Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/594075
NOVEMBER 2015 18 THE JOURNAL BY BRUCE SAVAGE COMMUNICATIONS CONSULTANT Building Allies for Our Industry It seems that everyone in the manufactured housing industry already knows what a great value our homes represent. And, more importantly, many in the building industry outside manufac- tured housing are now recognizing the great value our affordable homes represent. Yet, the biggest challenge is that most no one outside our industry thinks that our homes are a good investment. They immediately think that our homes do not provide good quality for the money in the long term! Sound familiar? Do you think we might benefit from an image-enhance- ment program that sets the record straight? There are members of our industry who, de- spite overwhelming odds, continue to tout the great value that today's manufactured homes offer to potential homeowners. They work every day to ensure that people's perceptions are in sync with the reality of today's homes. Over my many years with the manufactured housing industry, the quality of our homes has improved tremendously and we now offer a truly impressive value in af- fordable housing. But we need to reach out to more and more people with the reality of today's manufactured homes. In today's media savvy world, with more a nd more outlets to tell our story, there are some great examples of people doing the right thing. One such group is "Next Step: Affordable Housing Done Right," a Louisville, Kentucky- based nonprofit, dedicated to providing access to high-value, energy-efficient homes that meet and exceed building standards. They cooperate with nonprofit partners offering housing services to working America. As Stacey Epperson, Next Step's President and CEO, says "We believe that manufactured and modular housing represents a construction method that can consistently yield, lower-cost, higher-quality homes which are fre- quently misunderstood. It is not the universal an- swer, but represents a potential solution." What Next Step does, it identifies and partners with homebuilders throughout the country to build an energy-efficient home that will drive down the long-term costs for the homeowner. "These col- laborations allow us to do manufactured housing right, beginning with a quality home designed by us and built by our manufacturing partners." Recently, Next Step (www.fac ebook.com/ NextstepUS) announced the launch of the "#HomeisHome Storytelling Campaign" to cele- brate 10 years of delivering Manufactured Housing Done Right. Over the next year, Next Step's Stacey Epperson will visit Next Step Network Members across the nation to share their stories of how manufactured homes have answered housing needs for their clients. Earlier this year, one of my favorite industry advocates (Chris Nicely, former senior executive with Clayton Homes) joined Next Step as part of their senior management team. Chris is a partic- ularly effective member of the manufactured hous- ing industry and he gets the importance of carrying our message to the wider world. It should be a dis- tinct advantage for our industry to have Stacey and Chris working together on such an important initiative. At the same time, ta king advantage of the many opportunities inherent in today's rapidly evolving media world is a new initiative launched about a year ago by my good friend and fellow housing advocate, Suzanne Felber, and myself. We founded American Housing Advocates (www.americanhousingadvocates,com) as one more way of bringing the positive role that manufactured housing can play to people searching new forms of affordable housing on social media sites. Suzanne is another advocate who believes in our industry and is so creative in her understanding and use of new media platforms to spread the word. Our intent with our site is to let people search- ing the Web for affordable housing know about manufactured housing, what it is and what it of- fers, along with testimonials and success stories of people who have bought and are enjoying their new homes. We also believe t hat images are one of our strongest points in convincing people of the tremendous strides our industry has made over the past decade. One good image of a new manufac- tured home and what it is providing to a family can say so much that words alone can not convey. So we are constantly featuring on the Web such im- ages, along with testimonials from actual buyers, so that people who might not find out about us in more traditional ways will get to know about today's manufactured homes and our industry. Today's media world is becoming more domi- nated by people who find and share with circles of similarly-motivated people relevant information. People seeking information on affordable housing will often share what they have found on the Web with hundreds, no thousands, of other people seeking to know more about the same subject. What we have to ensure is that we are part of this conversation. That's one of the keys our industry needs to take full advantage of. It's obvious to anyone familiar with today's fac- tory-built homes that tremendous strides have been and continue to be made to our homes and they offer special opportunities to millions of Americans seeking to own quality homes that they can afford. It's simply a matter of letting these people…and the public officials who govern hous- ing…know about these strides and how our homes now offer a truly competitive home. These steps, such as NEXT STEP and the American Housing Advocates, help us reach beyond the traditional markets and help people actually visualize what factory-built housing is in 2015 and what a force- ful role we can play in bringing affordable housing to millions of Americans desperately searching for a safe, durable, efficient, and affordable place to call home. Bruce Savage is a national communications consultant to both for-profit and non-for-profit clients around the country. He formed Savage Communications Strategies five yeas ago to assist these clients with innovative approaches to challenging communications situations. He also recently formed www.Amer- icanHousingAdvo-cates.com with Suzanne Felber to highlight on new social media how manufactured homes offer tremendous opportunities to millions of Americans seeking quality housing at affordable prices. Savage served for more than 16 years as the vice president of communications for the Manufactured Housing Institute and he continue s to work with manufactured housing in- dustry members with various types of communications and marketing pro- grams. He can be reached at 202-664-4512 or bruce@savagestrategies.com. T J