Digital Marketing Tips for Self-Storage Owners
As a self-storage owner, you know that connecting with the right consumer at the right time is vital for your sales. Using digital marketing techniques can help you reach your target audiences, stand out among your competition and close more sales. If you’re new to digital marketing, the range of techniques and avenues might seem overwhelming, full of unfamiliar acronyms and jargon.
Understanding and utilizing digital marketing techniques will make a huge difference for your self-storage business. Digital marketing has multifaceted benefits, helping you close more deals and earn more with every rental. Learn tips for marketing your self-storage facility using digital tools.
What Is Digital Marketing? Self-Storage Marketing 101
Before you can make use of online self-storage advertising tips, you’ll need to understand what digital marketing entails. Digital marketing is any marketing technique that relies on the internet or online-based technologies. It also includes tracking and measuring the success of these efforts. Digital marketing can take on many different forms, including:
- Email campaigns.
- Social media posts.
- Paid search engine ads.
- Website content.
If you have yet to engage in digital marketing strategies, now is the time to start. As of 2021, over 85% of Americans have access to the internet, and that number continues to climb closer to 100%. People use the internet for every facet of daily life — education, entertainment, social engagement and finding the goods and services they need. Using digital marketing strategies increases your visibility and accessibility to online markets.
Importance of Digital Marketing for Self Storage
Digital marketing for self-storage companies should be a top priority. Your self-storage advertising strategies should include different forms of digital media. Getting involved with the most important self-storage marketing techniques can benefit you by:
Growing Your Business
Making proper use of the internet is one of the best ways to grow your self-storage business, allowing you to connect with potential customers from far and wide. Those interested in self-storage solutions can only buy from you if they know who you are and what you offer. In addition, a strong online presence contributes to your brand legitimacy and makes you more trustworthy in the eyes of consumers.
Digital marketing results in greater visibility and a stronger reputation, which will help you grow your business. It will also help you earn and maintain a positive reputation in your community. Digital platforms create space for customer testimonials and social engagement. Word-of-mouth advertising is powerful, and it exists online. Digital marketing strategies can help you earn new customers and retain previous ones.
Maximizing Your Revenue
Visibility is a vital factor for any self-storage business. A lack of visibility means your units will go unrented — that’s money left on the table. Using digital marketing strategies can help boost your visibility, ensuring you always rent out your units. This consistency will help maximize your revenue. If you’re looking to generate greater revenue from your self-storage business, digital marketing is the way to go.
Earning a Higher Selling Price
Using the best marketing strategies can create a domino effect for your business. Greater brand awareness and visibility will allow you to rent more of your units more often. More units rented means a higher occupancy rate. A higher occupancy rate means you can earn a higher selling price for available units.
As you can tell, digital marketing is highly important for any self-storage business. Using the web for your business will allow you to win new customers, retain past customers, maximize your revenue and earn a higher selling price for your units. So, how can you promote your self-storage business online? You’ll need to understand digital marketing techniques.
Important Digital Marketing Strategies for Self-Storage Owners
The world of digital marketing is ever-evolving and fast-paced. You’ll need to try multiple techniques and measure their impacts to find the best solutions for your business. Here are some digital marketing strategies for self-storage businesses — follow these self-storage marketing tips for the best results.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
One of the best digital marketing tips for self-storage companies is to focus energy on SEO. You may have heard of SEO before — any company in any industry can benefit from paying attention to this facet of digital marketing. SEO is the process of increasing web traffic from search engines to a specific site or page. It’s also about improving the quality of the traffic — reaching audiences who are interested and engaged.
Every time you type in a query on a search engine like Google, the engine considers several factors to deliver the most relevant, authoritative and helpful results to your search results page (SERP). As a self-storage business, you want to show up on SERPs for those interested in self-storage solutions. Appearing in relevant search results gives you a better chance of earning a potential buyer’s business. SEO deals with unpaid traffic, meaning visitors find your company site on their own, not through ads.
Plenty of different strategies can help you with your SEO. Making a user-friendly and authoritative website is a good way to get started. You should also create plenty of helpful, informative content for your website. Then, you should focus on the specific search terms you want to target. All self-storage marketing plans should involve SEO.
Local SEO
Your self-storage marketing techniques should also focus on local SEO, which will help boost your company’s visibility within your community. Improving your local SEO helps you appear in search results for those who are trying to find self-storage in a specific city or region. You’ll want your web traffic to include potential customers located close enough to utilize your services. For local SEO purposes, you might try to boost your visibility for search terms like “self-storage in Delaware.”
Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Ads
PPC ads help drive traffic to your website. Unlike SEO, which focuses on “earning” traffic, PPC ads are one way you can “buy” traffic. As the advertiser, you’ll pay the ad host or publisher each time someone clicks on your ad. Such ads are a popular way to boost brand awareness on search engines and social media platforms. If you’re wondering how to advertise self-storage, PPC ads are an excellent way to get started.
1. Display Ads
Display ads include some form of graphics. They can appear as text, images or video, and sometimes include audio. No matter how they look, they encourage web browsers to click and end up on your company’s site — most hosts will charge the advertiser per click. You can host display ads on many different websites, including social media platforms like Facebook or Instagram. Here are some examples of display ads:
- Banner ads: Banner ads are like online billboards. They appear at the top or side of a website and usually include visuals and text enticing users to click with a call-to-action.
