It is only a couple of weeks away!  It really snuck up on us for sure.  This is definitely going to be a week to remember.  This year we decided to set up a booth for Brainstorming, so we look forward to chatting with a whole bunch of great multifamily folks who are interested in education.  Come and see us at B-26.  The focus on this post is the overall apartment education we will all receive by attending both conferences.

It will be hard to list all the wonderful seminars that are up and coming, but I am going to highlight a few since they impacted me at the last Optimization Summits and Brainstorming, and their impact did not end there!  They are people who I have continued to collaborate with and will be at the conference this next month.   There are also some first timers that I plan on attending since the topics look very interesting and from their history it appears likely that they practice what they preach so that gives those two thumbs up for me.  So here we go!

Brainstorming

Geno Church from Brains on Fire is the keynote speaker on Wednesday.  I have not been able to get out of my head this phenomenal expression: “People are the killer app”.  He discussed that in depth earlier this year and I look forward to hearing it again at Brainstorming.  Brains on Fire recently came out with a book which I look forward to purchasing for myself soon.

Duncan Alney with Firebelly Marketing will be speaking on crisis communication which I have always found to be an interesting topic.  It takes very little for an onsite or corporate incident to spread like wildfire.  Duncan impressed me earlier this year with his thoughtful approach to making sure we as people and our companies are involved in the conversation and topics that are residents and customers are talking about.

Patty Morgan-Seager and Steve Matre will be chatting about time management.  This is an ongoing problem on all levels for all of us workaholics.  Patty and Steve always make me smile so I know that this seminar will do the same.

Kim Cory and Dan Oltersdorf will be speaking on student housing.  They both have proven themselves to be true veterans and pioneers of the student housing market.  Whenever I speak to them about their communities and ideas they have used and implemented, it completely blows my mind.  They made a cool Facebook page called “House Rules” which is dedicated to student housing topics.  This dynamic duo I know will bring some great info to the table.

Jay Ehret will speak about building an awesome brand by design.  Hearing Jay earlier this year, having numerous conversations with him since and hearing from multifamily professionals who have enlisted his services, it is quite apparent to me that he practices what he preaches and that it is effective.  Make sure you pencil this session in, if your brand identity is a topic for your company.

Those are just a smidge of topics that will be presented at Brainstorming.  I have the privilege of being on the idea panel on Friday with a bunch of very cool multifamily folks.  Coming up with those ideas was no easy task, so it will be interesting to see what a bunch of nerds in one room will have put together. Make sure you take the time to plan ahead for what you really need for education and don’t miss out on anything.

Optimization Summits

Brian Solis in many ways has been the pioneer for social media.  He will be speaking about the conversation prism which is one of my favorite visuals and topics.  Beyond the technical aspects of social media, there is much more to consider in social media which is why I look forward to attending his session.

Mack Collier’s session last time had standing room only and I know for sure that will take place again.  His concept of thinking like a rock star allows those brain juices to flow strong.  Since that session I have personally watched Mack engage his audience via his blog, twitter chat and regular online conversations.  What he teaches works! I hope there is a seat available for me.

Chris Penn from Blue Sky Factory will provide data about email marketing that just cannot be ignored.  If you are interested in saving money and delivering campaigns that have a broader and more effective reach, then this is the seminar to be at.

Mike Whaling had in some in depth Facebook sessions earlier this year and they have been brought back for very good reason.  Every single person I spoke to about his sessions could only express how impressed they were with the education.  This session once again I am sure will be all about “doing”.

Lauren Fernandez from Radian6 will be speaking about using social media too bridge the generational gap.  I do not know Lauren real well except for a few tweets here and there, but the subject is intriguing to me so I look forward to the education.

So that is a basic list for me to help with my overall educational objectives.  I could go on and on about the educational sessions that Tami Siewruk and her team have put together.  The point is you just need to be there! Check out Tami’s Brainstorming and Optimization Summits sites and make your educational decisions ahead of time.  Planning is important.  If you have any sessions that you plan on attending please mention them below in the comments section and tell me why.  I look forward to seeing everyone there.

Written by Jonathan Saar

For a quick throw back to earlier this year, check out our Why You Need To Be at Optimization Summits Video below.

