Facebook leads to "Sense of Community"

I don't necessarily think Facebook is the best at creating a "sense of community", but it does help connect neighbors better than before. Since I am a fan of their upcoming apartment community, I got the following friend request/message recently:

"Hey Neighbor My wife and I are moving into Springbrook Meadows next month and we would love to get to know some of our neighbors. If you live there and would like to get to know each other, we would be grateful. Have a great week."

How fantastic is that!?!? Apartment communities can no longer be scared of residents communicating, and instead foster positive interactions like this!

I find (at least in here) that people are afraid of the negative. "What do we do when people post bad". "Can we delete negative posts?" I try to say that we have to take the good with the bad and respond to negatives with a solution or explanation. You won't be able to please everyone but you can sure try.

That's a great use of Facebook!

The nice thing about people expressing a negative on your Facebook page is that you get an opportunity to address the issue. By publicly apologizing for any inconvenience and then contacting the person directly to hash out the details of fixing the problem, you are able to show that you really do care about your community.

If the person isn't complaining on your Facebook page, that doesn't mean they're not complaining. It just means you don't get an opportunity to 1. make it right, if possible and 2. show that you care whether residents have complaints.

@Bill - You are definitely right about being afraid of the negative, although I think that is changing slowly. I think Facebook was a good beginning step for many communities because a Fan Page is still very much a "push" strategy. Direct resident to resident interaction still has a ways to go though!

@Jill - I agree 100%. I have always loved hearing feedback, no matter whether it was good or bad because it helps me do my job better. But I think many people prefer the "out of sight, out of mind" approach, so they see negative feedback as just more work.

@Brent: It is a hard transition for people to embrace the negative and try to flip it to a positive. We are still struggling with that here.

I find when people are afraid of Facebook or other sites because of negative feedback its an excuse to not do your job correctly. There is a time that expires between when a resident feels they have been wronged and when they get on Facebook to voice a complaint. Normal residents will not just jump on facebook the first time an issue occurs to bad mouth you or your community but they will if this is a constant problem and no resolution has been made or even attempted.
Most negative feedback I read from other communities are problems that have occurred over time and no one has even attempted to make it right. "My bathtub wasn't draining since I moved in, I called five times to have them fix it and no one ever showed up". Those are the type of things I read and trying to make that siutation right on Facebook is a little too late. No matter how you justify it or apologize the fact is where were you the five times that person called?!?
Now I know there are some people that love to complain and will do so with no problem but those are the people you need to validate and make sure that they don't have any complaints by being on top of your game and making sure that their needs are met.
If you can't do that then get use to receiving negative comments.

I couldn't agree with you more Chrissy. You must embrace the negative as well as the positive.

You really have to be in this business... We get negative feedback but we handle it before it becomes PUBLIC negative feedback. People say you can't make everyone happy and I disagree I think you can make everyone happy just not as quickly

Guess we went off the discussion a little, Sorry Brent...

Although, I loved your initial post... that is what facebook is all about... We allow our residents to be goofy on ours and I'm generally pretty cheesy on my facebook page as well too. They say that when your residents get to know their neighbors they usually stay an average of 2 years longer than if they didn't! LOVE IT!

Now that is how to properly use Facebook. Create a apartment community page, invite all your residents to be members/fans and post updates and activities, and invite prospects to visit the page. Really good. You wont have to worry about bad material, as long as your properly doing your job.

A lot of people don't really know how to use Facebook effectively (management and residents alike). If you're posting interesting stuff and you've been able to grow the number of people who "like" you, then I think it would be hard for anyone to post something negative or inappropriate on your page. First, it just wouldn't look right to post a service request in the middle of conversations about the end of summer (for example).

Let's just say it did happen... If you have a group of people who are positively interacting with you then they'll come to your defense. The negative comment will probably be disregarded by most because all of the other interactions are good things.

I'd even go a step further and say it's good to leave negative comments up. The selling point to many owner/managers about having a Facebook Page for comments is that you can control what people see. It's tempting to take down negative feedback, but I think it's best to leave it up. It give you more credibility, especially if you were able to overcome the issue.

If you can help foster the sense of community through understanding the groups that already exist physically in the community and see the digital as an extension to these every day interactions, you will create communities. learning the communities that pre-exist in your community is a fundamental to properly going social.