The Official AppFolio Blog

We’ve written before about how greening your properties can give you a competitive advantage over your competition. But did you know that greening your property management office can also boost your business? Property managers who have gone green and paperless find that it saves them both time and money. And when you combine a green office with environmentally friendly changes to the properties you manage, you can market yourself more effectively as an eco-friendly business. A green image can be a big benefit in today’s market.

Here are seven tips on greening your property management office.

1. Go paperless.
   One of the most important green changes you can make to your office is to go paperless. Reducing the amount of paperwork you handle saves you time and money, gets rent money in the bank faster, frees up office space and saves trees. These days, you can conduct almost all your business via the Internet, email and fax. And using web-based property management software makes going paperless even easier. Email owners and residents, collect rent online, enter work orders and store digital documents, all right from AppFolio.
2. Say no to junk mail.
   Junk mail accounts for a ridiculous number of dead trees, and everyone hates it anyway. So dig yourself out from under the avalanche of ads and bogus offers. Check out the FTC’s instructions on how to opt out of junk mail. A few extra minutes spent now calling or emailing the appropriate agencies can save you the time and trouble required to sort through and discard junk mail in the future.
3. Buy rechargeable batteries.
   Rechargeable batteries will cost you a little extra money at the register, but are well worth it in the long run. One rechargeable battery can replace hundreds of single-use batteries. You’ll also reduce the amount of toxic metal waste put into landfills. Rechargeable batteries contain the same harmful materials as regular batteries, but you’ll use fewer of them. And remember, whether you use rechargeable or standard batteries, recycle them properly rather than just tossing them in the trash.
4. Replace incandescent bulbs.
   Replacing incandescent bulbs in your office with compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs) can save you money by reducing your electrical bills. And the less energy you use, the fewer of the Earth’s natural resources you’ll consume.
5. Hold meetings online.
   Consider conducting meetings over the Internet via Skype, Google+ Hangouts, GoToMeeting or another video chat service rather than having everyone drive to the office. Not only will you save people money on gas, you’ll preserve the world’s oil resources and cut down on air pollution from car exhaust.
6. Turn computers off.
   Computers use up a ton of energy, and leaving them on overnight is just wasteful. Make it a company policy for everyone to turn off their desktop computers before leaving work. And while you’re at it, make sure to turn off other major office equipment, such as printers, scanners and fax machines, when not in use.
7. Install a programmable thermostat.
   A programmable thermostat will quickly help you to cut down on your energy bills. Set it to a comfortable level during work hours and program it to reduce the temperature by a few degrees during the hours when no one’s in the building.

With the amount of time that people spend online these days, it’s very important to have a professional presence on the Internet. Potential clients and residents search for properties and property management services online, and your current owners and residents will appreciate the ability to connect with you via the web. On top of that, whether you have an online presence or not, your business likely has an online reputation. For good or bad, people are probably talking about your company online, and it’s important that you take part in that conversation.

Here are three simple ways that you can establish and improve your property management business’s online reputation.

Maintain A Professional Website
A company website with a professional look and feel is an important part of putting your best foot forward online. It is your business’s digital face, the place where people will look for your official presence. Building a property management website is a first step in establishing yourself on the Internet. Your website should provide people with all the important information they need about your business. A website gives you a place to post your contact information, list vacancies, connect with owners and residents and display positive reviews of your company. We work hard to make publishing and maintaining a property management website easy.

Provide Excellent Service
Excellent service is of course the key to offline as well as online reputation management. When you treat your owners and residents well, you reap the benefits in word-of-mouth marketing, and you attract better quality residents. Thankfully, the Internet makes it easy to provide better service to everyone. When residents, owners and vendors can do everything from sending you an email to paying rent online, you can respond quickly. And, of course property management software can make all this even easier.

Monitor And Respond To Feedback
Everyone appreciates a company that responds well to positive as well as negative feedback. In the digital age, it’s important to monitor mentions of your company online and respond accordingly. Run regular searches for your company name and find out what people are saying. An easy way to do this is to use Google Alerts – www.google.com/alerts. When you see a positive comment, be sure to thank the writer. You might even ask them if you can feature their review on your website. When you see a negative comment, apologize to the writer (even if you don’t think you were in the wrong) and fix the problem. Try to keep your replies short and simple, and use it as an opportunity to improve your business.

We’ve worked with Charity Hisle from Socially Engaged Marketing to create this great, free eBook on how to manage your online reputation.

We all know that curb appeal can help fill vacancies faster. If your property doesn’t appeal to a viewer at first glance, there’s a good chance they will pass it by without looking into it any further. Not only will a more attractive property gain you more inquiries about your vacancies, but it will also enable you to find better quality residents who will be willing to pay more in rent in order to live in a beautiful home.