- Interstitial ads: These display ads appear before a user can access the page they requested. In most cases, the user will have to click to close the ad before the browser redirects them.
- Interactive ads: Some display ads are more interactive than traditional banners. They might include clickable content or information fields the user can fill in right from the ad. Ads like these encourage engagement, which can be beneficial.
- Video ads: Video ads are popular on video-streaming platforms and social media pages. They’re similar to traditional television ads. You’ll often have only a few seconds to engage your audience with a video ad.
2. Search Ads
You may notice a few sponsored links at the top of the results when you type a query into Google — each has an “ad” label. These are PPC search engine ads. On Google and other search engines, you can bid for ad placement on certain results pages. You can bid for search terms such as “self-storage rentals.”
The goal is to make each visit to your site worth more than the fee you pay for each click. Choosing the right search terms to bid on and organizing them into smaller groups will help you find success. Keep in mind, Google’s goal is to provide helpful links to its users. If your PPC ads prove useful to searchers, Google will reward you by charging you less per click.
Google also takes into account your site’s quality, so maintaining a user-friendly, unique site will elevate your ad campaign. Learn more about Google Ads and how they can be advantageous for your business.
3. Remarketing
Remarketing is a highly useful digital marketing method for self-storage companies. It involves targeting individuals based on past behavior. For instance, a clothing retailer might offer someone remarketed ads for the items they have saved in their virtual shopping cart. Those who have already shown interest in your self-storage facilities are more likely to convert than random internet users, which is why remarketed advertising is so effective. Such ads remind users of your company and help nudge them further into the sales funnel.
Paid Social Ads
Paid social ads allow you to launch advertising campaigns on specific social media platforms. In the modern world, social ads are an absolute necessity. It’s a good idea to create unpaid content in addition to launching paid ads. Building a strong social media presence for your self-storage company will take time and commitment.
If you’re not sure where to advertise self-storage units online, try to choose social media platforms with the right user base. Social media user demographics vary for each platform. For instance, about 71% of those aged 18 to 29 use Instagram, while only 48% of those aged 30-49 use Instagram. If you’re looking to target those aged 30 and older, you might be better off focusing your efforts on Facebook content. About 77% of those aged 30-49 are on Facebook, as are 73% of those aged 50 to 64. Marketing for self-storage facility owners will depend on your target demographic.
Web Design
Creating a user-friendly website will ensure your self-storage marketing ideas lead to successful conversions. Self-storage digital marketing relies on useful, simplified and easy-to-navigate web design. Imagine someone who’s interested in a self-storage unit clicks on your ad while browsing Facebook — but when they get to your page, they find it confusing and difficult to navigate. Odds are, they’re not going to convert into a sale. That’s why web design is so vital to the digital marketing process. Keep these tips in mind to improve your site’s design:
- Include real-time information on the website: Make sure your website is always up-to-date. For example, if you post information about storage unit availability, make sure the information is always accurate.
- Use clear calls-to-action: A call-to-action compels a visitor to do something and offers a way to do it. A call-to-action might say “apply for a storage unit today” and include a link to an application form. Use short, simple and clear calls-to-action.
- Keep the online application or rental process simple: Make sure it’s easy for visitors to convert into sales. Keep the process simple.
Email Marketing
Another self-storage advertising idea is to launch an email campaign. Email marketing is popular because it’s practically free. All you need to launch a successful campaign are the emails of potential buyers. Ask your site visitors for their contact information and hold onto the emails of past customers. You might send out regular newsletters or exclusive promotions.
Additional Self-Storage Marketing Best Practices
As you learn how to advertise self-storage units online, it’s a good idea to keep certain best practices in mind. Whichever digital marketing tactics you decide to use, follow these tips for advertising storage units:
- Optimize your conversion tracking: It’s important to use the right tools to track your results and measure success. Conversion tracking will help you determine how you can make positive changes and improve your digital marketing efforts. Any time you run an ad campaign, keep a watchful eye on its impact.
- Be consistent with your online investments: Stay consistent — you get the best results when you’re consistently investing in your business online. It’s not enough to run sporadic campaigns here and there.
- Hire digital marketing experts: Although you may be able to manage some aspects of digital marketing on your own, you’ll get better results and save time when you work with experts.
- Experiment with different digital marketing strategies: Branch out and try different digital marketing strategies. Doing so will allow you to stay ahead of the competition and find what works best for your business and market.
Contact Investment Real Estate for a Free Property Valuation
Investing in digital marketing strategies is essential for any modern business. Using these techniques will help you build your brand awareness, generate more self-storage facility rentals and maximize your revenue. Consider taking the time to test out different digital marketing strategies. Design some display ads, launch an email campaign or focus on creating helpful, user-friendly web content. Stay consistent with your efforts and you’re bound to see results.
Another way you can boost your sales is by partnering with Investment Real Estate. At Investment Real Estate, we help self-storage owners like you find buyers and close deals. First, we’ll offer you a free, confidential property valuation, along with helpful tips for boosting your facility’s value and choosing the best time to sell. We’ll then list your units on our high-traffic database to connect you with qualified buyers. If you’re ready to sell your storage units for a high return, get started with your free property valuation today.