It is amazing how one customer can generate enough negative attention to bring down an entire community reputation, but in today's techno connected society it's easier than ever to damage your properties reputation.

We've all heard it before, social networking sites have given prospects a new degree of power to have their opinions heard. This can either spell success or disaster for your community. It's important to learn what you can do to get positive reviews and how to be in control of these conversations. We're calling this the age of conversational marketing.

If you think your 1980's snobby attitude is enough to get you new business, it's time to rethink! Instead of over the top sales pitches, today your prospects are looking for the leasing agents and managers who have mastered the art of listening, learning and responding to their needs. Not long ago a property could pressure a prospect into signing on the dotted line simply by telling them how "unworthy" they were in comparison to the communities amenities and other residents. You better believe that now it's your job to make sure that those prospects needs are met and their stories are listened to.

Communities are under extreme scrutiny because the once private conversation of dissatisfaction is now taking place publicly and in many more locations spanning all sorts of websites. One bad experience with a leasing agent is posted to that dreaded site, whose name we will not mention, which can now be picked up by other blogs, re-posted, re-circulated and then indexed in a search engine. It's called Viral Marketing for a reason, not only does it spread quicker than Mono in a high school, the speed at which it can be reproduced is almost unimaginable.

The hardest part is controlling the conversation, particularly when conversations take place in real time on sites like Twitter. The answer is simple really, you have to be ready to respond and make your side heard. Social networks are not the place for defensiveness, legal jargon or used car sales pitches, and using them will only further your demise. Remain calm and respond with the same delicacy you would use to speak to an upset friend.

It's important to get the customer service right the first time, because it takes an entire team effort to put out one wildfire.

In a recent book by Dr. John Medina called Brain Rules:12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School, he lists one the 12 principles as "We Don't Pay Attention to Boring Things". This notion almost seems too obvious, but the theme is reiterated in a blog post "20 Reasons Why Your Company is Boring" by Kyle Lacy, owner of Brandswag, an Indianapolis social media and design agency. It seems that many of us have forgotten this simple rule.

In an Ellipse More Than Just a Newsletter first, we have decided to start a series called, Why You're Boring!

Here are the first 5 reasons Why You're Boring!:

1. Your property uses an email that ends with a phone, cable, or ISP company: AOL, SBCGLOBAL, etc. Even worse, your email ends with any free web-based provider such as GMAIL or YAHOO. Stop branding for those other companies . . . they don't need your help! Brand your own company.
2. Your website says "Copyright 2002" or anytime before 2005. Update your online presence and keep the material relevant to today's consumer.
3. You photo copy your professional brochure and hand that out as collateral. Spend the money and print more brochures!
4. You attend all the networking events, exchange tons of business cards but never actually follow up on anything.
5. You don't attend networking events because you have, "better ways to spend my time." DVR your favorite show and catch up later because you may never recapture that lead.

Something doesn't need to be brand new to be interesting, but now more than ever, people need to notice you. Is your business noticeable or noticeably boring? Stay tuned for more reasons Why You're Boring! in upcoming issues.

Ellipse University is the ultimate in online education tracking for the multifamily industry. Comprehensive class listings, certification records, and individual scores can be easily accessible by logging into your Apartment Toolbox^®. Onsite teams can quickly and efficiently register for your management training sessions and with integration, they can even access their classes and scores within Grace Hill. Registration is easy and calendaring within the system allows teams to schedule training at the most convenient times. Customizable classes and reports make tracking your teams progress effortless.

Integration with the Grace Hill education system will provide mutual clients a fully functioning reporting package to aid in the tracking of apartment professionals' comprehensive online training activity. The Ellipse system provides a host of new tools for Grace Hill training clients including tracking who has not completed required training allowing training directors to schedule synchronous and asynchronous training via the calendaring component, online registration for training, and the ability to define learning paths based on hire date or job title. The ability to create and monitor employee testing allows you to focus on specific areas of training. The options are limitless with the customizable features offered by the Ellipse University product.

If you are intrested in learning more about Ellipse University or in seeing a demo, please call us at 888-678-3869.