But how do you improve the curb appeal of the properties you manage? Often you are so familiar with your buildings that it’s actually rather difficult to see their flaws. When this is the case, it’s important to be able to take a step back and make a real effort to view your properties from the perspective of an outsider. What would the average stranger passing by on the street see that you’ve overlooked?

Take a Step Back
To accomplish this, it can be helpful first to take a literal step back. Walk across the street and view your property from a distance so that you can see its surroundings at the same time. Are there many dead trees surrounding the structure? Is the front porch sagging, or could it use a new coat of paint? Is the fence in good repair, and does the lawn look cared for? What single problem could you fix that would make a significant difference to the eyes of a potential resident?

Now Come Closer
Next, walk back over to the property and look a little more closely at the building itself, as well as the elements immediately surrounding it. If someone passes by on the street and is struck by your property, you don’t want them coming closer only to be turned off by smaller details. Are the windows, doors and siding clean? Has the porch been swept? Are the steps broken? Is the gravel from the walkway straying all over the lawn? Are there old tools or pieces of trash scattered in the yard? Many of these minor problems can be remedied quickly and inexpensively, so it makes no sense to lose potential residents over them.

Pick a Few Easy Wins
Once you’ve identified some areas that need work, decide what you’d like to address immediately. Check out this article from PropertyManager.com with 5 Easy Ways to Improve Curb Appeal. Ask yourself, what changes will give me the most visual impact for my time and money? Also consider, what changes will make a lasting impact that renters will appreciate. And naturally, once you’ve finalized on the changes, enter them as work orders using your AppFolio property management software!

It seems like everyone is on Facebook these days. THE social network now has more than 800 million active users, and according to Facebook, more than half of those users log in on any given day. You can bet that both property owners and residents are part of that crowd, so it only makes sense that your property management business should have a presence there as well. But how can you make your company Facebook page stand out?

Optimize
First, you need to make sure that users will find your business. Thankfully, there are some simple ways you can make your page more visible in search results within Facebook. First, pick your page name and URL carefully. Choose a name that users will easily identify with your brand and that they will also remember. Next, fill out the “About” and “Overview” boxes in the info tab using important keywords to describe your business. Make sure that your location is included as part of the keyword phrases (for instance, “Chicago property management).” Finally, make sure to install Facebook’s Open Graph Protocol to improve your ranking in Facebook search results.

Create Custom Tabs
Facebook allows you to create custom tabs for your business. First, design a custom landing tab that every first-time visitor sees when they access your page. Brand that tab and give users essential information about your business. Also include a call to action: ask them to “Like” your page, so that your status updates will begin appearing in their news feeds. Next, create another custom tab to display the properties you manage, each with its own beautiful photo. Finally, use custom tabs to offer unique promotions to your Facebook fans and encourage them to share information about your business with their friends.

Serve a Need
If you don’t make regular updates to your Facebook page, the fans you do gain will simply hit “Like” and then forget about you. However, if you post spammy updates, people will unsubscribe en masse. To keep your fans attention without annoying them, make sure that your posts are serving their needs. Follow the 80/20 rule. Only 20% of your posts should directly promote your business. The other 80% should provide information that is useful to your audience. As a property manager, you could provide fans with information about local community, tips on taking care of their living spaces or photos of the city or town you serve.

Download this eBook, Facebook for Property Managers, to learn more great tips and tricks.

Did you know that, in addition to protecting the environment, implementing eco-friendly practices at the properties you manage can benefit your business? Greener units are a great selling point and can help you to attract a better kind of resident. Implementing these practices can help residents cut down on water and energy expenses, making your apartments more attractive. Also, residents who are more eco-conscious are more likely to respect both their interior and exterior environment, inflicting less wear and tear on their living spaces.

Here are seven easy ways to get started on greening your properties for the new year.  Not only does it help you to attract eco-conscious residents, you will find some money saving opportunities as well.

1. Replace incandescent light bulbs with compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs).
   ENERGY STAR-qualified CFLs produce the same amount of light as traditional bulbs with only about ¼ of the energy.
2. Repaint your units with low- or no-VOC paints.
   The EPA has found that levels of organic pollutants are two to five times higher within homes than without. These compounds can have serious health and environmental consequences. Using paints low in these compounds will improve the quality of life for your residents.
3. Install low-flow water fixtures and toilets.
   These fixtures produce a water flow that feels the same while using less water, saving both a natural resource and money. Many utilities and city governments offer incentives for installing low-flow fixtures, so make a few calls for added savings.
4. Install programmable thermostats.
   The automatic settings help your residents to more accurately regulate temperatures and save money and energy at the same time. Make sure to educate your tenants on their use.
5. Insulate your water heaters.
   A $20-$30 investment in an insulation blanket can translate into 9% savings on water heating. Older water heaters in particular need this attention.
6. Check furnace ducts for leaks.
   Sealing these leaks can account for as much as a 20% energy savings, plus will improve the air quality in your properties.
7. Use ENERGY STAR appliances.
   Encourage your owners to install ENERGY STAR appliances. ENERGY STAR-rated refrigerators, dishwashers, washing machines and dryers use significantly less water and energy.

