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It's usually easier to sell to someone who's experiencing a pain than it is to an upstream provider. In other words, if it was a big enough issue that you built something to fix it, and your apartment complex hasn't fixed it themselves, you probably aren't going to suddenly convince them to buy in (since they don't see the pain, or don't care).

Sell pain killers to people in pain.

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It's more work, but you can convince the upstream provider that their customer's pain is actually causing them pain.

I would try to find a larger complex to use as a case study. Set everything up for free for them, and check their retention rate before and after the install. 1 month less of an empty apartment probably pays for your product, and if you're anything over that it's a no-brainer from the complex owner's perspective.

Actually, I take some of this back. If the upstream provider can make significant profits by selling this as an add on, then you're in business.

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