Resident Text Messages
As any of our regular followers and readers know, The Urbane Way is about trying new and innovative ideas to market and manage your apartment communities. We use The Urbane Laboratory as our testing grounds and we let you know what works and what doesn’t, and why. Some are new ideas and some are old ideas wrapped differently. Some work and some don’t, we Focus on Fail Faster to get to what works quicker.
Look Within; Your Residents Are a Resource
What we have on store for you today is a report on a Text Messing System we have been using at Urbane Apartments for about a year and a half. We have no affiliation with this brand or product, but we do recommend it based on our experience with it. It was brought to us by one of the Urbane Residents. Property Management Companies, Are you listening out there? An Urbane Resident brought it to us! I only bring this up to continue to point out that OUR, and YOUR biggest assets are the RESIDENTS.
Most of our Residents know Kim and I personally. They know I am kind of quirky and always on the lookout for a hip and cool new product, and that WE WILL try new things here at Urbane. So, many of the things we test at the Urbane Lab are brought to us by our team of Resident Evangelists. So next time you blurt out lack of resources as an excess as to why you are remaining boring and a commodity, Look Within, Your Residents are Your Greatest Asset.
Text Messaging
Text messaging has begun to surpass actual phone calls as a form of communication, which is baffling. The product we have been using is pretty simple, and pretty economical, less than $50. Yep, that’s right, less than $50 and no ongoing fees, you download the software right from the internet. The really cool thing about it is that you can group your text message by Community, and or by Building within a Community. Our primary use of text at Urbane has been for Service and Maintenance related items, but also for upcoming events, such as Urbane sponsored Pub Crawls and the like. You can send the messages directly from your PC. Our friends over at Ellipse, marketing coordinator Elysa Rice suggested yesterday that it would be great to alert Residents of pending bad weather via text, which is a great suggestion.
Preferred Method
Paul Revere stopped using lanterns a few hundred years ago, yet property management companies still insist on leaving notes on Residents doors. Works OK I guess, assuming your Resident doesn’t travel, and you were getting ready to seal coat your parking lot. To that point, text messaging is a preferred and quite effective way to communicate. Just be careful to not over do it and spam, otherwise the system works great. Here is the text message system we use at Urbane Apartments, Data Doctor PC to Mobile Text Messaging.
(SMS) Software create and send unlimited number of text messages including (personalized SMS, event alert and notifications, Invitations, Season greetings, promotional campaigns, contacting employees, job alerts to group or individuals instantly from your Personal computer to Smart phones and Pocket PC phones on all national or International Mobile phones Networks. The software allows you to send SMS from your computer without Internet connection.
Good Luck, and let us know about your text message experience
Eric’s background is rooted in the rental and real estate industries. He founded metro Detroit’s Urbane Apartments in 2003, after serving as senior vice president for a major Midwest apartment developer. He established a proven track record of effectively repositioning existing rental properties in a way that added value for investors while enhancing the resident experience.
He also established The Urbane Way, a social media marketing and PR laboratory, where innovative marketing ideas are tested. Eric has been featured in Entrepreneur Magazine and Business Week Magazine.
You can connect with Eric_Urbane on Twitter.
Eric also writes regular articles for the following publications;
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