Maintaining a strong, positive online presence for your property management business grows in importance every day. The amount of time people spend on the Internet, and the number of tasks they accomplish there, increases constantly. We go online to socialize, play, shop and learn – your potential clients and residents are online, and they are using the Internet to find businesses like yours.

In our educational presentations to property managers we always talk about the importance of your company blog. HubSpot reports that businesses that blog get 55% more traffic than those that don’t. Here are just three ways that a blog can help you in your online property management marketing efforts.

Improve Search Visibility
Potential clients and residents need to be able to find you online. There are many property managers out there competing for the same business, and it’s very easy for your property management website to get buried in search engine results. More and more, the key to ranking well in search results is to provide frequent, fresh, quality content. A blog is an easy way to post new content to your site on a regular basis.

Paint a Positive Image
Let’s face it. No matter how fantastic your business is, eventually it will draw some negative reviews. In fact, the more successful and visible you become, the more likely you are to receive criticism in online places like Yelp. A blog is a great place to talk about the great things your company does, respond to concerns and generally give your online image a boost.

Become a Hub for Information
People love websites that provide them with what they need. Your property management website should provide potential clients and tenants with the information they need about your business and the properties you manage as well as industry trends, local information and a feel for your community.. It can also provide a platform for sharing other types of useful information that will draw traffic to your business. When you know the needs of your client base and speak to those needs on your blog, you can become an important hub for information and draw more visitors to your site.

We hosted a great webinar with Grace Hill where presenters Doug Miller (Founder & President of SatisFacts) and Mike Whaling (30Lines) shared results from the national survey: Inside the Mind of the Online Renter.

Download the survey summary here: http://www.appfolio.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/SatisFacts-Getting–Inside-the-Head-of-the-Online-Renter-Handout.pdf

Doug and Mike discussed what the top priorities are for today’s online renters and how property managers can best position themselves against their competition and manage their online reputation. One of our favorite slides highlighted how the ability to pay rent online if there is no convenience fee was the #1 factor that impacted what apartment applicants will rent in the future. Here’s the recorded webinar.

Many participants submitted great questions during the Webinar and we wanted to follow up with Doug and Mike’s answers below.

Is it legal to offer a gift in exchange for a positive review on apartmentratings.com?
It is legal, but the gift must be disclosed by the person leaving the review. If it’s not disclosed, you can be subject to a $25,000 fine from the FTC.

Should I ask residents to comment on apartmentratings.com or is that asking for trouble?
DM – It’s only asking for trouble if you are not consistently delivering superior service in the areas that matter most to residents…tied into the work order process, the related team effort required (driven by the office staff performance as they are the beginning and end of the work order process), communication, and what we at SatisFacts call a “culture of responsiveness.”

MW – You should absolutely ask your residents to leave reviews for you on Apartment Ratings. That said, each site has different terms, so be careful about this … for example, Yelp discourages asking for reviews, but they’re not opposed to you promoting the fact that you have a Yelp page for your business.

Is texting another way to have things in writing?
You should ask your attorney whether this is sufficient. Personally, I would prefer to have anything you need in writing confirmed through an email, not a text message.

What is the difference between Google Ratings and apartmentratings.com?
Google ratings are the star ratings and reviews that are found on your property’s Google Place page. Google sometimes pulls in the reviews that have been left on Apartment Ratings, but these are definitely two separate locations where people can leave feedback about your business.

How can I best use Facebook to rent units?
DM – By not spending time trying to rent units via Facebook. How many times have you gone to Facebook to buy merchandise, rent a hotel room or the like? It is not a primary source of traffic and there is no functionality such as found on an ILS or your property portal. Use it primarily as an online newsletter that focuses on community news (projects, new staff members, service related items) and events. Let the relatively small percent of people who go to a Facebook page to help with a buying decision see who you are and what you are about…a feel-good to validate what kind of community you are.

MW – I agree with Doug about not trying to sell, although I wouldn’t pass up the opportunity to list your properties there through a custom tab. Use Facebook as an opportunity to get residents, local business partners and other interested people to talk about you, either between friends or directly with your company. Give them interesting thoughts/links/things to share, and use tools like RentMineOnline to take your resident referral program online and get people recommending you to their friends.

