Marketing | BSitko

Apartments Overload

Jun 22 2015

On the surface, Brad looks like a well meaning, great guy. Familiar. His arguments many years ago about Chaos Theory and the unpredictability of nature, were spot on, especially as it relates to dinosaurs. Seeing commercials for ILS’s wasn’t something anyone could’ve predicted. Nor would I have wanted to. Unless you need one, to most, apartments are pretty boring. I always wondered how anyone could make a commercial about apartments not sound like a commercial for life insurance. Earlier this year, we heard about how a change gonna come. What was the change a comin’? I remember the first time I saw it. I was sitting in front of my television, the screen faded, and The Good Wife went to[…]

Nov 21 2014

Personally, if I’m ready to buy something, I need to know two basic things. First, what’s my excitement level for it and secondly, how much is it? That makes sense right? Overextending oneself is something one does right out of college when you think you have the world at your feet and assume that money grows on trees and so you run up your credit cards because you’re young and dumb. Not that I would know anything about that. Most people, though, are much smarter, whose thoughts are driven by the need to have what they want, balanced by how much they can afford. Fundamentally, at the end of the day, it’s really all about affordability – and at its[…]

Oct 17 2014

This is from a post on Apartminty in their ongoing “Quick Marketing Wins” series. The opinions expressed in here are mine. At first they called it the Now Generation, but I guess that had too many letters in it, so they officially named it the Y Generation but Google prefers you to call them the C Generation. Whew. Either way you look at it, these Millennial‘s want things NOW and are used to getting it that way. I speak as if this Generation is outside of my own. Err, let’s change the subject. If you’re under 35, you’re used to YouTube, getting things now, fast computers, and small devices you can hold. This generation makes up the majority of our new renters. This is who we[…]

Oct 10 2014

Over the years, I’ve always felt that industry marketers have always been on the lookout for the shiny new penny. They lift rocks, scrape off the moss, roll it around in their hand, stare at it and hope it’s the next thing that will bring the new residents in. If you think I’m just being curmudgeonly by saying these things, think about the new concepts that have been discussed over the years: Should you go all in on the ILS’s? What about SEO? Are there any more acronyms we can make up? How do you utilize email drip campaigns? Is posting to Social Media the answer? Will I rent more apartments by using Facebook? What about reviews? Do they matter? Will[…]

Jun 27 2014

(June 27, 2014) – In a recent move that caught the entire multifamily industry by surprise, an anonymous donor (The Donor) from a popular multifamily industry blog, acquired the Owl from the “BSitko foundation for the technologically challenged”. The owl supplants the original non-descript logo for the website with a fancier design, inspired by the acquisition. “It proves the point that we will really buy anything.” said an anonymous source. “We needed a spokescreature and this owl had just the look we were going for. We do give a hoot about spreading information.” In an interview right after the acquisition, Bill Szczytko, BSitko’s founder and proprietor of the foundation, admitted that his team struggled with the right image but after[…]

Jun 26 2014

Without business networking, the telephone as we know it might never have existed. Forced to setup his seemingly unimpressive telephone prototype in the top floor of Machinery Hall at the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia in 1876, Alexander Graham Bell was desperate. The hot summer sun had been assaulting guests through the glass roof all day and the judges, who had been forced to walk around in their formal suits, had reached their breaking point. They agreed to break early and judge just one more exhibit. With this being his last day, Bell had probably run out of time. Frantically, he made his way downstairs to where the judges and other exhibit presenters had gathered. It was then that Bell heard[…]

Jun 17 2014

“Change the way you look at things and the things you look at change.” ― Wayne W. Dyer Nowhere in my neurologist’s office did it say History Professor but when I noticed the Biography of Thomas Jefferson behind his desk last year, the history buff in me had to ask him about it. Little did I know I would spend the next 30 minutes talking to him about American History during the early 1800’s. Turns out, my Neurologist is also a History Professor and loves talking about history. Go figure. People would want to classify his life with a job title so let’s go with HistoricalProfologist. People really love job titles. In a psychology sense, it’s how people are able[…]

Jun 04 2014

Last week my wife decided that our ten year old purple couch, with the worn fabric and small baby vomit stains we’ve never been able to remove, needed to go. Besides the obvious failings, it didn’t seat enough people and guests in our home would often have to sit Indian style (or should that be criss cross applesauce?) on the floor in the living room. So, as husbands must do, I spent several days last weekend trying to make my wife happy. We shopped. We labored. (I labored and she directed) We improvised. We stressed. We re-did. The living room looks better because of it. While shopping on Saturday for the perfect coffee table, one of the stores we visited[…]

Apr 11 2014

For years now, we’ve used a free tool called Kampyle to collect feedback on our website. After a minute or two of browsing our site, customers would get a popup widget that asked them to rate the site from 1-5 and give comments on what we could improve. The great comments we’ve received over the years have led to many changes that have improved its usability. A month ago, Kampyle released their own full site redesign – which totally broke it. Links don’t function. I can’t log in. I cannot get my feedback data. I cannot see my website reviews. I’ve sent emails to them. I’ve filled out their feedback form. I haven’t received a single response. The irony of[…]

Apr 03 2014

Trying to reach perfect lead attribution is like trying to learn to fly with a pair of chopsticks and chewing gum. People just use way too many websites to get all the information they need to make the best choice. All we can do as marketers is simply the best we can. When going over our reports last year and discovering that our website had turned into a source code catch-all, we decided to try something different. Create sub-domains for your marketing. Here’s what I mean. Click on this link: http://iamanerd.bsitko.com. The iamanerd is the subdomain here. Do you notice when you click on this link it redirects you to a blog post I wrote? Notice the Google Analytics code[…]

Category - Marketing

Apartments Overload

Why Multifamily apartment pricing is broken

Executing Quick Marketing Wins

An Anonymous Donor acquires The Owl

From rags to riches: The power of industry networking

Why I hate job titles

What’s the true definition of value?

The Feedback Dilemma

A cool, pretty easy, and free trick you can use for better lead attribution (Yes, even on Craigslist)

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