Thanks to @mbrewer for the push to do a video.  Yes, I say “tools” a bunch in this video, but I wasn’t going to do it over.

Find out some things about Matt Kilmurray on his blog.

Click here to watch on YouTube

I’m somewhere in the middle here, and I think that’s where we need to be. Yes, we should be paying attention to what people are saying and try to fix things. However, after taking a strong position for the past few years that we should care tremendously about the reviews and respond to every one I have changed my tune a bit. Like some have said here, there are some things that just can’t really be changed and there’s no use fighting them.

I feel it’s now a game (and really became a game when we decided to care), like many marketing avenues are. We and our competition are attempting to influence or change it to our favor. I think programs that integrate with ApartmentRatings are good marketing strategies. They help even some of the good and the bad.

I guess my bottom line is that if you choose to play the ratings game just understand it’s a marketing play. I don’t believe it’s a customer service play as much as we’d all like to believe. It does carry weight though, and in the eyes of Google it weighs more than many other marketing avenues right now. I’m not ignoring it as a result, and would recommend marketers invest in the review game a bit. That said, I’ve often said there is more than one way to skin a cat, and if you can get the job done without getting in deep on reviews then I say well played.

So where am I today compared to even 2 or 3 years ago?  Not too far off.  I still pay close attention to reviews online, and we survey our residents internally with a reliable system.  To me that’s really what matters.  Asking your customers for honest feedback, actually paying attention to what people are saying, and developing plans to fix things that are missed should all be part of your customer service strategy in my opinion.  We can do all of that internally and ideally make a big impact on the way our customers feel about our brand.  It blows me away that some companies don’t invest in surveys internally and then complain about ApartmentRatings.com or other sites.  Please get a pulse on what’s going on out there first before you just start blaming someone else.

Now, if those survey comments and reviews can trickle out to the online space by asking people to participate there as well I’m all for it.  It’s good marketing.  We have to pay attention to what is working and where our customers are going.  Are any of us avoiding Craigslist because of the negatives that come along with it?  It’s cumbersome, it can be spammy, it’s ugly looking, and it needs to be monitored.  All of those things and other negatives don’t stop us from utilizing this marketing tool that works.  ApartmentRatings.com and other review sites are the same way.  They can be cumbersome to monitor, they may cost money, and sometimes they are ugly.  However, they do work.  ApartmentRatings.com brings leads.  If you monitor your analytics and have linkbacks to your websites you will see the results and they are good.  So I say play that game too.

At this point in the ratings game I don’t think you can argue against it.  You can surely ignore it if you’d like, but I believe that is a marketing mistake.  Just my opinion today, but as with any marketing strategy it’s ever changing.  Good luck with your strategy!

Now it’s a year later and I’m reflecting back on that 1st year with an iPad. As the title of this post suggests, I really feel the iPad has unfortunately reduced my productivity. Before you start hatin’ let me say that this post is not an attempt to tell fanboys and fangirls “I told you so,” rather a pros and cons summary of my experience with the device. It’s just me and how I feel about it today.

Let’s start with the pros as there are some nice conveniences it offers.

- Flipboard is a great app pulling most of my online reading into one spot.
- PocketCloud is a cool app that allows me to access my laptop if I decide to leave it at the office. It’s like tapping into my laptop and using my tablet as the monitor. Pretty sweet as I can access OneSite now from my tablet.
- I’m not a big magazine guy, but magazines through the newsstand are very nice and I appreciate being able to carry them with me wherever I go. (Downloading them is another story as that doesn’t seem to be consistently user friendly.)
- Other apps for reading or news are nice. Kindle app works well (although reading on an actual Kindle device does offer additional functions). USA Today app is good. Some sports apps are good like the Masters app. While I consider these pros for convenience purposes, I don’t think they are revolutionary.
- Games can be fun on the iPad. Angry Birds is a lot more fun with a larger screen, as is Draw Something and sports games like NBA Jam and Tiger Woods Golf. Of course it’s great for entertaining the kids as well.
- Convenience in general having email and social sites a couple taps away on a larger screen is nice too. While I don’t travel much, it’s nice to not have to lug my laptop to properties, conferences, or on vacation anymore.

Onto the cons.

