Don't ignore Apartmentratings.com

With every passing day, the internet becomes a larger decision making tool for today's consumer. One of the most widely used decision making tools is a consumer testimonial. In the apartment industry these testimonials are most commonly found on the site Apartmentratings.com

The well documented problem with this site is that it can quickly become a vehicle for upset residents to vent about their problems. While some issues posted on this site are accurate and honest, many are the result of the resident being evicted, or fined for breaking the rules of their lease. While these posts seem quite obvious to anyone in the industry, prospective residents who use this site to decide which communities to call home, may not be able to differentiate between honest feedback and eviction rage.

Jeffrey Lee, from NAAHQ.com has his take on it here. "When renter Candice Chung was deciding between two apartments in Arlington, Va., she turned to past residents at both communities to help her make her choice. On the Web site ApartmentRatings.com, she found a network of renters from both communities sharing compliments and complaints about their experiences. One community had 100 percent positive ratings, with commenters mentioning specific things they liked about the community, such as its friendly management. The other, a commenter alleged, had rats.
“After that, I was really adamant about getting the apartment with high ratings,” Chung says. “I liked that the management left responses to the comments, like ‘Thank you for your comment.’ ” The responses reassured her that management was responsive, she says. As to the rats: “How would I ever have known that otherwise?” she asks."



The question on everyone's mind is how do we manage our property's online reputation? It is silly to ignore and just assume that prospective residents won't react to our prior residents beef with management. Studies show that not only do consumers take notice, they are using this information to make a decision.

The answer is to be proactive with ApartmentRatings.com The first way to be proactive is to have a the manager pay the fee and provide feedback to all post (both positive and negative). When someone sees that management is taking an active roll in addressing issues at an apartment, it shows that the manager cares about the community.

The second way to combat this problem is to have happy residents post good things about the community. Anytime a happy resident comes into the office, we should have Apartmentratings.com pulled up and ready for posting. We should then invite the resident to share his or her experiences on the site. Just asking someone to post later does not insure that it gets done. We must already have the site pulled up, and then we must ask them to take 2 minutes to write a brief testimonial while we make them a cup of coffee or get them a refreshment.

These two easy steps can do wonders for your property's online reputation. If we can surround the negative comments, by many positive comments, it shows the prospect that the negative comment was left by a disgruntled tenant who may have been facing fines or eviction due to their inability to follow the rules of their lease. Which as we all know, is typically the case. The bottom line is this, don't ignore your property's Apartmentratings. While the real reasons for most negative postings are very apparent to us, the prospect takes them to heart.