It is generally believed that companies that use business intelligence (BI) tools and techniques are more likely to be profitable than those that do not. BI helps organizations make smarter decisions, faster, by providing access to accurate and up-to-date data and analysis. Securing all your data in one central location also affords users the opportunity to see correlations between data that was not possible when their data was siloed in various pockets throughout their tech stack.

With this data at their fingertips, businesses can identify opportunities for improvement, optimize operations, and make strategic decisions that drive profitability. Per a study conducted by the McKinsey Global Institute, organizations using business intelligence to drive decision-making are 23x more likely to acquire customers, 6x as likely to retain those customers, and 19x as likely to be profitable than organizations that don’t.

Overall, the study suggests that BI can have a positive impact on the performance of companies, particularly in terms of demand generation and revenue growth. However, it is important to note that the relationship between BI and operational and financial performance is not necessarily causal but rather hinges on the way a company uses BI and the decisions it makes based on the insights gained.

Applying this to multifamily, business intelligence can be used to gain insights into a variety of areas, such as:

• Occupancy & demand
• Maintenance
• Resident satisfaction
• Financial performance

Occupancy & Demand

BI tools can help multifamily leaders analyze data on occupancy rates, rental rates, and demand for units over time. This can help teams make informed decisions about pricing, marketing, and unit availability.

Maintenance

BI can be used to dig into maintenance requests, helping teams prioritize and allocate resources more effectively as well as spot potential property-wide repair issues before it’s too late.

Resident Satisfaction

BI data can be used to measure resident satisfaction, helping teams identify areas that may need improvement or understand correlations between how residents feel about their home and their renewal rates and overall occupancy.

Occupancy & Demand

BI data can help multifamily leaders see revenue, expenses, and profitability trends, allowing teams to quickly compare how they are performing against budget and proactively reallocate resources as needed.

And if you still need convincing when it comes to the value of good data insights to effectively optimize your multifamily portfolio this year, here are 3 ways that strategic use of BI can impact your team’s profitability quickly: 

1. Community Managers have a renewal negotiation dashboard to go into every lease renewal discussion armed with the latest market trends to ensure they aren’t leaving any money on the table.
   
   
2. Asset Managers see a map view of historical service request counts at each property and can identify a costly leak before it occurs saving future expenses and mitigating potential resident impact.
   
   
3. Marketing Leaders can conduct what-if analyses to determine how many leads are needed to hit lead-to-lease conversion targets and adjust their spend accordingly; leaning into higher converting channels, pulling back on others, and digging into that low visit-to-application conversion ratio.