“Try Anti-Depressants,” and Other Ways Not to Respond to Resident Feedback

“Try Anti-Depressants,” and Other Ways Not to Respond to Resident Feedback

Posted on 30. Nov, 2009 by Heather Blume in Resident Retention

All the cool kids are doing it.

We used to ignore sites like ApartmentRatings.com and tell our people to try to just forget they were there and not take things personally. In the last two years though, the shift of the social media model has required a reexamination of our silence, and it’s been decided, by pretty much everyone out there, that it’s time to respond to online public resident feedback.

I get emails on a weekly basis asking me questions from how to avoid escalating a situation in a response to how to deal with a clearly crazy resident ranting, a favorite line being, “Can I just tell her to try anti-depressants?” No. You may not suggest that your residents try taking a dosage of Prozac or Xanax.

So let’s talk about what you can say and how to communicate it clearly:

  1. Start with a little empathy. Maybe your company thinks it’s alright to dust off the old Kindergarten standby of, “I’m sorry.” Maybe not. But above all else, display a little empathy. As I said in the #AptChat on Twitter a few weeks ago, if it makes you angry to read what they wrote, think how angry they were when they posted it.
  2. Realize that if they’re complaining, they’re pretty angry, and if they thought they had to come online to do it, then you’ve got a communication breakdown somewhere. Take responsibility for that.
  3. If the situation has already been addressed, discuss publicly the solution that you worked out.
  4. Even if you think the solution worked out, make sure that you invite the resident to call the office and follow up with you should the same problem happen again.
  5. Use the words you would use if you were dining with your Grandmother. Don’t use slang, don’t use LOL, BRB, TXT MSG ME, etc. Don’t drop the Fbomb. Don’t say “Sry U were Pissed. Txt me 2 talk.” This is not appropriate, and the Grammar Patrol will come, get you, put you in a bag, and beat you with large semi-colons. (What, you thought semi-colons had a valid use? No. They’re for beatings by the Grammar Patrol.)
  6. For the love of Tony Danza, take a moment to proof read your post! If you are responding as management, it doesn’t matter how illiterate the original posting is, if you respond in half words or type out the word “loose” when you mean the word “lose” (which can drastically change the meaning of a few sentences I’ve seen on ratings sites) not only you, but your entire company looks dumb. A misplaced apostrophe rankles me something awful!

One ApartmentRatings.com page had the following response to a resident complaint. I’ve not edited anything out of the post. Now, kudos do go out to management for actually responding to the post, but not for HOW they responded:

I’m sorry to hear that you think this about our apartments, we have been active in trying to clean our side of the block up..its the surrounding apartments that make it bad. we dont let anyone with criminal history in here so i have no idea why you think its us. as for office hours, we are open 9am to 6pm except when we have functions. sorry. have a nice day.

“Sorry. Have a nice day.” I imagine that’s what their residents are going to tell them at the end of the lease.

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5 Responses to ““Try Anti-Depressants,” and Other Ways Not to Respond to Resident Feedback”

  1. Dave Dugdale

    30. Nov, 2009

    The best line in this post is:

    “Realize that if they’re complaining, they’re pretty angry, and if they thought they had to come online to do it, then you’ve got a communication breakdown somewhere. Take responsibility for that.”

    So true.

    Reply to this comment

  2. Annemarie

    30. Nov, 2009

    Always enjoy reading your articles, Heather. I especially like when you get all riled up about grammar. I’m the same way, but have to bite my tongue quite a bit as I don’t want to offend the offenders! :)

    Reply to this comment

  3. Kelly

    01. Dec, 2009

    More people will vent online than in person. If there is a legitimate concern, someone will make direct contact in person or by phone. When responding to complaints online, you have the ability to step back and make sure that you are giving the proper response to address the situation. It gives you a chance to make an impression on several residents or prospects rather than just one.

    I do agree that managers should work on their punctuation and present themselves in a professional manner online, given that they have the time to review their answers.

    Funny thing about Tony Danza – he lives on my floor and is my favorite elevator companion.

    Reply to this comment

  4. Marcus James

    01. Dec, 2009

    DO WHAT’S RIGHT
    I think that when a person says sorry, they’re saying it because they feel that they need to say it. But sometimes, they often can be just saying they are sorry to a person in order to make them feel better inside about themselves or just so they don’t have to be worried about anything.

    Sometimes they may be scared of somebody, trust me I know because I’ve been there in life, and I still am at times.

    But it’s just a way of life because if someone knows that they need to say they are sorry, then that shows me that they are being the bigger person and being very responsible in doing what they have to do without any problems. I’m proud of you whoever you may be.

    Reply to this comment

  5. Heather Blume

    01. Dec, 2009

    So many great comments! Seems I’ve hit either a chord with some people or a nerve with others. Yea!

    Dave- I have to wonder how many of our resident issues can be solved if we send some Draino down those communication pipes.

    Annemarie- I don’t worry about offending the offenders anymore. When you grow up with an English teacher in your home, it’s second nature to correct someone’s grammar or pronunciation for them. I figured it was never going to go away, so I shifted my perspective on it. Now I see it as making the world an better place to communicate in. :)

    Kelly- You may be right about the tendency to vent online, but something that occurred to me last week when I was in Houston for a conference was that it once was that people wanted to complain online because it was anonymous, however now you see people who are very proud to shout the reviews and complaints that they give places. It’s an interesting society shift when you step back and look at it. Being an unlisted complaint may be easier, but I still don’t believe it’s the first stop for most people. Sometimes they’re not an overt complainer, but they try to deliver the message in other ways, ie – body language, subtle hits, etc. Then they go online. You’re never going to catch them all before the aptratings post goes public, but at least it does provide you with the safety net of getting feedback from the ones who might have been ignored before :)

    Marcus- You’re very right on the point that “sorry” can be quite a self serving word, however, I’ve seldom found a time when I genuinely meant that I was sorry, and it didn’t help improve the situation. It’s when you fake that you’re sorry that stuff starts to blow right up in your face. Mean it, or wipe it from the business vocab. Good rule of thumb! :)

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