Mack Collier wrote a post the other day that coincided with research I have been doing for the past few weeks for a presentation that Tamela Coval from RentWiki and I will be handling for the Atlanta Apartment Association.  He wrote a great piece called “Here’s why you shouldn’t treat social media as being ‘free’” Please take a moment to read it!  Mack knows his stuff.

He was speaking about how you can make a blog for free and its connection to your overall website and SEO.  Tamela and I are about to present some information regarding Facebook pages and what it takes to make them successful.  I have reviewed about 100 or more property management and community Facebook pages and my findings were conclusive and probably of no surprise.  Over 90 % of the pages I reviewed were standalone pages.  There was no connection from the website to the page or vice versa.  We know it is very easy to make a Facebook page and maybe as Mack stated in his post that it was an easy buy in from the boss, because it’s ‘free’.  What about your overall goals in creating the page in the first place?

The reality is that if you do not make the connecting points and spend the time and money to make sure you have a full circle approach to your Facebook page, website, blog, twitter account etc., then you are wasting valuable time and resources.  If time seems to be an issue to in monitoring these channels then part of your planning phase should be to come up with a comprehensive strategy to keep these factors in mind.

• SEO
• Return on Engagement
• Resident Retention
• Community Outreach
• Return on Investment
• Corporate Culture
• How to be Social

The last point may seem kind of odd but from the status updates I am noticing that really does need to be discussed.  What are we going to talk about to our residents?  What are they interested in?  What will they respond to and appreciate?  I am sure you have some thoughts on this subject that will lend to this discussion.  What have you found that is working for your company, property management or otherwise?

Written by Jonathan Saar

Have you become a fan of The Training Factor on Facebook?  Thoughtful discussion and regular relevant content is posted daily.

I had an interesting conversation with Tarla McCann from On-Site the other day, about social media and the impact conversation and reaching out to people can have on your overall brand.  One of the points that her and I were chatting about was measuring the results.  We use often the expression ROI since of course we are looking for those bottom line numbers to always improve in whatever venture we pursue.  That is the ultimate goal.  However there is another part to the equation that helps you get to those magical numbers and that is your ROE—Return on Engagement.

This expression is not something new.  Sarah Evans wrote a nice article last year about how to Measure your ROE.  What we all fight against is our own inhibitions and our fear of what others will think about us.  Posting a blog, making a comment on one, tweeting your opinion, participating in an online discussion groups such as MultifamilyInsiders, #Blogchat and #Aptchat are all ways we expose ourselves and that can be challenging to do.  We are used to having shower curtains, doors to lock and clothes to wear because physically we are afraid to expose ourselves but that also translates to our own emotions and fear of being looked down upon.  Hence we can become lurkers instead of participants.  If you are a lurker that is ok!!! Your being there is so greatly appreciated.  Your support is encouraging to all that are currently comfortable enough to jump into the online space.  It takes baby steps in everything in life in order to feel comfortable with it, but please know that you have an amazing network of professionals who are always there to help.  So take it one step at a time and you will see the value of participating.

Return on Engagement can come in other forms as well.  Think of the other platforms you are using where you want to hear what people are saying.  Some apartment communities felt forced into using apartment review sites and platforms like Yelp simply because there was a fear factor that was initiated as a result of people talking about you and you had little control.  This is where property management companies should be most concerned about their ROE.  It’s your opportunity to capture valuable real estate and that is—people.  Ignoring what people say about you whether it’s good or bad is a waste.  As Geno Church described it, people are the killer app.  The more you make conversation with your residents whether it’s through review sites, Facebook pages, or in your leasing office, the more potential you have to gain valuable ROE and valuable word of mouth marketing.

The challenge from a company standpoint is to let go of those inhibitions.  Take the shower curtain off of your company.  Let your residents see you for what you are! Let them see how much you care about them and how much they mean to you.

How are you leveraging your residents as the killer app?

Written by Jonathan Saar

Are you going to NAA?  Click through to sign up for our complimentary Train the Trainer course.

I have wanted to share The Training Factor social media program for some time now especially on the topic of time and ROI.  There continues to be the never ending question of exactly how long it takes and what should you be seeing.  Every company is different of course so this is not a “You should do this” post.  It’s simply going to show you that it works and to give you something to compare the time factor involved.

I hope you had a chance to read Social Media Examiner’s post on how Time Pays with Social Media Marketing. It provides some great statistics on a broader scale.

