Tracking Attendance At Your Apartment Party

Ask 100 different apartment property managers what attendance they get at their summer apartment party and the overwhelming majority will say 25%. With such a large number of people answering the same way, that must be a pretty good rule of thumb, right? Wrong!

People are notoriously bad at estimating, especially when they are not used to trying to estimate something. So when a property manager tells me that she usually gets 25% of her residents to attend their apartment party, I just smile and tell her “good job”. No use in arguing, right? But for those of you ready to really optimize your resident events, one of the biggest keys is to understand what is working and what isn’t. What is the best day to have a party? What about the time of day? What are the best ways to market the party to your residents? You may have some great ideas about all these things, but until you actually do the math, you really have no idea!

But how do you actually track attendance? It’s difficult to count a party’s attendance in the first place, with people moving, hidden behind things, and other issues. Add in the fact that some people leave early, stop by late, and it is extremely hard to track! So one technique I recommend is using raffle tickets. Raffle tickets are a great way to give out prizes at different times during the event, and PLUS, they can be counted! The hardest part is making sure someone stays at the door to give out a ticket to each new person, but other than that, it’s a great tracking tool.

Once you’ve done that, don’t stop at just attendance. As with anything you do, put out a survey after the party to see what your residents thought! Did they like the theme? Could you have had better food? Feedback, feedback, feedback!

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