By Stuart Macdonald, Founder and Managing Director of See Media
One of the most important moments at this year’s Inside Housing Communications Conference for me was launching the Housing Communications Benchmark Survey 2026 with Inside Housing. The survey grew out of a simple observation: communications teams play an increasingly important role in housing organisations, yet we know remarkably little about how they are structured, resourced and supported across the sector.
The conversations I had throughout the day only reinforced why this matters. Housing comms teams are being asked to do more than ever before. Resident engagement, public affairs, accessibility, crisis communications, reputation management and internal communications all sit on the agenda already. Now AI has been added to the mix.
Unsurprisingly, AI cropped up in almost every session. Speakers touched on how they have created agents that assist customer-facing staff with writing to customers, tone of voice agents, and a website content gap agent which trawls peer websites.
Responsible AI use
One comment from Aaron Cue at L&Q particularly stayed with me: “AI is not a dirty little secret. We need to talk about it and how to use it.” That feels like exactly the right approach. Residents are using AI, colleagues are using AI and communications teams are using AI. The challenge is not whether to engage with it, but how to do so responsibly and transparently.
There was also a recognition that housing providers cannot automate their way to authenticity. L&Q’s commitment not to publish content that is solely AI-produced is something we absolutely echo at See Media. People know when they are dealing with an AI bot as opposed to a person. There is a time and place for this technology, but in the experience of housing comms colleagues I spoke with at the event, this time is not when discussing repairs, service changes or complaints.
AI and your reputation
Another speaker described being aghast at how ChatGPT presented his organisation, only to discover that outdated information on the organisation’s own website was part of the problem. This shows something many organisations are only beginning to appreciate: reputation is no longer shaped solely through media coverage, social media and search results. AI platforms are becoming another crucial lens through which organisations are judged and understood. In terms of how they perceive you, they’re only going to be as good as the information you feed them, which is why getting the content of your owned channels right is more important than ever.
This is the reason why we are working on our HARI product (Housing AI Reputation Insight). HARI uses a series of prompt runs – combined with expert human analysis – to provide a detailed picture of how an organisation is perceived by ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini. Importantly, HARI also compares how that organisation performs against its peers.
Focus on trust
Other than AI, the strongest theme of the day was trust. Whether the discussion was about working with government, engaging residents or preparing for a crisis, speakers kept returning to the same principles:
- Build relationships before you need them
- Use evidence to support your point
- Be present in communities and listen properly when you are there
- Most importantly, make sure the reality of the service matches the story you’re telling about it
Resident stories
I was really pleased to hear the repeated emphasis on evidence-based resident stories. Several speakers made the point that policymakers respond not only to data but to credible examples of how housing issues affect real people. That’s something the housing sector sometimes underestimates, or files in the ‘too hard’ box.
It can be difficult, but the loud and clear message today was that it is some of the most valuable comms that housing providers can share. Resident voices remain one of the most powerful tools available to organisations trying to influence opinion or policy.
There was a real desire from delegates to know how to build customer panels that truly make a difference and how to achieve resident engagement that is more than a tick-box exercise and delivers true value.
Becky Hoskins from Sanctuary spoke about the landlord’s 250-strong ‘community of interest’ made up of customers around the country who have agreed to review comms materials. Jennifer Wickert from Southern Housing explained how letting residents do a takeover of production of their customer newsletter led to a 400 per cent increase in engagement and views in excess of 20,000 on newsletter editions.
Human contact
But when we drilled down in sessions about how to truly get those resident stories we all know are essential, panel members repeatedly came back to face-to-face human contact being the best way for success with residents. Knocking on doors, basing yourself in a scheme, getting hyper-local with stories to demonstrate wider operational success. In an arena where AI and new technology were the talk of the day, it was pleasing to see that getting back to the tried and tested basics and getting the foundations right held an equal share of the conversation.
That nicely links directly back to the Housing Communications Benchmark Survey. Across the sector, communications teams are juggling more responsibilities than ever before. What we don’t yet understand well enough is how different organisations are responding, which approaches are working best and where teams need greater support. That’s what I hope this research will help answer.
If there was one conclusion I took away from the conference, it’s that housing comms is changing quickly, but the fundamentals largely remain the same. Embrace new technology, by all means, experiment with AI and use data more effectively, but don’t lose sight of the things that build trust in the first place: honesty, evidence, good judgement and genuine human connection.
PS. To receive a free, tailored benchmark report on your organisation’s communications approach and how you compare to your peers, please do complete the Housing Communications Benchmark Survey that See Media is running in partnership with Inside Housing using the link below!
Housing Communications Benchmark Survey
Image credit: Created with AI / See Media