My program was literally one day at a time.  Early in 2009 I started working with different social media platforms and did my research, reading and observing of others to learn what to do and obviously what not to do.  Just some basic experimenting and familiarizing myself with platforms such as LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Digg, Delicious, Plaxo, and others took about 5 months.

The buy in was challenging.  2009 was certainly not a time when people were reaching out for anything.  Most companies were huddled in the trenches and riding out the economic war that was taking place.  The subject of “How long does this take?” came up often during our team meetings.  I am grateful to a wonderful company who believed in my plan and philosophy and was willing to be patient despite the challenging year 2009 was.

It took some time for me to develop a consistent approach to what I was doing each business day since every day was a learning experience.   There was a lot of experimenting in order to test reactions and see what the overall affect was.  So here is a basic rundown of what I monitor each day.

1. Check our LinkedIn Group and monitor activity
2. Find relevant content for our Facebook pages.
3. Interact with comments and questions on our Facebook pages.
4. Find relevant content for Twitter account
5. Interact and have conversations with various professionals on Twitter
6. Read various blog posts and make comments
7. Create informative and relevant blog posts for our viewers.
8. Analyze analytics on all platforms.
9. Educate myself on latest news and updates that change constantly on the topic of social media.
10. Screening data from “listening” platforms such as Google alerts and others.

Now how much “time” do you think this takes on a weekly and daily basis?  Obviously I have numerous other responsibilities during the day.  I have customers I reach out to regularly.  I have numerous companies who I contact regularly that have demonstrated interest in us.  I collaborate with team members on a regular basis on the numerous projects we have going on and the list continues.

The bottom line is it takes a solid consistent approach in order to make it work.  The results speak for themselves.  Obviously I started with big Zeros on all angles.  I was starting from scratch.  From a search engine optimization perspective the results were phenomenal.  The moment we transferred our blog to our actual website, our traffic doubled.  The more blog posts I put out, the more traffic comes in.  As a result of a well rounded approach, traffic sources come from all over the place.  In my opinion, every inbound source is gold.  We are even seeing our Facebook pages show up in Google alerts based on certain keywords.  Whether it’s organic, or from social media platform referrals, each instance helps our Google rankings.  Did this happen overnight? NO! Was it a struggle to keep consistency when initial results were slow?  YES!

The big question is has it worked towards the bottom line?  As a company we have no trouble in saying…Yes.  Did it require patience?  Yes!  Can you just jump in blindly and hope it works?  To me that is like jumping off a bridge into a river when you do not know what lies beneath the surface.  A definite moldable goal and plan is an absolute must.  A consistent patient approach will pay off.

I am interested in hearing your stories.  What were your feelings when you first started using social media for your business and how have you found it working for you?  Thanks for stopping by.  If you value these posts feel free to subscribe via email or RSS feed on the top right corner.

Written by Jonathan Saar

Are you going to NAA this year?  Make sure you stop by booth #1740 and say hi!

If social media is overwhelming you with the plethora of tools, platforms, fan pages, accounts, usernames etc, then it’s imperative to stop for a moment and organize your thoughts and process.  You may be voicing your frustration and throwing up your hands and saying there is nothing but a bunch of noise going on.  Or you may be wondering how in the world you can keep up with the pace that these platforms are growing.  Let’s reflect on another platform that morphed and that we quickly evolved the ability to control how we used it.

Jump back a couple of decades in the television world and reflect on what was available.  Mainstream television did not even become available to most people until the 50’s.  Those were the days when you only had one or two channels tops and you had to get out of your chair to turn the TV on.  As the decades past, the amount of options and information increased.  Currently you can make a choice on what kind of channel package you wish for yourself.  Some can be as low as 200 and then the options continue to climb.  Within these packages are channels dedicated to certain topics.  We have The Weather Channel, The Food Network, ESPN and many others.  Does this mean that you leave your TV on just one of these channels all day long?  Of course you don’t.  What was the premise behind making channels that focused on just one topic?  So that the viewer would always know where they could find the specific information that they need.  Maybe at first people as the viewers were a bit perplexed at seeing an information specific channel available, however we learned the ability to change the channel.  You got to love remote controls for that!

