Can anyone share any thoughts on how to move up than Ripoff ?

Help me understand why a Yelp user is less likely to feel like their landlord would retaliate against for a negative review them compared to an Apartment Ratings user?

It’s true that you can’t leave anonymous reviews on Yelp, so I’m not sure what you were referencing when you told me to get my facts straight.

I will concede that someone could create a fake profile (use a different first name, not post any information, and omit a picture) and post whatever they wanted. Similar to if your name was actually Jason and you left your comment as “Brett.” I guess technically you could consider that the same thing as being anonymous (although that’s more like lying whereas being truly anonymous would be not providing any personal details, but I digress).

I don’t blame anyone other than myself or our associates when our customer’s expectations are not met. As I stated before, I appreciate feedback even when it’s negative. What I don’t appreciate is when people post negative comments regarding a problem they had (or sometimes incorrect/inaccurate info) without providing contact information for us to follow-up. Speaking of Apartment Ratings, when our Corporate associates read the reviews it’s helpful to have the complainant’s name to help get information about a problem that might be happening at one of our offices. Being able to call the manager and say “What’s the deal with Eric’s A/C not being fixed after 2 weeks of him calling?” That gets better results than “Someone posted a review that says that they’ve called to have their A/C fixed for 2 weeks and it’s not done. Do you know who that is? What’s going on? *pause* Oh. You don’t have anything outstanding?? Well, great job being caught up on your service requests.”

In hindsight I would feel the same way if someone were complimenting our service and didn’t provide a way for me to say thank you. Using the same example, had Eric’s A/C been repaired the same day he called and he was impressed with our response I would want to send him a card to thank him for being a resident.

Finally, I don’t work for a “corporate REIT.” I work for a private company that manages about 40 properties in the southeast. It’s true that our owners and investors don’t build these buildings because they want to be nice… it’s because they want to make money. We only make money when our residents are happy and we try to provide a quality living experience for everyone we serve. Sometimes we make mistakes, but it wasn’t for lack of trying to do the best thing for our residents by treating them fairly and with respect. I work in an amazing industry filled with extremely qualified, professional individuals who provide homes for thousands of people. No one I know would want to live in an apartment where they were treated badly, so I’m not ashamed of doing what I do. Nor am I ashamed of the property management industry as I know we treat people well. I’m really sorry that you don’t feel the same way (I assume a bad experience that caused you to feel the way you do – if that’s true I hope it was resolved or gets better; if I’m wrong I apologize).

Thanks for your comment as you’ve made me stop to think about some important topics. The intention of my initial post was to reiterate the fact that someone’s anonymous opinion is less credible than hearing from someone who believes in what they are saying enough to provide their name and to provide an example of the two types.

“Read your reviews where people are more honest, like Yelp.com. At these there you can’t leave anonymous comments. I feel like people are more likely to be honest if they can be identified.”

It is true that a lot of Yelpers *choose* not to be anonymous. I’m just speculating, but maybe that’s because they don’t have to worry about their landlord retaliating against them for posting a true negative review.

The way corporate REITs treat tenants, you should be ashamed. Your comment is yet another example of blaming others for your problems (“That damn website!”) instead of looking inward where the root of the problem lies.

“…can’t leave anonymous comments” on Yelp. Please. Get your facts straight.

The idea was that you should polarize the crowd; get a bunch of people raving about you and a bunch of people absolutely hating you, but just get them talking about you.

Essentially you’re creating a positive and negative reputation at the same time. I suppose that might work for some people, but if you’re not into being outrageous, it probably won’t work.

One thing I did learn in my public relations classes while doing my journalism degree: take bad publicity by the horns. Deal with it head on. Correct the problem, take ownership of it, and turn it into a positive.

The flip side of that is to not try to hide things. If the media gets a hold of that, you’re done. First of all, it’s more honest if you’re the first out with the story via press release. It totally defuses the media’s “what are you trying to hide” line of questions. Second, you get a chance to direct the agenda.

“Here’s what happened, here’s what we’re trying to do to correct it and here’s what we’re doing to try to stop it from happening again.”

Imagine how many PR fiascoes could have been avoided by this kind of proactive PR approach.

Interesting topic!