Ensuring the best location for your client with effective strategies

Whenever we meet with those responsible for choosing a new address for a company — whatever the reason: expansion, cost reduction, technical quality of constructions, change in the company’s image — one of the first conditions put on the table, without fail, is the location.

But what is a “best location”?

It is not an abstract concept, or a matter of opinion, but rather an objective condition measured on a scale of values. Therefore, the exercise of defining the “best location” must meet specific metrics within this scale of values. And the scale of values ​​must be clear to all parties.

Without it, the “best location” can be defined based on subjective premises that will become obsolete as soon as the agents who defined the new location change. As a consequence, the legacy can have a very high cost for the company, turning it into unpleasantness, which would be contrary to the motivation.

One of the first companies that hired Ocupantes’ corporate services had the clear objective of changing its corporate image. Finding such a property, with the budget restrictions of someone renting a single-occupancy commercial property, on an adjacent street in a mixed-occupancy neighborhood, was a great challenge, but it was still made easier by the contractor’s clear objective.

In this case, the “best location” was determined, in addition to other criteria, by the intended microregion and the appearance of the building.

In another case, the decision fell to IT. Although the motivating factor for the change was the proximity to clients, avoiding the displacement of its consultants, the “best location” for this company was limited by the necessary infrastructure provided for data transfer.

In this case, internet provider companies should be the owners of satellite links, or level 1 providers, without the intermediation of third parties in the so-called “last mile”. An exclusionary factor, but well defined.

Discover the case carried out in Rio de Janeiro

But, what if the limiting factor is not in the property, but in the journey of customers and collaborators, especially in the time and resources spent on the home-office-residence route? Are there tools that can measure this criterion?

Ocupantes, as a company focused on consultancy, and not just on transactions, faced this challenge.

For this client, located in Rio de Janeiro, where, due to mergers and acquisitions of other companies, its offices were geographically separated, it was essential to know how the relocation, unifying the offices, would impact its clients and collaborators.

The initial task was to select, for reference, the buildings that met the technical requirements, in addition to the corporate image desired by the client. With each option being subjected to a financial and qualitative analysis.

All that remained was to determine the “best location” considering the impact on travel time. Under this criterion, the relocation would be justified if there was a reduction in the average travel time of property users.

The test proposed by Ocupantes went further.

In the model created, the company can check the time spent by each user commuting, in addition to defining the relevance and frequency of their presence.

The city of Rio de Janeiro presents a unique geography, spectacular for tourists. However, it makes it difficult to connect neighborhoods, with the main roads and avenues defining the axes of urban travel. Almost no fast and safe alternatives.

Using the zip codes where employees live, we define the main access routes to the offices on a map.

The map above shows the route of an employee to each of the selected properties.

With the use of specific programs, Ocupantes was able to define the route and time traveled for each employee, from “Point A” (the employee’s address) to the properties selected as reference defined here, as Points “B”, “C ” and “D”.

This model resulted in the spreadsheet below, with the travel time of each employee to the future workplace.

We finalize the presentation of the “best location” by combining other pre-established criteria, in addition to what has been demonstrated.

We apply a score to each criterion according to the relevance defined by the client. The resulting score was the basis for evaluating the best alternative.

The consultancy work carried out involved other aspects that were not mentioned. However, considering the financial cost represented by the bottleneck that is traffic in the city of Rio de Janeiro, it is relevant to consider that the “best location” provides the shortest average travel time.

As a result, the service developed by Ocupantes provided the client with an approach characterized, not by the mere appeal of the initial value of the rental, but by a holistic view of the relocation, pointing the direction and supporting decision-making.

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