Reputation: It’s created from what people think and, more importantly, say about your communities. “Negative or false comments about your building can affect how others view your site, sometimes even before seeing it in person,” says Kings III, a Texas-based provider of emergency communication service solutions for property managers. That perception can translate to lost traffic, prospects and, ultimately, money. “Put yourself in your tenant’s shoes. What will you do when looking for a property? You’ll aim straight for online reviews and social media pages to see what you’re getting into. You’ll be turned off if you find one-star reviews and inactive/barely active social media accounts. The same applies to your prospective tenants,” notes the Los Angeles Property Management Group (LAPMG), which serves commercial and residential property owners. Industry research bears out these sentiments. For example, 69% of respondents to the 2022 Renter Preference Survey Report said they referenced property ratings and reviews in their most recent rental-home search, while 79% said ratings and reviewed stopped them from visiting specific properties. Recent reviews and an active, updated Google Business Profile can help place communities in the Google Local 3-Pack and rank them higher than competitors in search engine results. In fact, according to search marketing research groups Redshift and Moz, 15% of the ranking factors that determine whether you get into the “Local 3-Pack” — the listing of three businesses you see first in the results of searches using keywords — come from the quantity, quality, recentness and response to reviews. About 25% of the weight of your Local 3-Pack ranking signal comes from your Google Business Profile, so it’s important to optimize and maintain it. Here are a few tips from LAPMG and other experts on the best ways to, as Kings III...