Improving Tenant Communication: The Impact of Real Estate Digital Signage

As the person responsible for the profitability of a commercial or residential property, you’ve probably invested in a considerable number of digital solutions to help reduce operating costs and optimize workplace efficiency. You may be using several proptech solutions for tenant communication in an attempt to ensure everyone in your building is informed about day-to-day developments as needed.

If you’ve spent time browsing property listings and tenant satisfaction surveys, you’ve probably found more than a few submissions calling attention to the desire for modern real estate prop-tech amenities and communication techniques, with good reason. For tenants, effective digital signage technology is an impressive amenity—a source of both information and entertainment. 

For building managers, real estate signage provides a cost-effective way to achieve multiple goals. Once you know why property owners and their management teams are using digital screens to improve tenant communication, it’s easy to understand how this proptech is also driving incremental revenue.

Why Decision-Makers Are Investing in Real Estate Signage to Improve Tenant Communication

Digital signage screens are popping up just about everywhere, including supermarket checkout lanes, airport terminals, healthcare facilities, and premium commercial properties. The technology is cost-effective, highly adaptable to the needs of numerous industries, and merges seamlessly with most building aesthetics and tech stacks. For property owners choosing to forgo permanent installation, it’s possible to use a simple plug-and-play device to connect free-standing displays to their network.

Related: Which Digital Signage Software Enhances Building Communication? Discover the Best Choice

Management teams are leveraging this proptech to publish property messaging in spaces that can capture the attention of their tenants (and visitors) at multiple touch points throughout the property, ensuring building messages are seen as residents engage with the screens. They’re taking full advantage of user-friendly design tools and customizable templates for the following business essentials.

Automating Resource-Intensive Tasks

The software used to create residential messages helps property managers save time and money by automating multiple resource-intensive tasks. Instead of dedicating numerous hours (and the cost of materials) to creating and printing posters, hanging signs, and other time-consuming activities to ensure tenants who may have overlooked important email notifications are aware of the latest information, you can create, edit, and publish eye-catching screens in minutes. The advantages are far-reaching.

Not only are the screens able to reduce the amount of time devoted to ineffective communication methods, but administrators can include QR codes that building occupants can scan with the camera already installed on their smartphones to RSVP to events, learn more information and track engagement. 

These codes can direct tenants to the details of hosted events, satisfaction surveys, upcoming policy changes, and answers to frequently asked questions—automation that reduces the amount of time needed to respond to queries and track individual survey responses.

Publishing Maintenance Notifications & Safety Protocols

Building owners and management are responsible for the security and safety of a considerable number of people. Many worry that tenants may not have the information they need or remember what to do in an emergency. 

Knowing digital signage screens are optimized to capture and hold viewer attention in multiple areas throughout the property is a game-changer. You can help ensure tenants are safe by uploading a rotation of evacuation instructions, emergency exit locations, fire alarm testing announcements and safety protocol reminders to your proptech solutions.

Tenants also appreciate having a central, reliable location for emergency alerts—along with easy access to the contact information needed to report after-hours maintenance issues. When the community management team has access to cloud-based communication tools, real estate proptech can also be used to advise tenants, employees, and visitors of weather warnings, travel hazards, and potential security threats.  

Providing Contextually Relevant Information & Entertainment

Real estate signage elevated to amenity status can display essential business communication alongside content tenants and their visitors’ value. At the same time, this is where you need to be cautious. Most community managers uploading property notices to real estate signage display a steady stream of property messages alongside dull RSS feeds or a limited number of generic programming unlikely to have an impact. In the absence of contextually relevant stories and content, people eventually stop paying attention.

The best companies provide the custom communication solutions property owners need to elevate their tenant communication in their buildings alongside a professionally curated programming mix from reputable sources tailored to the preferences of their building’s viewers. 

When everything aligns, your tenant communication screens are displayed alongside a bite-size mix of content your tenants value most—national, global, and business news, stock market reports, health and lifestyle tips, sports scores, real-time weather and transit updates, and more. 

How to Use Proptech Screens to Drive Incremental Revenue

Keeping tenants informed and engaged can go a long way toward earning favor, loyalty and optimal occupancy rates. Property owners invest in real estate signage to ensure efficient, effective communication and leverage the impact of transparency, collaboration, and tenant satisfaction to their advantage. They’re using the same screens to elevate their image and reputation.

In a market where commercial property vacancy rates are difficult to predict with any degree of certainty, forward-thinking property owners are also using their real estate screens to drive incremental revenue—income from sources other than rent—to ensure the continued profitability of their investments. Of the many innovative ways they’re monetizing unutilized space, promoting some of the following amenities are examples of key avenues for achieving this.

Meeting Room Rentals

Meeting rooms with flexible rental terms, like hourly or daily rates, for example, make nearly any commercial property more attractive to tenants. Business owners investing in the technology and furnishings needed to create the right aesthetic offer their meeting rooms as a cost-effective alternative to booking conference centers. 

In addition to accommodating meetings, the rental spaces are often used for hosted events and large-group training sessions. Most operate on a first-come, first-served basis, and tenants are expected to adhere to clearly defined reservation policies to minimize the risk of scheduling conflicts.

 À La Carte Services

Offering à la carte services can also give property owners a definitive edge in a competitive market. Of course, profitability demands investing in services that suit the needs and interests of current tenants and future prospects. 

In some premium office spaces, tenant polls could suggest that on-site childcare, housekeeping services, or a lunch café would be the ideal fit, while tenants in another area might prefer having an on-premises fitness center, dry cleaning services, or a coffee shop. Whichever services work for your building, using the right proptech can bring visibility to the services and even provide an easy way to access them or sign up.

Coworking Space

Coworking spaces provide common areas where people can gather to work independently or in groups. Property owners are using proptech screens to customize and modernize these spaces, keeping tenants and visitors informed and providing an attractive alternative to leasing an office for numerous consultants, freelancers, and telecommuters. Like meeting rooms, workers typically have the option of renting space by the hour or by the day. 

In addition to offering an appealing, professional environment for independent workers to collaborate or meet with clients, property managers may provide internet access, office supplies, enclosed spaces for private calls, and meeting rooms. It’s not unheard of for start-ups outgrowing their coworking spaces to transition to long-term tenancy.

Green Building Certifications

Environmentally conscious tenants are generally willing to pay more for sustainable, energy-efficient spaces, especially when those ideals are a fundamental component of their values. Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification, developed by the International WELL Building Institute (IWBI), is the most widely known and recognized rating system.

Related: WELL Certification – Your Questions Answered

Buildings that achieve WELL certification are designed and operated in ways that create a healthy living environment with an emphasis on promoting physical activity and reducing stress. Property owners are using energy-efficient real estate signage to achieve certification, raise awareness of their initiatives, celebrate certification milestones, and promote goodwill among environmentally conscious tenants.

Improve Tenant Communication and Elevate Revenue Streams with the Right Digital Signage

Today’s property owners and community managers are investing in real estate digital signage to streamline communication, automate resource-intensive tasks, improve tenant satisfaction scores, and boost renewal rates. 

They’re making the best use of leading proptech to create, upload, and display directories and contact information, maintenance notifications, safety reminders, event calendars, and more. They’re using the same screens to generate enthusiasm and boost awareness for a wide range of tenant-centric features and services—investments that also provide incremental revenue.Captivate is an industry-leading media network with more than 25 years of experience. Adding Captivate-powered screens to your communication strategy is a lot easier than you might expect. Property owners have the option of uploading their messaging screens to a fully managed network or connecting a Captivate | Go plug-and-play device to an existing HDMI-capable display. To learn more or get started, submit a contact form.