In spite of the recent real estate collapse in North America, some savvy entrepreneurs have managed to continue to profit. They have negotiated major deals and launched new companies while others have struggled to survive. One example of someone who could have easily cashed out and retired to avoid the risks involved in real estate is Canada’s own Daniel Drimmer.

Drimmer is a truly international real estate mogul. Born in Germany and educated in Switzerland, Drimmer formed Transglobe Property Management Services in 1994 in Toronto. Over the years, he expanded the company’s holdings to cover all of Canada. He was one of the first to implement internet tools like virtual apartment tours, interactive search maps, and online submission of lease applications. While these are now standard on rental sites across North America, they were ground-breaking when Drimmer began using them.

In 2010, Drimmer completed the largest multi-residential transaction of the year — leaving him the largest shareholder in Transglobe Apartment REIT, but no longer CEO. Instead of retiring at a young age and enjoying the fruits of his labor, Drimmer chose to start over again. Taking personal family holdings that were not part of the Transglobe sale, he formed Starlight Apartments. The original plan was to take five years to build the company, but instead he managed to get it up and running in one year. After its launch on September 1st with 5,500 units, the company has already acquired additional properties bringing its total holdings to over 5,900 residential units and more than 300,000 feet of commercial space.

With Starlight Apartments, Drimmer is drawing on not only his years of experience in Canadian real estate, but his willingness to look forward to find new and better ways to serve his customers and make the apartment hunting process easier. His ambitious goal is to have 10,000 units by the end of 2012. Based on his track record with Transglobe and the initial acquisitions of Starlight in the last quarter of 2011, there is little doubt that he will succeed.

image courtesy scazon on Flickr, Creative Commons License

Thsi is the first SES Chicago I have missed in years but thankfully due to modern technology SES are now sharing their conference with us which allows us to share with you.  I still miss the networking.  Enjoy the keynote.

A few  years ago when we visited family in Ireland we went to a tiny little Island close to where my Mother lives.  My children has the best experience of their lives as they watched the car ferry load for returning to the main land.

Robert Klara from AdWeek wrote an article published in Ad Week this week about the business of Online Reputation Management.  Robert talked to a number of ORM companies and produced a very good report.  You can read the full report here.

I have never considered myself to be in the “business” of Online Reputation Management as we are and always have been an SEO company offering Search Engine Optimization Services.  Good SEO is the strategy behind ORM and as such I have always considered our ORM campaigns a different version of our SEO services.  Today there are so many companies offering ORM as a stand alone product without the SEO emphasis and background that I guess it has become a “Business” I am not sure I agree with that nor indeed do I want to be seen as and Online Reputation Management Company as its forms such a small part of our client base and revenue.  Our core business is and always has been Search Engine Optimization and I am passionate about what we do.  We turn away almost every lead we get for Online Reputation Management and we get quite a few.  In most cases they are not looking for what we have to offer but a quick fix to cover up bad services and legitimate complaints.  We have been the victim of a malicious online smear campaign and I can see these very clearly versus a company where there is a pattern of complaints online which point to a serious problem with their business and their services.

A report on CNN by Blake Snow reports that Facebook lost 7 million users last month.  Facebook has reached a plateau in the US but this is not a plateau this is Facebook losing its appeal.  I am not surprised.  I find Facebook interesting and I do use it for both personal and business.  However, I see it as totally overused.  I have no interest in 90% of what I see on there and for the most part it gets in the way of thr 10% that I am interested in.  Some people spend way too much time on Facebook and think that their “interesting” trip to the store is of interest to the rest of us.   I recently opened up my wall to posting something I had always blocked.  Within hours it was being spammed, or people were posting inane comments that get in the way.  I believe one of the reasons facebook is losing users is also the fact that there is a trust issue with users personal information.  Many people are oblivious of the risk but many more are becoming much more aware.   The biggest issue I have is the APPs once you use those APPs you are sending your data outside out facebook and that is where it gets way too woolly for me.  Therefore, you will never ever get a response from me when you send me an APP message or post to my wall as I will never open them. 

In Snow’s report he talks about the google search “delete facebook” and he is correct simply typing the letters ‘dele’ into google returns a suggest of “delete facebook account” that means its is a popular search.

You can read  Snow’s full report here

Swiftrank one of the world’s largest networks of travel sites has changed its name to TravelShark.  The full press release is here

They also created some fun viral videos to announce the change my favorite is this one.  I love the Irish Guys comments “bunch of bollocks”.  The Irish just do not mince words!!

Never put anything on the web that you would not want to see printed in a newspaper

It NEVER goes away.

Now if only Anthony Weiner’s PR agency had told him that before he tweeted his penis.

Finally, the media coverage of the nonsensical story about Anthony Weiner sending a picture of his crotch to an unknown twitter follower has been debunked by Joseph Cannon on his blog Cannon Fire.  I could not,  simply could not believe it when I sat down to watch the news yesterday and it was all coverage about this so called event.  Why did the media think that Anthony Weiner was that stupid has he ever done things in the past which implied he was a complete idiot.  It was insulting that the news outlets think this is news in a week where we are back to record lows in the housing market and 9.1% unemployment.  The media look like complete idiots with their analysis paralysis and their experts talking about why he was being so evasive and probably hiding something.   He played the media and he played them hard.  At first he was angry then it was clear that he decided to get some publicity out of it.  Good for him if the media circus comes to town why not take a ringside seat if you can get one for free.  You can see Joseph’s analysis here.

The current state of news is pathetic and serious news no longer matters its who can get the latest twitter story.  The serious journalists are being beaten to the post every time with social media coverage.  I mean who has time to  check facts when you can put rubbish like this out in 2 seconds flat and grab the attention of every major news outlet in the US.  The serious journalists are having to participate in this to survive.  I bet Anderson Cooper cringed when he had to cover this.  Its hard to believe that he would willingly have done it unless his bosses dictated to ensure CNN did not lose out on any ratings.  I am going into hibernation for the  2012 elections I cannot even stand to think how many people will decide who to vote for based on unfoudned opinions that are louder than journalism which sticks to the facts.

Somebody owns the crotch and my guess is that they will “expose” themselves.  Then they can make a sex tape and get their own reality TV show and join Kim and Paris as important people in our culture which rewards mediocrity. And just for the record here is the famous crotch picture which caused all the drama sad really that this caused such an uproar.  Heaven forbid that anybody would publish a picture of a covered penis.  Could have been a pickle in there for all we know but who cares about that facts dont matter.