Apartment Social Media
Using Social Media to Market Apartments – J.C. Hart
J.C. Hart Live the Life Video Contest 2009
“Last November at the Indiana Apartment Association “Industry Outlook” presentation, the speaker said a dirty word when sharing his thoughts about 2009. It was much longer than four letters, beginning with a “C” and ending in “onsessions”. After that night we began brainstorming about overcoming this obstacle. What we came up with was “The Year of the Resident.”- Mark Juleen
“Turn the focus inward” became the mantra for Mark and his team. They re-imagined the way they would allocate their marketing resources spending money on such things as; resident functions, upgrades to social meeting spaces and special promotions. One of those special promotions made use of the social medium YouTube and the catchy tune, Live Your Life by T.I. [featuring Rihanna] It really caught our eye and we wanted to feature it here.
“Some may have already had a chance to see what’s been going on with our first “Special Promotion” called the “J.C. Hart Live the Life Video Contest.” This contest asks for J.C. Hart Apartment Community residents to create a two minute video or less on why they love living in their J.C. Hart Apartment Community and Apartment. The videos were posted to YouTube.com to enter, and since, were narrowed down to the top 5 finalists in our 6 winning categories. We posted these finalists to a custom blog (livethelife.homeisjchart.com), and have just recently selected our winners. You can read the winners announcement on the blog, and view all the 44 entries on the J.C. Hart YouTube page.” – Mark Juleen
We asked Mark to share the numbers with us and this is what he had to say –
All data and information as of March 31, 2009:
- YouTube.com/homeisjchart Channel Hits – 11,045
- YouTube Video Entry Views (44 total video entries) – 34,420
- Total views in-full (YouTube does not count partial views or facebook sharing views)
- Live the Life Finalist Blog Hits – 13,483
- Absolute Unique Visitors – 10,048
- Page views – 27,248
- Only 360 users on Dial-up
- Facebook referral hits – 819, 2nd highest next to direct URL
- Hits from 37 countries (astonishing # from Guam)
- 146 comments (88 alone on Overall)
- Votes Cast Using Poll Daddy Polls – 15,554 (6,964 for Best Overall Video)
We’d also like to share some of the comments we’ve had from the contest as well.
“Just wanted to let you know that this contest was a great idea.”
“I thought all the videos were great! Everybody did a really good job. It’s great to see so much participation!”
“Way to go J.C. Hart! Great to see your pro-active involvement in assisting those with disabilities.”
“This contest has been a lot of fun….we really had fun making the video.”
When asking a prospect how they heard about us: “I saw you on the J.C. Hart website. It sounded like a fun place to live. You are listed on my notes under the “funny video” apartments.”
“Thanks J.C. Hart for running such a great contest. It’s nice to see a company do something so unique and cool. I don’t work for J.C. Hart, I just live here. :)”
It has been fun and exciting to open up new communication lines with our residents. A huge proponent for our online social media efforts has been our local marketing partner Firebelly Marketing. With their expertise and our talented leasing teams we have been able to implement a number of new online tools and enhance our web presence. We feel by utilizing social media tools we are now reaching our residents more frequently than we ever could with resident events or more amenities. Most importantly, we’ve found a group of our residents that love to share their stories and love their apartment/community. Beyond the online data, these testimonials help confirm we are doing things right as well. It’s our goal to “Make your home an enjoyable living experience,” and many of our residents have helped demonstrate that for us.
I think this is a great testament to the use of social media to market apartments and in the same respect, I have to imagine that Mark and his team were mindful of the fact that someone could have used this platform/stage to speak adversely of the J.C. Hart brand. I applaud that this did not detour them in their efforts. Thank you for demonstrating some real courage on this one Mark.
The story gets better. Or, at least in my opinion it does. On two different occasions I emailed Mark, at the request of people I told about the J.C. Hart contest, to ask if he would field some questions – questions about how these individuals could create their own respective contests. Mark, being the class act that he is, said absolutely. To me – that is what is all about – sharing for the betterment of the industry as a whole. Hats off to you Mark and thank you for taking the time to share with us.
You can learn more about Mark and what he is up to at the following sites:
LinkedIn Profile: www.linkedin.com/in/mjuleen
Twitter Account: www.twitter.com/mbj
Other Profiles: www.theapartmentnerd.com
Using social media to market apartments. The start of a great divide?
I came across this great post; Does Social Media Help or Hurt? » Customers Rock! this morning. In it, Becky Carroll points to another great post over at Marketing Profs Daily Fix: The Customer Chasm. Are you Creating a Social Media Divide? by Jason Baer.
Both are rather short reads and raise a very interesting observation that I think is worthy of discussion in the multifamily space. A number of you have a passion for this subject as you have touched on it via blog posts and tweets so I look forward to your continued thoughts. I think the catalyst for the hotbed of comments came when Jason penned the following;
Are we inadvertently creating a Customer Chasm, where those who are
socially media active are receiving preferential treatment compared to
those who are not? And not just in customer service, but in customer
acquisition too?