So where can this be applied for the current social media hysteria.  Social media platforms do have the ability for you to change the channel; you just need to learn how to use the remote.  Facebook has a feature at the top of its page called “Top News”.  Facebook uses its own algorithms to ascertain users and pages that you interact with most often and makes these its suggested “Top News” for you.  You can also set up various lists that can quickly change your feed.  I currently have 6 different lists (channels) that I have made for my Facebook account.  I know I will be adding more soon.  This enables me to change channels so to speak in order to review information based on my categories.  Twitter also has this feature.  You can now create lists based upon different categories of information you may want to review.  Third party platforms like Tweetdeck allow you to add as many columns (channels) as you wish so that you can review information at your leisure that is topic or industry specific.

Just as with choosing a channel package for your home television, you also have a choice as to whom you will friend, who you will fan, and who you will follow.  Some may provide value and some may not.  Some you may be interested in slightly but not as much as something else.  This is where your choice comes into play.  The difference is you are in the driver’s seat.  You get to make your own channels.  Some people started throwing their TV’s out because of this radical change but that did not make sense.  Neither does it make sense to just completely shut down your social media platforms.  You can reduce your “channel” package or set up your favorites so to speak.  So if you feel you are in hysteria mode at the moment, remember that it was not too long ago when television had a similar impact when it went from 2 channels to 2000 in a matter of decades.  It did not take decades for this to happen to social media but the ability to control the information has not changed.  The remote control is in your hand and you get to choose your channels.

If you have any other suggestions on what has helped you to control the flow and overflow of social media information, please feel free to share with the rest of us.

Written by Jonathan Saar

March 23^rd and 24^th in Dallas Texas, Tami Siewruk will be hosting an event like none other.  The workshops that will take place will cover every social media topic you can imagine.  After reading through the profiles and topics that will be covered, to me this event will be the A-Z’s and 123’s of best practices with the new and growing tools and methods of reaching our communities within the multifamily industry.

If you have not yet scrolled through the list of workshop leaders that will be attending, you can check them out here.  Make sure you come back though.  After attending seminars regarding social media, did you ever say to yourself, “Ok.. Now what?”  If you are attending this event you will be given hands on training on the subjects you want the most assistance on.  If you have not registered yet for this event go ahead and click here.  This is your opportunity to empower yourself and your team to take 2010 by storm and stop wondering about how to use social media, but to start doing!

There is also an opportunity to win a free trip!  This conference is having a contest called, “Be the Face of Optimization”.  Now, how fun is that!  The deadline is March 1^st, so get your creative juices flowing!

A special thanks to Tami and to her team who have worked very hard to coordinate and bring in some of the industry’s best.  The education and training is something the multifamily industry will not want to miss.  So what you gonna do?  Go to the Optimization Summits.. It’s easy!!!

The Training Factor put together its own contest promo video.  Special thanks to Mechelle Flowers the owner of The Training Factor for authorizing this project and special thanks to Brian and Emily Fieg, two of our in house production team, who took a concept and a vision and brought it to life!

Written by Jonathan Saar

Image credit to Optimization Summits Fan Page

On a regular basis I will check on my Twitter account to see updates of new followers I have.  Sometimes I pay attention to the actual numbers but not often.  By coincidence I was writing some content for one of our courses on Bots and their effect on the number of followers you will and will not have on any given day.  While I was writing that I was refreshing my Twitter site and saw that my own numbers went down by 3 within that 20 minute period.  Not that this was a real big deal to me but at the same time it left me wondering for a moment, was it something I said or was it the bots.  I don’t have any of those tools for tracking who unfollowed me so I really don’t know the answer.  But it got me thinking of some other comments I have heard from others from time to time on something similar that has happened to them.  I did some investigating on a couple of the accounts that unfollowed or even blocked fellow tweeters and this is what I found.

When I looked at their ratio of who they were following, versus their followers, there was a huge gap.  So imagine this scenario.  A Twitter user has 100 people that follow them and they only follow back 20 people.  Now in those 20 people you have maybe one or two regular tweeters.  What do you think the user’s Twitter stream is going to look like?  Of course it will be filled with those couple of tweeters who are active on Twitter which will then lend to their opinion that all they see on Twitter is them…hence perhaps this is the reason for the unfollow.

