Technology at most companies tends to follow a familiar formula: software and hardware sit squarely with the IT department, the gatekeepers to all things digital. But inside Veris Residential, the rules are different, and the results are shaping tenant experiences in new ways.
Responsibility for consumer-facing technology at Veris Residential has shifted from IT to the teams who are closest to tenants. Nicole Jones, senior vice president of marketing and communication, told GlobeSt.com that the marketing group drives much of the strategy, working with a range of vendors because, in the end, it’s the customer experience they’re building and maintaining.
“A lot of the technology actually sits with my team in terms of my team leading those efforts, or working with different vendor partners, because at the end of the day, a lot of it ends up touching the customer and interacting with their experience.”
Rather than rely on a single, unified system, Veris takes a broad, integrated approach, weaving together best-in-class software solutions to power everything from leasing to virtual tours and smart building operations. They call their suite of tools Prism, which includes AI-driven leasing, immersive virtual experiences and advanced building systems. Jones explained,
“The marketing team developed the brand. We know what the brand promise is, and we want our residents’ experience to always be as closely and tightly aligned to that brand as possible. It's not necessarily led by our IT team — which is fantastic, they're fabulous — but it's really coming from the marketing team working really closely with operations. How do we smooth out some of the lumps in the resident experience using technology?”
This philosophy extends to day-to-day operations across Veris properties. The company regularly manages hundreds of thousands of messages—from tenants requesting maintenance, prospects seeking information to inquiries arriving day and night. Instead of overwhelming property staff with countless emails waiting each morning, Veris taps digital tools, including generative AI, to handle a large share of conversations.
Quinn, the company’s digital assistant, has become a valued member of the team in the eyes of residents.
People come in and they say, ‘I have a tour with Quinn, or I was communicating with Quinn about this, and I'm doing a self-guided tour today, but I just wanted to let your team member know that Quinn and I had messaged about,’” Jones said. The name itself was chosen to avoid any gender bias, and residents’ questions that Quinn cannot resolve are automatically routed to a live team member.
The integrated approach has required persistence and collaboration from Veris and its partners. “One of the unique things that we have done — and it takes a lot of time and a lot of reassurance to various partners — is getting tech partners to work together and to play nicely in the sandbox,” Jones noted.
She emphasized that residents rarely know how complicated the backend truly is, with a web of different technology systems supporting every interaction: “At the end of the day, if the experience feels lumpy or it feels outdated, or [tenants or prospects] submit something and it doesn't go through, or they don't get responded to in a timely manner, they have no idea there could be 10 different tech partners behind these.”
This focus on seamless experience has paid off, with Veris reporting strong rent growth and longer tenancies as a result of its technology-driven approach to resident services and engagement, Jones said.
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