Eric Wu's Blog

As the NAA Conference nears, I've been thinking about questions the industry would want to ask Tony Hsieh, Jeremiah Owyang, and Pete Flint. Instead of guess what the space want to ask,

What would you want to ask Tony Hsieh, Jeremiah Owyang, and Pete Flint?

Put your questions in the comments below or email me at eric@rentwiki.com and I'll try to ask them during the Thought Leadership panel Saturday morning.

In 1997, I can recall my older sisters saying how cumbersome email was.

In 1999, I can recall high school classmates saying that Napster will never replace music CD’s.

In 2005, I remember friends saying how stupid Facebook is.

The recent months, the hot topic in the multi-family housing industry has been social media. There are those who understand it, those who are experimenting with it, and those who deny it's existence. As we gear up for the NAA educational conference and the social media panel with Tony Hsieh, Jeremiah Owyang, and Pete Flint, I have noticed that there are some people that have never heard of large companies like Zappos.com.

So to reward those who know what Zappos.com is and want to see Tony, Jeremiah, and Pete discuss Social Media, but cannot afford tickets, here is a great way.  NAA has graciously sponsored a contest to give away 1 FREE NAA CONFERENCE TICKET and 50% off 1 NAA CONFERENCE TICKET. Enter the contest and see if you are a social media guru.

In our industry, the traditional methodology of developing and implementing a new idea or service seems to stifle creativity. At a typical property management group, the risk-profile is perceived to be very high. Further compounding the problem, traditional mediums are viewed as efficient "enough". 

I'm not recommending you spend hours a day tracking and measuring leads, but putting some simple processes in place will help you identify which leads are converting from which sources. Though the general goal is to drive the most leads possible, maybe it should be to drive the most qualified leads possible.

Yesterday, Yelp announced that businesses will be able to respond to reviews. According to the NY Times: 

"Starting next week, Yelp will let small-business owners publicly respond to reviews. This is a big change for the site, which has until now steadfastly refused to give businesses significant access to its pages. 
 
Yelp’s co-founder and chief executive, Jeremy Stoppelman, has said that to protect the voice of the consumer, the voices of businesses, many of which advertise on the site, had to be muted."  

 As a member of the multifamily community, I am excited for communication and interaction between businesses and consumers.  Businesses will have a voice and a way to depend and refute inaccurate and unfair content.  

Today, we launched a simple, but useful integration with Twitter. Goal... provide renters with additional tools = more transparency information when searching for a place to live.  Here is an example >>

So the question is, can you use Twitter to help you find a place to live?

Let's first take a look at some other verticals using Twitter:

Can you use twitter as a financial adviser? Answer: Stocktwits.com

In an interesting post by Mark Juleen Walkin’ the Line, Mark discusses the difference between effectively engaging in social media vs. spamming users.  As a consumer, I wish social media is an unbiased conversation, but this is not the reality of the marketplace.  Brands and advertisers supply the dollars for most of the websites that host the conversation.  Without revenue (or the potential for it), Facebook, Blogger, YouTube, Yelp, and even Twitter would have to shut their doors.  If consumers continue their fundamental belief that the internet is free, we have to understand the fact that advertisers will attempt to join the conversation.  There have been hundreds of posts of how to use social media as a marketing tool, but here is the quick 1,2,3…4.

1)    Join the conversation
It is more important to join the conversation and build a relationship before you self-promote.  Discuss current trends, provide some news and facts in your industry, talk about the weather, whatever.  The main ingredient here is to build some rapport before promoting your product.

2)    Be yourself
Obvious.  No one wants to talk to “Craigslist”.  We want to talk to Craig Newmark.

3)    Be engaging
Social media is not about just broadcasting messages, it is about engagement. Ask questions, talk to customers, be responsive, and be interesting.

4)    Provide value to the end user
If the end user is not gaining any value from the conversation, they will leave.  And in the case of most social media outlets, the value is in content.  

If every other message, post, or tweet is about how great you are, then you are either Apple or a spammer.  Instead of sending a message about new features, discuss the feature, talk about the pros and cons, how it is going to affect users, and ask for feedback.  One-way messages have some value, but creating the conversation around the message is much more effective.

Let’s take the use case of Twitter.  Everyone is talking about Twitter.  Everyone wants to utilize Twitter.  Gary Vanderchuck said it best, “Having Twitter is like having a cell phone.  No one cares.”  Serioulsy, no one cares.  Having a Twitter account does not mean you have a social media marketing strategy.  Determine what you’re end goals are, listen to your customers, engage partners, friends, and users, and find a way to provide value. 

Anyone want to start/contribute a wiki around ideas for use cases for apartments around specific social media marketing?  I've started it, but I need help!  http://socialmediaideas.pbwiki.com/

We’re witnessing deflation and rising unemployment, resulting in trailing decreases in consumer spending.  The movement towards thrift spending has impacted the housing market, and I am noticing a couple of obvious trends.

1)  Empty nests are being filled

Renting is the largest living expense and consumers are moving home to reduce that cost.  Many recent college graduates, young professions, and the unemployed will be forced to move home.