There are some compelling thoughts and ideas laced into Jason’s examples and those couched in the comment section below his post, all of which could apply to our space.
Thanks in advance for taking the time and have a compelling week.
M
7.10.9 Update
Related story:
Does Social Networking Breed Social Division?
Don’t use social media to market apartments, if…
…you are not ready to be a marketer. You see, the essence of social media is conversation and that conversation is you being a marketer. So in order to use to social media to market you must be willing to be a marketer, you must be willing to engage.
When you use social media to market apartments you take on the responsibility of engaging in feedback – be it good, bad, indifferent or even downright hateful. And, therein lies the fear of many operators. How do we handle the negative and hateful feedback we might get, is the question I hear most often. I say, “engage in a conversation with them.” I might add, “how do you respond when someone meets you face to face to voice their discord about your community? Do you sit silent or do you engage in a conversation?” You have to think of social media as just a mechanism for conversation – nothing more – nothing less. And, about those potential negative comments, they take themselves.
To that point let’s direct our attention to a Washington Post titled; Listening to the Dot-Commenters written by Doug Feaver, former Executive Editor of the Post [thanks for the great post, Doug]. The gist of the article is about the self correcting nature of socially irresponsible commenter’s and more specifically anonymous ones, that is to say people who use feedback platforms as bully pulpits. I think the Post’s philosophy is one that could/should be mirrored in the multifamily space.
I have come to think that online comments are a terrific addition to the conversation and that journalists need to take them seriously. Comments provide a forum for readers to complain about what they see as unfairness or inaccuracy in an article (and too often they have a point), to talk to each other (sometimes in an uncivilized manner) and, yes, to bloviate. – Doug Feaver
I can see merit in Doug’s logic and I think it will – over time – marry well to sites like apartmentratings and yelp, just to name a few. I have to believe that the more accustom apartment seekers become to prospect/resident generated feedback sites, the more they will either avoid, ignore or correct socially irresponsible comments. The down right passionate users will see it as their absolute duty to counter the negative or misguided users. Now, should the down right passionate user be you – please remember to handle yourself professionally. In my mind you represent an industry not just your individual community or property management firm. And, just remember, it’s all marketing.
Have a stellar Easter weekend.
M
Zappos’ CEO, Social Media Expert to Speak at NAA Education Conference
Arlington, VA–April 9, 2009–Several of social media’s greatest minds will discuss how this popular marketing approach applies to customer service and retention during a session at the National Apartment Association’s 2009 Education Conference & Exposition on June 27 in Las Vegas.
Tony Hsieh, the CEO of online shoes retailer Zappos, is one of the featured panelists. Hsieh is recognized as having the largest following on Twitter worldwide, with more than 350,000 followers. Hsieh has grown Zappos from $1.6 million in 2000 to $840 million in 2007, a measly 525,000 percent increase.
This is one of more than 50 education sessions to be presented at the 2009 NAA Education Conference & Exposition. Visit www.naahq.org/educonf for registration information and a complete schedule, which includes keynote speakers Forbes Chairman and CEO Steve Forbes, comedian Dana Carvey and Politico Founder Jim VandeHei.
Dominating the current talk about marketing is effective use of social media—how Twitter is taking over e-mail, how Facebook has more users than most countries have citizens and how engineered virality can replace a marketing budget. With all the chatter, one might think that social media should be a substitute for advertising–a reason to eliminate a company’s marketing staff, and even cure the common cold. This panel will share effective social media strategies that companies can use and discuss common misperceptions about social media.
Rentwiki.com co-founder Eric Wu will moderate the panel, which also includes Jeremiah Owyang, Senior Analyst at Forrester Research; and Pete Flint, Founder of real-estate industry Web site Trulia.com.
Visit www.naahq.org/educonf for registration information and a schedule of the more than 50 education sessions to be presented at the 2009 NAA Education Conference & Exposition. Or call NAA at 703/518-6141.
Paul Bergeron
National Apartment Association
Director of Communications-UNITS Magazine
4300 Wilson Blvd Ste 400 Arlington VA 22203
phone: 703/797-0606 fax: 703/248-9440
America’s Leading Advocate for Quality Rental Housing
Rule #1 in Using Social Media to Market Apartments
Don’t be Boring
First off – I despise the word rule. In the same respect I think it is appropriate to suggest that we can not be boring when using social media to market apartments. And, know that boring includes the use of social media to push goods and services.
Social media is not push marketing – use it as such and watch the people run. Social media is rather, permission based marketing and is about conversation and participation. And, that conversation and participation turns out to be the marketing. We have to really wrap our minds around this concept as it is very counter to the way we have used traditional mediums to market apartments. Nevertheless, it’s our time to shine – as for all intents and purposes the mass adoption of social media in the multifamily space is just getting started. It really is the perfect time to put a dent in the multifamily universe – are you ready?
Have a very non-boring and otherwise compelling day
M