- No Flash. Sure, many have adjusted sites so this isn’t as much of an issue, but Flash is still out there on the web and it’s annoying the device doesn’t support it when it does so many other things.
- App updates are a pro and a con, but I’ll put them on the con list as I feel I have to constantly approve the updates. Being an Android phone owner where updates download automatically this seems inferior to me.
- Sharing functionality is inferior to Android as well. With one menu touch on an Android device I get a list of apps to share something on or with. With Apple that share functionality has to be built into the app. +1 Android on that. One of the main reasons I’ve never gone iPhone.
- While the screen isn’t as big I can do most of the items in the pro list on my phone too. If I really want a larger screen my computer is available.
- It’s just not my computer. This is the big con. The keyboard isn’t as friendly, I don’t have access to everything I’d like to, and multitasking just isn’t as efficient.

Now, I never expected it to be my computer, but I hoped it would fill some type of void and provide a connectivity benefit I’ve been missing. For me, the main void it filled was in entertainment and content consumption. On my laptop I mainly do work. There are no games on there, and the most entertaining thing I do on there is visit Facebook and use Pandora. Facebook is more business for me anyway at this point, so I find myself focused on business items while on my laptop. However, when I’m on my iPad I’m often flipping through Facebook more casually, browsing through email (but mainly to filter or respond to urgent messages like I would on my phone), reading blog posts and articles, or playing games.

So the result has been more entertainment consumption, but little production with the device unfortunately. I’m not sure how I plan to use my iPad in 2013, but I do think it was a good exercise for me to create this pros and cons list and recognize it’s not really helping my productivity. Will I get rid of it, no, I don’t think so. However, it may just stay on my night stand unless I know I’m traveling somewhere and I can benefit from its portability.

I often say, “To each their own,” as I realize everyone has their preferences. For me, the iPad still has potential to be something better, but for now it’s killing my productivity and I need to repurpose its use for my world. I’ll get you an update in 2014. Have a productive year all!

1. Discipline  At one time I had nearly made it a habit.  But, like anything in life, habits can change and priorities can shift.  Blogging lost its high priority and I lacked the discipline to push on through anyway.

2. Value  Why did blogging lose priority?  I think it was my perspective on value.  While I still think there is value in blogging, I had to take a step back and prioritize where blogging here on MarkJuleen.com fit into my career and life.  At least in 2012, it obviously slipped on the list.  However, blogging for J.C. Hart is stronger than ever, and we have even more coming in 2013.  Moving targets.  Why I love marketing.

3. Content  Hot Damn!  This can sometimes be tough.  When social media was fresh and new tech online or in mobile seemed to be flying at me from every direction I felt like I had lots to talk about.  While I believe tech is still evolving, I’m not afraid to say that it’s pretty dull lately.  Maybe I just don’t get as excited anymore, but I also read so much on networks like Mashable or Techcrunch that I don’t feel like I should reinvent the wheel.  So it’s time to reinvent my content strategy.  Be ready for some randomness…maybe.

Hello 2013.  What’s in store here on the blog?  Who the heck knows?  I’m not setting any goals, but I’m not going away.  We’ll see what emerges, and I look forward to challenging the status quo in apartment marketing as I’ve set out to do over the past few years.

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Chuck’s speech was obviously very emotional and sports can arouse numerous emotions.  Whether it’s sports, business, or life, we all are faced with circumstances and choices.  In thinking about choices Chuck speaks of vision.  I know I’ve read a number of books on being different, standing out, and making choices that affect me in a positive way.  What I like about the word vision though is that it speaks to a plan.  It’s not just about trying, but consciously focusing on where you want to go.

So what is your circumstance today?  Do you have a vision for where you want to go?  Can you help others with their vision?  Considering all of this I’d like to ask you to make some choices today.  And with those choices I hope you help shape your vision or the vision of others.

1.  I hope you choose to vote tomorrow.  Your vote is your voice.  Please embrace it as an American.

2.  Donate to a cause this month.  Whether you are passionate about helping the hurricane relief effort, you know someone growing a mustache in support of men’s health, or you are inspired by people like Chuck Pagano and his cause, I encourage you to pick a cause that fits your vision for you or for others.

Thank you so much for the opportunity to share these thoughts with you.  My vision for “The Apartment Nerd” evolves all the time, and you all are my inspiration for that.  I can’t thank you enough.

Check it out on YouTube

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Me: What’s your experience with apartments?

Jeff: I believe I started working in the industry after my junior year in High School. At the time I worked as a leasing consultant at two different properties owned by the same company. Over the years, I worked for several different companies throughout the state as anything from a temporary maintenance technician to an assistant manager, to a parking garage attendant.

Me: Jeff, I hear you’re quite the educator. How does the apartment industry relate to your career in education?

