he self-storage industry has been at an all-time high recently, but some facilities still face higher-than-average vacancies and overall bad months in their business. Marketing during this time is imperative to make sure your business doesn’t go down like we have been seeing many small businesses do, especially since the industry caught the eye of some famous investors that have access to huge marketing budgets and get to navigate trying times a lot differently.

Marc Goodin, author of Crush Your Competition: 101 Self-Storage Marketing Tips For The Fastest Way To Huge Profits and president of Storage Authority, a self-storage franchising business that opened back in 2016 and makes $39 billion a year in revenues, shared some tips on how to navigate discounts efficiently during high vacancy. “A rule of thumb is to avoid giving month-free discounts. Most people who try this don’t realize it until they run into the tens of thousands in loss of profit, but for a large facility, this can end up costing even $80,000 a year,” he warns.

Attracting new clients, especially for new business, seems to be the biggest problem facilities run into when facing high vacancies, but when creating a marketing plan, it is best to refrain from discounts that continue past the first payment. As Goodin points out, these reductions can also end up amounting to a big number in the long run, causing the company a big loss in their profit margin.

To maintain the company’s good image, it is also a good idea to be honest and upfront with new customers by being transparent about pricing. So, avoid trying to fool new customers into signing up for lower-than-practicable rates just to raise them within a month. “Low teaser rates that are raised $30 to $90 a month in two months make customers unhappy and make the company look bad,” says Goodin. “This will probably make customers not want to do business with you in the future.”

One thing to keep in mind is that each customer is not an isolated individual; they are connected to a large-scale group, which has become even bigger as most people now tend to talk about their issues with companies online. So, if one of your customers has a problem with the company, the people they know, who could be potential customers, as well as strangers researching your company online, will probably hear about it, which can directly impact your sales and profit in the longer run. “Too many people are experiencing tens of thousands of lost incomes trying to follow the REITs’ main marketing and giving a free month of storage to every customer. It is much more profitable to better train your staff on sales and marketing,” Goodin claims.

Out of some discount incentives that Storage Authority has actually seen work in the past firsthand, the first-month discounts when signing up are simple yet highly effective. However, if customers ask for extra discounts, especially when claiming other similar businesses around your area have a better rate, Goodin advises sticking to a script like this one: “I understand you want the best value for your money. I am sure you can see how our facility and benefits are head and shoulders above the competition. We set our rates so we can provide our customers with the service they deserve and expect. I promise you, I will be here providing you with top-notch service that is hard to find these days.”

Some other strategies, such as making sure your facilities have a commercial car vacuum customers can use or that any time they stop by there’s free candy, water, soda, and coffee, should also be a part of your practice, as it makes for an enhanced customer experience. “Given the REITs are raising rents at two months and again at seven months, guaranteeing you will not raise their rent for at least a year is a significant saving.”

Making sure your staff has a little arsenal of tricks under their sleeves to close a deal is also imperative. “Small incentives to create a good relationship with the clients, like offering a $20 Dunkin Donuts gift card to be able to offer a free breakfast or a free lock customers can use in their unit, is a great trick to get a customer to close a deal faster,” he states.

If that’s out of budget, you can make more cost-friendly offers, like providing customers free use of your company’s app, which allows them to drive in and out of the facility without reaching out to the window to enter a code, or even offering the 13^th month free if they pay 12 months in advance. Getting customers in your facility, especially during high vacancy, is half the battle, so once they do reach out or take the time to visit your location, it is a good idea to have a skilled team and some incentives that don’t take away a big chunk of your final profit margin.

In Goodin’s book, he also mentions that the No. 1 rule when talking to a prospective client is to avoid giving price information before you have a chance to discuss the benefits of storing with your company. “The most important thing to remember is do not give them the price; I repeat, do not give them the price unless and until you have made them aware of at least three benefits of storing with you!”

Sometimes, the best discount can be no discount at all. Instead, a better marketing strategy can do the trick, as marketing has managed to become a necessity in every business of all industries and sizes, playing a big role in the road to achieving success. “The difference between low rental rates and high rental rates is often marketing,” Goodin affirms. “Unfortunately, many self-storage owners are using paid marketing like Google pay per click, which is no longer effective due to the cost and the fact that most of our clients come from a three-mile radius,” he adds.

As a solution, Storage Authority invests in guerrilla marketing, a term created by Jay Conrad Levinson to describe some creative and out-of-the-box marketing campaigns that sell products or services using either an unconventional approach or a surprise element. “Guerilla marketing is the most effective and productive marketing, but it takes consistent hard work,” he says. “The benefit, besides the results it brings, is that it doesn’t take a lot of money to do it.”

Above all, getting noticed is the goal. “One of my favorites is holiday marketing, as it gets people to stop by or at least look our way,” he states. “We give away 300 pumpkins every October, line our frontage with two dozen American flags on the 4^th of July, Labor Day, and Veterans Day.”