I believe this to be bad etiquette, but don’t get offended; the next couple of paragraphs are going to help.  Twitter is about community.  This tool will do little to help you in your daily process if you open an account, find a couple of friends who have accounts via the email suggestion tool and then stop there.  There are hundreds and hundreds of multifamily professionals who use Twitter every day.  So if you do not want your stream to look like only one person is posting something all the time, it’s time for you to reach out.

Twitter lists have helped solve this outreach for you.  I am going to post a couple here and then for the readers of this post if you have any lists you want to share, feel free to post below in the comments section.  These lists once you click through on them you will find endless multifamily users to help build your community.

Of course I will start with mine    http://twitter.com/trainingfactor/multifamily (383 listed)

The Ellipse group has a nice list as well  http://twitter.com/TheEllipseCow/multifamily (416 listed)

Charity Hisle list http://twitter.com/CharityHisle/multifamily (404 listed)

Turn Social list http://twitter.com/TurnSocial/multifamily (407 listed)

There are others as well but I will let them post in the comments section if they wish.

You will not regret building your community.  This industry does nothing but set the tone for what it means to help one another.  So don’t unfollow.  Don’t block.  Build!

Written by Jonathan Saar

How overwhelmed are you right now?  What is helping you to get through your daily process?  The speed technology is growing at is phenomenal.  Look back just a couple of years and remind yourself what kind of phone or laptop you had.  What do you have now?  Step back in that same period and ask if the words Twitter, blog, Smartphone, HD, terawatt, were words you used on a regular basis or even knew about.  Technology was designed to help streamline our daily process.  Do you find that to be the case in your daily routine?

From my observations discipline with our processes is so crucial right now.  Perhaps more than ever this is the case.  Here are some questions that may help our analysis.

1. Company Decisions: Is there a shorter period of time necessary to make decisions within the company or longer in comparison to a couple of years ago?
2. Do we have a few projects on the board that are accomplished in a few weeks or numerous projects that are stretched over numerous months?
3. Responding to correspondence:  Whether its correspondence via phone or email.  How quick were you able to respond a couple of years ago as opposed to the present?

Now I know these questions are very general and the reasons behind your answers will be as a result of numerous variables, but do you understand the gist of where we are presently?  Now we throw in social media and all of its platforms and questions about our processes become even bigger.  It seems like every day there is something new we need to learn just to stay ahead of the curve.  A couple of days a new social media platform was released which I will call “Moogle Fuzz”. (I don’t want to be accused of using a key word just to draw attention)  We know this trend will only continue to grow.  At the moment there does not seem to be a plateau in sight.

That circles back to the discipline part of this post.  How are we training ourselves and how are we training our staff to deal with this onslaught?  The multifamily industry is already a very fast paced environment whether its onsite or at the corporate office.  I am curious to get your take on this topic, so please comment below.

Mark Juleen and Duncan Alney will be driving deeper into using technology platforms from an integration perspective at Optimization Summits this March.  The education from this event will certainly be phenomenal.  As you will see from the video below, they will be providing education on how to use these tools effectively and have them work for you.

Written by Jonathan Saar

I know this is such a cliché title and perhaps the die hard Trekkie fans may only understand it.  Here are the two key words to explain it, Borg and the Federation.  The Borg were determined to make change on their terms no matter what got in their way and the Federation resisted this and hence the common expression the Borg would make is : Resistance is Futile.

We approach each day where words like change, shift, new, revolution, generation seem common in daily conversation, blogs, news etc.  There is no doubt that change is here and that a major shift in how daily business operations are accomplished is necessary due to the impact of things like social media and new generations of incoming employees and residents.  In general most of us by nature resist change and the main reason behind that is the delivery method.  If the Borg approach is used and change is forced on us, we automatically resist.  If change is delivered in a palatable way, with gradual implementation and education that is conducive to our personal way of adapting, then the transition is much easier.  My experience at the IREM Georgia Social Media workshop will illustrate this.

At one of the roundtable workgroups I was with, one of the ladies asked me a point blank question.  She asked, “Should I go and purchase the XYZ for Dummies book to help me learn this?” My response to her was an automatic one purely based on my personal way of educating myself.  I told her to go to this site and this blog and search here….but then she stopped me halfway in my comments and said : “You don’t understand, I need to have a book in front of me, so I can read along and then apply it on my computer.  I like to underline key points and make notes in the margins…..”  My internal tune changed immediately and I told her : “Maam, that is a great way to learn and by all means go and buy the book and go to town!”  This wonderful lady was not resistant to change but was resistant to my suggested way of achieving it.  Once she could see approval and validation, there was a smile and she was able to learn many new things that day.

