Keep Communications Brief

Less is more. When it comes to keeping people informed about their building, use different methods and understand your audience’s attention span. We all get so many emails during the day and attention spans are short, so we like to keep our emails to residents no longer than two sentences whenever we can. They can just glance at them and absorb the information right away. Texting is good for emergency situations, like package theft. You say, “Dear residents, please be advised this morning that packages were stolen from the lobby. Please contact your provider or delivery company.” It’s kind of like an AMBER Alert. 

Timing is everything. Of course there are times when you have to send out longer emails, but we typically keep those to under three paragraphs. You want to be informative but not include any unneeded filler. We also use bullet points so people can skim through things quickly. Little bites of information are always easier for people to digest. We send out emails either at the end of day on Friday, when people want to close out their mailboxes so they can start the weekend, or first thing Monday morning, when everyone is in full work mode. 

Dialing it in. We also do short robocalls, just two or three sentences. We’ve found that at our properties with a lot of seniors, they actually prefer robocalls, while younger residents prefer emails or text messages. By using all three, you can reach everyone on the spectrum. You want that, because having good communication is 90% of our job.