In the world of property technology, BuildingLink stands out not only for its innovative software solutions but also for its unparalleled commitment to the customer experience. BuildingLink boasts a 96% customer retention rate, serving nearly 7,000 communities worldwide, including in Australia, Canada, and Ireland. Managing over 1.2 million units across condos, rentals, co-ops, and more, BuildingLink has cultivated long-term relationships with its customers. Many of them have been with BuildingLink for over ten years, and a significant number have been customers for more than 20 years.
Leading this endeavor is Sloan Morris, the VP of Customer Experience, who has been instrumental in evolving the customer-centric culture that ensures users have all the tools they need to succeed. In this blog, we sat down with Sloan and learned how he and BuildingLink have been able to provide a top-notch customer experience.
Sloan Morris: A Career Dedicated to Customer experience
Sloan has worked in Customer Experience his entire professional career but has never been more honored or grateful to be a part of the team he is now. From the start of his career at BuildingLink, Sloan has loved the people. “I remember asking other employees what they were into, and every answer was fascinating. We have photographers and actors, musicians and writers—every person I met was smart, knew the industry, knew the product, cared about our customers, and was so interesting and creative.”
In addition to BuildingLink’s team members, Sloan was impressed by the company itself. “One of the things I love most is that we're solving real problems for people. Our customers include property managers, front desk staff, residents, board members, maintenance professionals, and more—we know our customers well and deeply understand their needs. It's incredibly fulfilling to take what we have and scale it efficiently to help more BuildingLink users," Sloan shares.
When it comes to leadership, Sloan is all about empowering his team. "I want to help people find success and support them in solving problems for our customers," Sloan explains. “Compassion and empathy are our most important qualities; our people are genuinely excited about helping others and understanding how the customer feels. On top of that, communication and teamwork are vital so we can share updates about our users’ experiences and support each other to ensure their needs are met.”
While Sloan acknowledges the growing capabilities of automation, he emphasizes that technology can never replace the human touch. “I’m big on analytics and data for scalability, and using automation to help people,” he shares. “As tools get better and better, there’s more computers can do but they still can’t replace people. We’re always talking to our customers and incorporating their feedback, even across departments. If a member of our sales team is talking to a prospective customer and they’re interested in a feature we don’t have, sales will pass that feedback along with what else prospects value.”
The Customer Experience Team: A Three-pronged Approach
Sloan shares that a main factor in BuildingLink’s higher customer satisfaction and retention rates is the strategic structure of their CX team. “The team is divided into three core areas: customer support, professional services, and customer success,” he explains. “Each works together to ensure that customers have everything they need to succeed in their roles.”
Customer Support
Sloan shares that the Customer Support team is one of the first things that customers mention about BuildingLink, and for good reason. “The team consists of 10 dedicated full-time employees who handle a variety of customer interactions, including phone calls, emails, and after-hours monitoring services. This means that when a user needs help and calls BuildingLink support, not only will their call typically be answered in less than 30 seconds, but it’ll be answered by a knowledgeable internal expert who truly understands the robust features of the platform,” he says. Many of these employees have grown as BuildingLink has grown too, so they’re the best suited to serve our customers. “In fact,” Sloan adds, “many of BuildingLink’s features have come directly from the team working to solve customer challenges and needs.”
In addition to direct support, Sloan is proud of the robust self-help tools that BuildingLink has developed. “A lot of our remote capabilities significantly evolved from the pandemic,” he says. “Since then, we’ve worked to strengthen the ways we remotely support people, which obviously wasn’t a focus when the company first started in 1999.” These include multilingual help sites filled with articles and videos covering over 60 modules of functionality, ensuring that customers have access to comprehensive support resources at all times.
Professional Services
The Professional Services team at BuildingLink focuses on the critical aspects of user implementation and training. “New users often have tons of data on their units, residents, amenities, and more—all in different formats,” Sloan shares. “A major responsibility of this team is meeting the customer where they are, including their other current systems and integrations required, so we can accurately transfer and sync their data.” The Professional Services team also works closely with customers to customize the platform according to their specific needs and best practices, supporting them throughout the entire process to ensure that their workflows are effectively enabled by the platform.
Customer Success
BuildingLink’s Customer Success team, many of whom have been here for five years or more, helps customers who are already up and running with the platform reach and exceed their desired business goals. “This helps them optimize their usage and get the most out of the platform,” Sloan explains. Most importantly, the team takes a proactive approach to their mission. “For example,” Sloan shares, “the Customer Success team is continually reviewing current usage patterns. If they see that a residential property isn’t using a certain module that might help them, we’ll proactively recommend that feature. We love to hear customers say, ‘I didn’t even know you could do that!’ They really appreciate that and it’s a great way we build trust with them.”
life outside of Work
Outside of work, Sloan enjoys spending time with family in the picturesque Pacific Northwest. He loves camping, hiking, and exploring rivers. Music is another passion, with Sloan playing the acoustic and electric guitar, plus the mandolin and bass! He loves that he’s part of a team filled with creative artists, and shares an interesting story about BuildingLink’s founder, Jerry Kestenbaum. “Jerry didn’t want a bunch of boring corporate types to work at BuildingLink,” Sloan recounts. “He actually put out an ad on Craigslist that said, ‘Creative Types Wanted.’ Well, the creative and passionate culture that Jerry first fostered is still going strong.”
Partner with BuildingLink
Trusted by HOAs, co-ops, condominiums, and multifamily properties around the globe, BuildingLink helps property managers deliver superior resident experiences while streamlining maintenance and operations. We offer tools that will simplify your record-keeping and administration, communications, maintenance, and front desk operations.
When you’re ready for smarter community management, book your BuildingLink demo today.