Jeff: Great question, Mark! I consider them linked, if not entirely similar. Education is all about marketing: pedaling an undesired product to a consistently disengaged customer base. The most effective teachers utilize marketing strategies to engage their students in whatever material the teacher wishes to deploy. And, like apartments, it’s not just about the initial closing, but rather the creation of a valuable experience with that product. I don’t teach to the test, and managers don’t work for the lease. I teach to the students, and managers work for the leasee.

Me: You have your masters in History and Literature; how does that experience/knowledge help you every day?

Jeff: I’ve always been fascinated with the power and value of stories to change the world. They can. They do. With the right voice, a single person can create a religion, start a war, change a law, destroy a country, build a town, create a life, frighten, inspire, confuse, excite, and arouse the imaginations of countless people. As a student, I love studying how certain stories have shaped various historical events and with my psychology background, how those events in turn shaped the people of the world. It’s the same reason why I love education and apartments; I’m a story teller, and the best story wins. Period.

Me: What’s one of your proudest accomplishments in teaching?

Jeff: In 2010, I was voted Montgomery County “Teacher of the Year,” which basically means I got my name spelled wrong in the paper, but hey, it’s on my resume. Though, I think a more fitting question would be, “What’s one of your proudest accomplishments in life,” and I would say, “Teaching.”

Me: Do you have any fun leasing stories?

Jeff: Of course! Appropriate ones? Maybe not…most of them involve incidents that resulted in the closing of our community pools.

Me: As a writer, what do you hope people can take away from reading your blog posts?

Jeff:  That a human being wrote them. Seriously, it’s so easy to mechanize everything these days and to fall into the perilous routine of thinking our jobs are futile. Albert Camus, a French philosopher once said, “Rising, streetcar, four hours in the office or the factory, meal, streetcar, four hours of work, meal, sleep, and Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday and Saturday according to the same rhythm – this path is easily followed most of the time. But one day the “why” arises and everything begins in that weariness tinged with amazement.” I guess, with my writing, I want to remind myself mostly (but if other people pick up on this, then hooray for me!) that people live in apartments. People with lives and stories and concerns and dreams and passions. If we can remember that and not simply go through our days looking at the clock and filing away lease renewals—if we seek to find the meaning in the meaningless (like cotton balls), then not only will our lives be more enriched, but we will be better at what we do.

Me: You recently wrote about local schools connecting with apartment communities. Why is this so important?

Jeff: Because the conditions in which people live and their success in school are so inextricably linked. It just makes sense that schools and apartments should work as closely as possible to provide a safe and productive environment for the academic stakeholders of a given community. I can’t tell you enough how important home life is to students. You wanna fix the schools? Fix the homes. Apartments can’t do the first one, but in working on the second one, both will improve. Right?

Me: How has technology affected the way you study and teach? How do you see that continuing to evolve?

Jeff: How much time do we have? I’ve found that as information becomes more readily available, two primary shifts have occurred in education. For one, the incentive to establish and maintain a strong credibility with my students has increased drastically. No longer do students feel the need to simply take a teacher at their word and believe whatever they say because at any moment, what the teacher says can be verified with the use of a phone—something virtually every student has. This forces teachers to master their material and the best means to disseminate it to the students.

Another interesting shift in education stems from the fact that students now have a lot more power. Because of their capacity to access information and share in that discovery, teachers must not only establish credibility as instructors, but also relevance for their product: in this case, knowledge. In democratizing information, technology has turned knowledge into capital. In turn, classrooms have morphed into a sort of digitized free-market economy wherein students warrant attention and respect. In truth, I’m more of a tour guide nowadays than the teacher of previous generations; I direct, facilitate, and indicate rather than lecture, test, and scold.

Me: What are your goals with your writing as they relate to the apartment industry?

Jeff: Honestly, having worked in a variety of apartment communities, I wish would have had something to read that was somewhat industry specific, but that offered a refreshing blend of casual insights/social observations and professional wisdom. I guess I’m trying to get as close to that as possible. As a teacher, I pride myself on finding the teachability of everything. I think the same is true with apartments; there’s value in everything. At the end of the day, I’d like to be the guy who talks about it on the internet.

Me: Book you think everyone should read?  Movie you think everyone should watch?

Jeff: Kurt Vonnegut’s Welcome to the Monkey House is an all-time favorite. I also enjoy Ian McEwan’s Atonement. Movies that everyone should watch? Hmmm…The Truman Show is a classic. Ask me again tomorrow.

Please do me a favor and follow/connect with Jade.  We look forward to bringing even more online fun to the Multifamily space.

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