Smart Inclusion™ – The New Normal for Capital Improvements

Under ConstructionCommercial buildings account for 35 percent of US and 40 percent of global electric consumption. They eat up 30 percent of companies’ operating budgets and account for nearly 20 percent of worldwide carbon emissions, according to the U.S. Department of Energy.

By integrating smart energy and water management practices, public sector institutions can improve operational outcomes as well as environmental outcomes. Adopting advanced conservation technology such as motion sensing shower heads and smart lighting can yield substantial cost savings. Equally important within public interest sectors is targeting strategic communications that incentivizes stakeholders to modify behavior in ways that lead to reduced energy and water consumption. This will only occur when a stakeholder benefit resonates in a manner that is measurable and personal. Messaging that public interest institutions can convey include:

  • Healthcare institutions must strategically communicate to stakeholders that their smart energy management initiatives help to improve public health and wellness by reducing carbon pollutants into the atmosphere.
  • Colleges and universities can communicate to its student population that their conservation habits can result in lower operating costs that can help to control tuition costs.
  • Governments and municipal utilities have to integrate smart energy and water management into the 21st century citizen engagement paradigm.

Austerity measures and global competitiveness are now forcing local institutions to expand their brand reach in order to survive. Healthcare systems are marketing newly constructed cancer centers to attract potential patients from the Middle East. Public colleges and universities that historically have recruited from within the state now market new research centers and business incubators to attract new students from China. Municipal utilities are investing in broadband technology infrastructure in order to attract new investment from international technology conglomerates. In order to align innovative messaging with transformational change, Visibility Marketing Inc. rolled out Smart Inclusion™. Smart Inclusion™ facilitates delivering strategic messaging across barriers that used to be avoided or ignored.

Smart Inclusion™ among colleges and universities, healthcare systems, and government entities is ultimately about embracing the fact that constant change and paradigm shifts within these sectors require innovative models of cross-sector collaboration. Major construction projects must have an identity that connects to a much wider array of stakeholders than ever before. Strategic communication that integrates Smart Inclusion™ is not merely a model of inclusion, it is model of institutional sustainability.

Technology Solutions and Services – The Smart Approach to Customer Engagement

Fotolia_51590279_XS(1)Converging social will, environmental stewardship, and financial responsibility – or the Triple Bottom Line – requires that smart water metering technology providers adapt and deliver 21st Century sustainable solutions.

We have seen successful smart water metering deployments where a vendor deploys a fixed network and ensures that hundreds of thousands of smart water meters communicate according to engineering specifications. The utility then quantifies field labor cost reductions, and identifies various opportunities to realize operational efficiencies. In the case of a progressive utility, additional success metrics relative to leak detection and a reduction in non-revenue water loss is also applied. Thus, tangible short-term and long-term benefits were realized.

While such success factors remain true, the water management landscape is increasingly becoming scrutinized within a broader landscape. This landscape includes municipal government entities leading regional conservation initiatives, and commercial and industrial customers routinely applying environmentally responsible solutions that reduce costs.  Residential customers, now more than ever, are able to link modifications in water consumption behavior to reducing their carbon footprint.  Solution delivery must now integrate environmental, economic, and social benefits.  The end customer and external stakeholders will only become more empowered.

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