How much are properties investing on average for SEO?
It really depends on your current situation, internal resources and what you’re ultimately trying to achieve. If you want to rank first for a highly-competitive term like “apartments,” expect to make a huge investment. Also, most apartment marketers are trying to optimize their website, when they really should be trying to build a broad online presence that positions them positively in a number of different places where prospects might be searching. Some other reports indicate that as much as 80-90% of prospects are starting their apartment search from a search engine like Google, so the more you can invest in optimizing your presence, the better. Educate yourself first about the SEO services that you’ll need (on-page optimization, link-building on external sites, incorporating social ranking factors, in-depth keyword research and Web analytics), then find a partner that can best address your specific needs.

Today we announced RentApp – a new, free online rental application service for property managers who are not using our web-based property management software. Read the release here.

Note: Our AppFolio customers already can accept rental applications online and use the built-in screening service.

Why RentApp?
Many property managers offer rental applications on their website – but these are often PDFs that must be downloaded, printed and faxed by the potential renter, leaving the property manager with stacks of annoying paperwork. We also found that the online rental application solutions available today can be costly and many property managers don’t use them because it is too hard and time consuming to customize and include with their vacancy postings.

RentApp was built to solve these problems and offer property managers (who aren’t yet using the AppFolio property management software) the quickest and easiest way to accept online applications and screen residents, so they save a ton of time that can then be devoted to more important tasks. We’ve invested a lot of time and effort on usability testing to make it very easy for both the property manager and the potential resident.

How does it work?
Signing up for RentApp takes less than a minute – Property managers simply set up an account, customize the rental application and add links to the online application right on their vacancy ads. RentApp also offers property managers the option to include credit, criminal and background screening, with packages starting at $10 per screen – streamlining another task.

“We love RentApp,” said Edith Sanchez-Badawy (Porta Rossa Apartments). “It is just so easy and convenient for our prospective residents and our leasing agents to receive applications online – our company can now reach many more clients.”

Learn more at www.RentApp.com

The 2011 NARPM National Convention was a big hit this year! We are honored to partner and participate with NARPM as they deliver valuable education to it’s membership all year long and the National Convention is no exception. We kicked off this year’s NARPM Convention by sponsoring the 2nd Annual Past President’s Golf Tournament which was a big hit. We continue to see the white polo shirts from the tournament floating around the office.

At the trade show booth, we held product demos and talked to customers and prospects about how AppFolio’s Property Management Software can benefit their business. After the show let out on Thursday night, many NARPM attendees were ready for a cocktail, a snack, and possibly a chance at singing their favorite song on stage in front of their peers. Yes, we are talking about Karaoke at the Magic Time Machine restaurant! We shared some awesome photo booth pictures from the party on our Facebook page. Feel free to tag yourself in the pictures because we want to get them to you!

Not only did some of our executives travel to the convention this year but many of our Dallas AppFolio team members were present as well. Having an office in the same city of the convention is a huge perk! You get rides to the airport, they know which restaurants have T.V.s showing the World Series, and they have a wonderful hospitable Texan spirit!

We had such a great time and are already looking forward to the NARPM National Convention in 2012.

Related: Highlights from the 2010 NARPM Convention

We hosted a great webinar with Grace Hill on the topic of ways to immediately improve your leasing success.

Lisa Trosien covered five ways to improve upon even the best leasing pro’s skills. We had record-breaking registration and reached the maximum capacity for GoToWebinar! Here’s the recorded webinar with a few questions we didn’t have time to answer below that.

Many participants submitted great questions during the Webinar and we wanted to follow up with Lisa’s answers below.

Do you have any ideas on new ways to complete with people buying or leasing homes?
You can point out how maintenance free it is to rent an apartment. People who rent a house usually still have to do some routine maintenance and yard work / lawn mowing / snow removal. Point these things out gently to the prospect.

As for purchasing, it’s tough to fight that if the prospect has their heart set on it and the corresponding tax breaks. However, there is no guarantee that the house will hold its value and for people first moving into a home, the ’start-up’ costs can be high. Purchases of things like lawn mowers, yard equipment, home repair items can add up. Unless the house is in pristine condition they will need to budget accordingly for replacement and repair. Those are things they don’t have to worry about when renting from you.

What industry Facebook pages do you recommend for us to follow?
Here are a few I suggest. If you have another one that’s great please add it in the comments:

Rent and Retain
Apartment AllStars
Multifamily Pro
Grace Hill
AppFolio
Socially Engaged Marketing
Behind The Leasing Desk
30 Lines

I always suggest that you look at the content on an industry page. If it appears to be informational or educational and not heavy on the self promotion, that’s a good one to follow.

Through my office, I manage four different properties. How do you avoid steering?
This is where the questioning of the prospect is really important. You need to zero in on what their needs are and then determine which property best meets their needs.

When a bad review is given on a website such as apartmentratings.com should the manager go on there and respond to it?
Absolutely!

Can you recap the two authors + books you recommend?
Anything by Robert Cialdini and Paco Underhill are very good.