Over time, massive amounts of data are created from the hundreds of activities that take place in a commercial real estate (CRE) property every day. Are you tracking, measuring, and learning from this data to make better, more informed decisions for your tenants?

Because of the recent rise of customer expectations, every CRE firm puts an emphasis on providing a better tenant experience. That means using every possible advantage to stand out – and many firms are turning to the data within their own properties to do so.

Here are three steps to using data to drive your property management and tenant satisfaction strategy:

1. Implement modern technology to measure tenant satisfaction

Believe it or not, many CRE firms in the industry are still using obsolete tech and even manual processes for operations. A study by Atlas Group found that nearly 1/3 CRE companies still run on spreadsheets. Since spreadsheets are prone to errors (88% of spreadsheets contained errors), mostly caused by simple data entry mistakes, it is impossible to manage data and operations this way. The same goes for outdated technology.

2. Seek regular feedback from tenants

Over 80% of high performing CRE firms seek regular feedback on tenant satisfaction with property management service. Waiting for tenants to come to you will only cause more frustration for them. Not to mention, irregularly getting feedback from tenants means you aren’t keeping a pulse on their happiness. As a result, you could easily be missing red flags that show tenants are unhappy. Gaining and monitoring feedback regularly means you always have an idea of how satisfied – or frustrated – your tenants are.

3. Proactively analyze tenant feedback and data

Many times, data is collected in property management systems that just end up sitting there with no one looking at what it means. Or they don’t know what to do with the data they are looking at. But marketing-leading property teams are 1.6x more likely to spend their time proactively looking at data. By doing this they can spot problems with tenants earlier, instead of waiting for a frustrated tenant to come to them. They can proactively put out fires before they get too unwieldy.

Using data can make all the difference:

Meeting today’s tenant expectations is no easy feat. It requires a whole new level of attention that property teams didn’t face before. Equipping your team with the data they need to proactively and effectively manage and monitor tenant satisfaction is key to keeping your tenants happy. Follow these three steps to transform how you manage operations and satisfy your tenants, giving you a competitive advantage over your peers.