Apartment Marketing Ideas
Apartment Marketers: Afraid to Blog?
Below is a link to a story that resonated with me relative to a conversation that was broached on Mike Whaling’s: Apartment Marketing Gone Digital’s last episode. I believe it was Eric Brown that made the point about the lack of conversation about blogs as it relates to apartment marketing at NAAs 2010 convention.
Apartment Blogging: Fear
I agree to some extent with Eric that there is a dearth of examples with apartment blogging in the Apartment Space as I think the offerings are growing everyday. For example – Mills Properties – is on the verge of launching seven regional blogs in addition to revamping the Mills employee-centric blog. In addition, JC Hart, Trillium, Paragon, Village Green and PCMG have ventured down the path of blogging and from my perspective are doing a good job of it. I applaud the fact that these firms have taken the endeavor on as an in-house marketing function.
With that, I feel it necessary to make the point that I am not an advocate of ILSs that offer blogging as a part of their advertising package. And, time should be of no excuse. I would rather hear the fear stuff like; I am afraid of what others might think of my choice of topic, my grammar, my spelling or what if I can’t think of anything to write about. Not that those things are not important but – time as an excuse – save it. This is something you make time for at the expense of other things.
Apartment Non-Blogging
To the topic at hand – the following post was offered up on the Conversation Agent Blog a couple weeks ago. In it Valeria Moltoni suggests alternatives to blogging that could and are effective in building your digital footprint. If you are not into creating original and or mashed up blog content – this read is for you. The premise is that participation is an equally compelling form of content creation. She offers some real practical applications using LinkedIn, Twitter and others. So – if you just can’t bring yourself to do it and you elect not to farm it out to a third party, try this method.
Enjoy and let us know your thoughts in the comments below –
Conversation Agent: Blogging at Work if You Don’t Have a Blog
I’ve said it before, but it bears repeating. Participation is content because it is what will activate your content in the context of the conversation. Remember when you worried about nobody coming to your blog? It’s the same with content in other places – you’ve got to interact to activate it.
Apartment Marketing: @earlybird a New Way to Use Twitter
Have you ever wondered what the most appropriate way to use Twitter to market your companies Apartment Living Experience is? Now I’m not to suggesting that any one way is better than another but I do think there are some ways that garnish more attention. My only piece of advice is avoid using old school push marketing tactics.
It looks like @earlybird is positioning itself as a socially acceptable way to broadcast your current promotion. Brian Solis puts it this way in On Twitter, The Early Bird Gets the Worm
If you can imaging the possibilities for @EarlyBird, it goes beyond just one-off deals and specials through a generic account [push marketing], it can be themed into opt-in channels for almost any area of interest, food, music, entertainment, events, etc. [relevancy] emphasis mine.
As it relates to apartment marketing, I can see the value in an opt-in channel for apartments as a good thing –
What do you think?
Apartment Marketing: Gather the Group
Over the next month or so, I will be reaching out to some of our apartment Facebook friends asking if I can enlist them in a virtual ongoing open feedback Tell Dell like mechanism. The intent is to prompt the forum in the coming weeks, months and years as we move forward in building out Mills Properties improved web strategy. The friends are coming from a mix of our like pages that span across our 43 communities [Note: not all are published as of this writing] in Saint Louis. The only catalyst to their selection is – on balance – they participate more than others. Our real hope – as part of a much larger strategy – is to build on the success of others in and out of our industry by including consumers in the process. That said, it never ceases to amaze me just how easy it really is to get acquainted anymore. This quote below is part of a response I got to reaching out just this past week –
…..been here just over 5 years and really like it. My main interests include Conservative talk shows and Trance/Techno music. Odd combination……
I can’t wait to get some discussion going with this resident. 5 years – can you imagine the change she/he has seen in five years? Can you imagine the potential value he/she might add on the premise of that 5 years of history?
What are you doing to leverage the power of your networks?
Apartment Talent: The Price of Waiting
Hey there! Nice to meet YOU! This post is for those of you that serve on the stages of our industry. That is to suggest the leasing, assistant managers and property managers out there. I like what Seth had to say on his blog a couple of days ago about waiting for validation – here is an excerpt:
If you’re waiting for a boss or an editor or a college to tell you that you do good work, you’re handing over too much power to someone who doesn’t care nearly as much as you do.
Keep Cool Keep Control
Some time back, I attended a group counseling session that described it this way, when you lose control, it’s like you have a string attached to your heart and you give the prompter the string and you allow him or her to pull that string at will. In other words you give up the very control that was given to you on the day you loudly pronounced your place on earth. It’s frankly a travesty of monumental proportions. It’s not unlike that in business – be it sales, marketing, finance, transaction, operations or the such. You cede control under the guise of waiting for validation and you cede control of your future.
Relating it back to Seth’s post and also to caring about what you do in the apartment space – beat your own best self everyday of the week. Remind yourself daily that no one will challenge you more than you will challenge yourself. No one person or thing has control over you unless you cede it to them. There are so many opportunities to build Your Personal Brand today – so many ways to take control of Your Future –
Using Social Media to Market Apartments – Ripe with Opportunities
For all intents and purposes – new media in it’s concerns with marketing apartment homes is in its infancy. It’s the perfect space to join in the conversation. Blogs not unlike this one are the perfect place to; come and observe – start to participate – use for a catalyst to start your own blog and reference back to now and again once you are up and running. Rest on this notion – not even the best of the best in this space know where the platforms and mechanisms will be two to four years from now. It’s any one’s best guess at this point. In spite of that they keep innovating – they keep plugging away – steady trying, refining and trying again. You can too. It’s the way Brand You is made. The alternative – the price of waiting? – Your Future.
What are you going to do today?
Multifamily Troublemaker
Check out this byline from Engrain
A design and technology consultancy dedicated to helping organizations make their brands and technology relevant, usable and beautiful. We are trouble making, data pillaging idealists obsessed with usability and design that works.
I like troublemakers! Anyone who is willing to put it out there like that is worthy of some press in my opinion! I do wonder what a data pillaging idealist is. A swag realist? Seems not to go together – sounds cool though.
I’ve never heard of Engrain and only ran across them because of a Google Alert I have set up for terms related to multifamily. So this in not an endorsement of any sort, neither is it an invitation for Engrain to solicit business – I just love the gumption and could not help but to say as much.
Does anyone have experience with the group?
One item of note: I tried to follow them on Twitter but got the protected tweets message – kind of a #fail but maybe there is good reason. And, the post I made to their Facebook wall letting them know I wanted to follow them on Twitter but could not was removed – kind of a uber #fail. Maybe that has to do with that data pillaging idealist thing – swag it in the spirit of perfection. It is – after all – all about appearances.
That aside – I love the spirit of this organization and look forward to tracking their successes. Check out their website – they show off some pretty cool stuff related to our space.
Your safeguarding ignoblist [Read: tongue in cheek]
