Tenant Communication Tools

Tenant Communication Tools: The Digital Layer That Supports Tenant Experience

Key takeaways:

Tenant communication tools create an organized system for messages, updates, documents, and requests, streamlining all communication tied to tenant operations and building workflows across mobile, web, and onsite channels.

Commercial real estate (CRE) properties depend on structured communication that aligns with work order management, leasing activity, and building procedures, giving tenants accurate updates and a positive tenant experience.

Visitt centralizes tenant communication through a branded app and portal with built-in messaging, announcements, automated status updates, and AI tools, helping teams reduce manual review, improve clarity, and deliver a more consistent tenant experience across portfolios.

What are tenant communication tools?

Tenant communication tools cover the full range of ways tenants and property teams connect, from traditional channels like email, text, and phone calls to modern, digital platforms like tenant apps and online portals. The newer systems serve as an integrated communication layer for tenant operations, centralizing updates, requests, documents, and announcements, and replacing fragmented communication with organized workflows, automated messaging, and clear records that support daily operations across portfolios.

Online tenant portals and tenant portal apps capture each interaction, attach it to the correct unit or space, and keep it aligned with the building’s operational data, including maintenance activity, access schedules, safety and compliance updates, and leasing information. This creates a more streamlined tenant experience across mobile, web, and onsite channels and prevents communication from spreading across untracked emails, texts, and calls.

How do tenant communication apps improve CRE tenant communication?

In commercial real estate (CRE), these apps for tenants run across office, retail, and industrial portfolios and sit at the center of systems like work order management, CMMS, risk management, AI property management software, predictive maintenance, preventative maintenance, and resource management software. 

To understand how these tools work for commercial properties, it helps to look at the key functions they provide:

• Multi-channel message delivery: Messages can be simultaneously sent to the tenant app, tenant portal, SMS, email, and push alerts, so time-sensitive notices reach tenants across entire buildings, specific groups, floors, or individual tenants,  within their preferred channels.
• Structured communication threads: Every exchange—questions, follow-ups, confirmations—stays within the same tenant communication log, creating one continuous communication record.
• Service request communication linked to operations: Requests submitted through a tenant web portal or tenant communication app connect directly to work order management, preventive maintenance, amenities management, office maintenance, and facility management workflows. Staff see asset history, inspection notes, and past tickets in the same view.
• Real-time status visibility: Tenants receive clear updates when a request is received, assigned, progressed, or closed, reducing repeated check-ins and clarifying next steps.
• Centralized documents and building information: COI rules, leasing documents, safety procedures, building policies, and self-service knowledge tools remain stored in a single, current repository accessible through tenant portals and web access apps.
• On-site communication displays: Lobby screens and elevator displays pull updates from the same dashboard used for digital channels, keeping on-site and mobile messaging aligned.

The role of AI across CRE tenant communication tools

AI supports tenant communication tools by handling the steps that slow teams down: collecting and learning from data, understanding what the tenant needs, and inferring the next steps. This is reflected in the way AI:

1. Understands the purpose of each message. AI identifies what the tenant is asking for and sends the request into the correct workflow.
2. Strengthens the clarity of updates. AI rephrasing tools help teams prepare instructions, timing updates, and safety notices that are easy to follow, reducing confusion and unnecessary back-and-forth.
3. Enables live multilingual communication. Features like Visitt’s Live Translate let both sides write in their preferred language while keeping one consistent conversation record in the tenant communication app.
4. Spots repeated questions early. When the same issue appears across multiple tenants, AI groups the pattern and alerts teams so building guides or operational instructions can be updated.
5. Creates ready-to-send alerts from building data. If smart building systems detect an issue, AI produces a clear tenant-facing message and formats it for the app, portal, and on-site displays.
6. Automatically runs reminder cycles. AI schedules rent reminders, missed-payment follow-ups, and confirmations and logs each step so the process stays transparent.

Why are tenant communication tools important for CRE?

Cushman & Wakefield’s What Occupiers Want 2025 report shows how closely communication connects to the value tenants expect from their workplaces. With 85% of tenants expecting landlords to provide enhanced amenities, services, and workplace experiences, communication becomes part of that service delivery. When updates about safety, access, scheduling, or procedures move through a tenant app or tenant portal instead of individual inboxes, tenants experience the building as organized, responsive, and aligned with their operational needs.

The same report notes that 46% of tenants are willing to pay a premium for buildings that deliver stronger workplace experiences. In practice, this includes clarity around building activity across maintenance timelines, access changes, vendor schedules, inspection windows, and policy updates. Tenant communication tools give CRE teams a structured way to distribute this information across office, retail, and industrial properties, ensuring tenants receive accurate updates at the right time and through the right channels. Instead of relying on internal forwarding chains or siloed emails, communication stays linked to the building’s workflows, records, and procedures.

This foundation leads to clear advantages for CRE teams:

• Clear, consistent messaging: Centralized tools reduce the gaps that form when messages rely on forwarding chains inside tenant organizations.
• Direct alignment with operations: Communication stays tied to work order management, inspections, and building procedures, not split across inboxes.
• Better service continuity: Shared communication records remain accessible when teams change roles or properties.
• Support for experience-focused portfolios: Tools meet tenant expectations for organized updates as landlords and property teams deliver more service-oriented operations.
• Portfolio-wide visibility: Patterns in questions or delays reveal where building processes need to be adjusted.

How are tenant communication tools used in CRE?

Commercial properties generate a steady flow of questions, updates, documents, and service activity, and each group involved in running a building depends on tenant communication tools to keep this movement coordinated. Interactions may begin during screening through a tenant screening app, continue as tenants use a commercial tenant portal to move through onboarding, and then shift into the day-to-day exchanges handled through a tenant communication app. Each message becomes part of the broader tenant communication log that ties communication to the work happening inside the building. 

As portfolios grow, many teams rely on tenant communication tools integrated into mobile apps and the best automation tools for tenant communication to guide how to communicate with tenants in a way that stays aligned with leasing activity, building operations, and the overall tenant experience.

How does tenant communication work with Visitt?

Visitt brings the full tenant communication layer into one CRE property management system, so every message, update, document, and request moves through the same mobile and web experience. This, while ensuring the data is accessible, enables CRE firms to better understand trends and performance, as well as gauge tenant satisfaction. Tenants can choose to use the branded tenant app or online portal to submit requests, chat with property teams, review building information, schedule resources or amenities, and receive real-time updates. Each interaction enters the same structured workspace used by property teams, keeping communication linked to work orders, inspections, documents, and building procedures.

Inside Visitt, built-in tools handle the details that normally slow communication down. Announcements are published once and reach every selected tenant group. Chat-style messaging keeps exchanges clear and organized. Automated status updates show tenants when work is received, assigned, or completed. And the AI Rephrasing Tool helps teams send accurate, professional responses, while Live Translate supports instant multilingual conversations. AI also categorizes incoming messages, surfaces repeated issues, and flags items that need attention, reducing manual review and improving tenant communication and response times across the portfolio.

See what Visitt’s tenant communication tools can do for your portfolio.