand, office workers are 18% more productive, according to an MIT and UCLA study. On the other, CoStar reported an all-time high office space availability rate of 16.4% after first quarter. Then there’s Zoom, the epitome of remote working, requiring more in-person office time for its workers.

Justin Owings, in his book Exec on the Desk, a play on “Elf on the Shelf,” quips, “[Leaders] hope water coolers and hallway collisions spark innovation. Only when people show up, the heads go down and the headphones go on. How else do you defend yourself from the assault of the open, collision-friendly office?”

The path forward and possibilities for office-using organizations and their employees definitely seem open and collision-conducive.

“We’re still relatively early in this massive upheaval of work life and office use, but we go back to the ol’ truism ‘our people are our greatest asset,’” said Vince Vitti, infinitee’s vice president of business development and the firm’s recruitment marketing guru. “Companies must do right by their people with RTO so they can stay on course to reach their goals.”

The report of on-site retail’s demise has been greatly exaggerated. Let us count the ways.

The saying ‘you had to be there’ didn’t apply to malls in the last decade-plus or any retail place during the pandemic, but people know — even if occasionally having to relearn — that there’s nothing like in-person shopping, dining and entertainment. Retail centers offer more than goods and services; they offer variety, discovery and, perhaps most importantly coming off COVID-19, the opportunity for social interaction and experiences.

GlobeSt. examined how physical stores remain “a vital backbone for the retail industry.” Everyone from lifestyle centers and big box stores to discount shops and mom & pops will like its conclusion: “While you can take retail out of the store, you can’t take the store out of retail.”

By the Numbers

It was not surprising in the least that e-commerce volume jumped significantly during COVID-19. E-commerce grew from 11.1% of total sales in fourth quarter 2019 to 16.4% by June 2020, according to Census Bureau data, but then back to 14.7% by the middle of 2022. By November 2022, the portion of consumers shopping on retail brick and mortar sites was about par with where it had been pre-pandemic, GlobeSt. reported referencing survey data from CapGemini’s 2023 consumer behavior study.

Those industry pundits insisting that e-commerce would become the dominant form of retail ignored the power of the people, specifically indomitable human nature that will always spur people to get out, socialize, and stop and smell the retail roses. Furthermore, stores support communities with necessity products and services and can rally them with on-site activations, which e-commerce obviously can’t.

“If you’re a pure-play e-commerce, it is expensive and time-consuming to reach people,” said Stephanie Cegielski, Vice President of Research at the International Council of Shopping Centers.

More Bricks & Mortar Benefits

Retail brick & mortar is the full complement or, better put, full of complements. The old-school way is harmonizing tenants that trigger walkup customer traffic for each other. The new wave manifests in a halo effect supporting retail omnichannel strategy: when a store opens, online sales for the retailer in that market increases 37%, while if a store closes, online sales decrease 33%, according to Cegielski.

Site selection obviously is critical across the entire commercial real estate spectrum. Students in the first week of Real Estate 101 know that – location, location, location – but in retail, effectively placed stores can also serve as their own advertising.

Getting Smarter

The reality is that with e-commerce consumers have another option if on-site retail is not satisfactory. That has made the latter work to be better. One key lesson learned by store operators is to commit to very good service, with hands-on expertise becoming a “pivot point” for why customers want to come into the store.

“So much of what our customers rely on us for is expertise,” said Craig McNair, Batteries Plus’ chief retail officer. “It’s about experience, multichannel, to get products and services in the ways you want to get them.”

Speaking of multichannel, it’s like experience goes both ways—on the giving or service end as well as receiving or experiential. It all counts for customer experience, which has never been more important in the retail world.

“If you need proof that the social, experiential need of consumers will never go away, just look around at the countless concerts and sporting events, as well as the rebounding travel industry. The same rings true for retail,” said Michael Rivera, infinitee’s creative director. “Whether reimagining your retail space or refining operations based on post-pandemic lessons, keep your eye on the customer and find yourself a good marketing partner.”