So there it is folks.  That little experience reminded me of the human element when educating change.  There are those who are taking a strong and active lead in broadcasting and educating the multifamily industry in the changes and shifts that are taking place and this is fantastic.  As we individually make steps forward in educating our teams what do you think is the best way to deliver this kind of education?

Written by Jonathan Saar

State the Problem- Why am I using social media?  How will I use it?  What benefits will it bring my company and community?  The purpose of social media is to reach a broader audience and connect with key people that are using these platforms

Form a Hypothesis- I predict that if I research this properly and use surveys to ascertain where and how my audience is using social media, I will then be able to reach certain marketing and retention goals.

Experiment- I will make a Facebook page for my community.  I know how many people in my community use Facebook, so I will reach out to them and invite them to become fans of my page.  I also know that local businesses use Facebook, so I will also reach out to them.  I will daily try different content on my page and use a recording method to track my results.  I am interested in statistics such as how many new fans I have, who are they and why are they fans, how many interactions did I have on my page, did my page result in clicks to my community website?  I will use Google and Facebook analytics to help track my progress.

Analysis- When experimenting with different content and posts, it had an impact on the interactions.  When content was not regular, this seemed to affect website traffic.  Reaching out to local businesses that have become fans has built up interactions on the page.  New fans are not all residents but potentially could be.  When mentioning good news about a resident on the Facebook page, this also increased interactions.

Conclusion- By being thorough in my initial research, I was able to reach the people that would mean the most to my community.  This experiment has contributed to reaching marketing and retention goals as part of a collective effort from my business plan.  Ascertaining what platforms my residents and my local community are using did enable me to connect with them and contributed to the initial and continued success of my Facebook page.

My son and I were going over his biology papers and I could not help but apply a traditional and aged method of analyzing a process to what we face each day.  Is this how you approach your social media strategy?

Written by Jonathan Saar

Content Content Content.  What does it take to keep your blog fresh and up to date?  The worst thing in the world is to plagiarize.  The search spiders do not like this and if you are working on your SEO then this is not the way to go.  How hard is it to blog for your multifamily community?  That is the million dollar question.  I guess it all depends on your perspective.  Does your community have a story within itself?  When you are walking through your community, what is running through your mind besides the fundamentals of making the day successful from a curb appeal, Fair Housing, leasing perspective?  What about the people?

Every resident has a story.  Do you know what it is?  It will be quite challenging for you to have a social community blog when you have no connection with the people that make your community alive….  with the people who give your community a name.

So now you are approaching 2010 and you want to add a community blog and a Facebook page.  You are wondering what the best approach would be, who is going to do it and what kind of content will reach your audience.  Your first question should be: How do my residents view me and the staff or our community?  Are you viewed only as the rent collectors and the curb appeal enforcers.  If you want your outreach efforts to have a name, then you need to reach out to the residents with the names.  Who is your Betty the baker, Joe the DJ, Eileen the retail manager, and Bob the county inspector?

If you want your blog and other outreach programs to have a name, reach out to the people who already have one.  The rest will take on a life of its own.

Written by Jonathan Saar –The Training Factor

1. “Question the source. While the Internet and new media industries have been around now for over a decade, social media as its own industry is young. If someone is touting social media certification, question where they received it and what they had to do to earn it.
2. Google them. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been approached by potential clients who have been ripped off by people claiming to be social media consultants. A quick Google search of those consultants and companies reveal little in the way of evidence that the consultant/company in question is engaged in social media. A good social media consultant will be active in social media including LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook but also other more niche networks.
3. Read them. At this early stage of social media consulting, those who are doing it are also writing about it because there is so little credible documentation of what we are all doing and learning. Read their blog, white papers or articles, and check out the recent books by some of the top social media thought leaders of today for greater perspective.
4. Check their references. Why someone would hire a social media consultant without checking their online portfolio and references is a mystery to me. A few phone calls and emails, and you’ll have a much better sense about the reputation, professionalism and skills of anyone claiming to be a social media consultant.”