Businesses · Advisory for growth-stage businesses
Pre-raise · Market entry
The commercial foundation your business needs to grow.
Suraiya Comunello · Strategic Advisory
Brand Strategy. Commercial Growth. Market Advisory.
Integrated advisory across commercial, brand and marketing, customer experience, operations, and growth strategy.
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15 Years Senior Leadership
Global Experience
PE · Growth Capital
Former CMO, Nido Living
Founder & Chair, Women in PBSA
PBSA Woman of the Year 2023
15 Years Senior Leadership
Global Experience
PE · Growth Capital
Former CMO, Nido Living
Founder & Chair, Women in PBSA
PBSA Woman of the Year 2023
— The WorkBusinesses. Operators.
Businesses. Operators.
Investors.
Investors · Investor advisory · PE & Growth Capital
Standards and Performance
Where operator performance meets investor confidence.
Operators · Operator advisory · PBSA & real estate
New market entry, platform optimisation.
Every part of your business, performing as one.
— How It WorksAudit. Analysis.
Audit. Analysis.
Roadmap. Delivery.
Brand, experience, operations, technology, and commercial narrative move together. When one is under pressure, it impacts the others. Most advisors address one, this practice considers them all.
01Audit
An honest assessment of where the business or portfolio currently stands: commercial, brand, customer experience and operational capability evaluated as a whole.
- Commercial baseline
- Brand & marketing review
- Operational capability map
Everyone is talking about growth.
Most are leaving performance on the table.
Not because the strategy is wrong.
Because brand, experience, and operations aren't built to carry it.
Brand without operations is noise.
Operations without narrative is invisible.
Experience without consistency is churn.
The businesses that win the next decade won't be the loudest.
They'll be the ones built to carry what they promise.
— The Practice
Strategy from the inside out.
Comunello Strategic Advisory works at the interface of growth capital and business performance. It advises operators expanding into new markets or strengthening the platforms they already run, the investors backing them, and growth-stage businesses building the commercial foundation they need to scale.
Brand and marketing is the primary lens. But 15 years of senior leadership, including as CMO at Nido Living, a 15,000-bed platform scaled across seven countries, makes it impossible to look at a business without seeing how operations, technology and investor narrative connect to it. That isn't a broader service offering. It's what that experience brings to every engagement. Most advisors know either the operator or the investor. Comunello's founder has run the operation and reported to institutional capital.
Four lenses. One coherent view.
- Brand & Marketing
The specialism that underpins everything.
- Operations Interface
Where brand meets delivery.
- Technology & Data
Seeing the blind spots.
- Investor & Commercial Narrative
The story capital believes.
Not four services. Four perspectives that come standard, because real growth needs all of them together.
— About
Who's behind the practice.
Comunello Strategic Advisory was founded by Suraiya Comunello after 15 years in senior marketing leadership across PBSA, real estate, universities and institutionally backed businesses in European markets, including roles at Hines, GSA and The Student Housing Company. The most recent was CMO at Nido Living: leading brand, marketing and customer experience across a 15,000-bed business in seven countries, and taking the platform from emerging operator to a globally recognised brand. Recognition includes PBSA Woman of the Year 2023, Highly Commended Woman of the Year 2025, Top Voices in Property Marketing 2025 and 2026, and Bisnow Women Who Shape the Future of Real Estate 2025.
The practice is built on what those businesses taught: brand and marketing advice only holds up when it's connected to how operations actually work, where technology creates friction, and what investors need to see.
Engagements run as a fractional CMO when a business needs someone inside it, or as an external advisor when it doesn't. Either way, the advice comes from someone who has done the job.
How the practice works →
Suraiya Comunello — Founder
15+
Years senior leadership
7
Countries scaled worldwide
15,000
Beds under one brand
2023
PBSA Woman of the Year
— Track Record
Where the experience comes from.
Fifteen years inside universities, operators, investors and platforms across European markets, before advising them.
Now
- Comunello Strategic AdvisoryCommercial growth and market advisory
- VerbaFlo AIAI SaaS for real estate
- Forum Asset ManagementInvestor, developer and asset manager
- Women in PBSAIndustry network and initiative to advance gender equity and leadership
Former
- apartoPan European PBSA & Flex Living Operator
- Nido LivingPan-European PBSA & Flex Living platform
- HinesGlobal real assets investment manager
- Global Student Accommodation GroupReal estate asset management in PBSA
- Queen Mary, University of LondonHigher education institution
Recognition
Woman of the Year
Highly Commended
Chair & Committee Roles
Media & Press
As featured in.
Interviews, bylined columns, podcasts, and industry commentary across national press, real estate and specialist media.
— Industry Leadership
Women in PBSA
Founder & Chair
From an idea to an industry movement.
Women in PBSA was founded by Suraiya Comunello, with support from Global Student Living, and has grown into an industry-led movement advancing gender equity, leadership representation, and building more inclusive, supportive workplaces across the living sector.
As Chair, the role covers setting the strategic vision, priorities and annual objectives, and leading a cross-industry committee that turns them into action: best-practice recommendations and workplace policies, oversight of the WinPBSA Mentorship Programme, and learning through online sessions and the inaugural WinPBSA Summit.
— FAQ
Questions, answered.
A clear overview of how Comunello Strategic works, who it serves, and what to expect from a strategic advisory engagement.
Comunello Strategic Advisory is a commercial growth advisory practice working at the interface of operator performance and investor confidence. Founded and led by Suraiya Comunello, former CMO at Nido Living, the practice treats brand and marketing, operations, technology, and investor narrative as one connected problem rather than four separate services, working with growth-stage businesses, operators, and investors as a fractional CMO or external advisor, depending on what's needed.
Comunello Strategic works with founders, executive teams, and boards at mid-sized and growth-stage companies worldwide seeking outside strategic guidance.
Most engagements run between 6 and 12 weeks for a focused strategic project, with ongoing advisory retainers available for longer-term support.
The deepest expertise is in real estate operating models built around residents and members: PBSA, build-to-rent, coliving, and flex living, developed over 15 years working inside those platforms, and increasingly with the AI-native proptech companies building the next generation of resident experience within them. The same brand, commercial, and investor-narrative work applies to any growth-stage business, operators, and engagements with investors, which sit at exactly that intersection of commercial narrative and operator performance.
Getting started begins with a discovery call to understand your goals, followed by a tailored proposal outlining scope, timeline, and deliverables.
Comunello Strategic offers both remote and on-site advisory services, with engagement format tailored to the client's needs and project scope.