What if I told you a secret that increases occupancy,
decreases expenses, and enhances manager performance?
Intrigued?
Well without further adieu, the secret I'm referring to is
marketing tracking... tracking your marketing effectively
so you know what marketing efforts are really working for
you and which ones are wasting your money. When I say
marketing tracking I'm not referring to just asking the
customer how they found you. Today's customers use multiple
marketing channels to find your facility and most likely
have done the same for other facilities as well. So by the
time you ask them how they found you, they are not going to
have an accurate answer. Not only that, they honestly don't
care to remember how they found you. They have a hectic
schedule and all they care about is getting their stuff out
of their messy garage.
If customers can't accurately tell you how they found your
facility and that's the only data you're using to track
your marketing then you're going to be making decisions
based on faulty data. And since the goal of tracking your
marketing is to be able to determine what's working and
what isn't, it's very important to have accurate data.
So how do you ensure that your tracking data is accurate?
If asking the customer doesn't work what are your other
options? First let's talk about what to track, and then
we'll get into the how.
Tracking Prospects. When you look at a marketing source you
really need to analyze all of the ways prospects can
contact you from that marketing source so you're sure to
track them all. For example, if you have a website that
gives the customer the option to reserve online, you might
think that the main thing for you to track will be online
reservations. But don't forget that your phone number is
also posted on your website, so you need to track calls.
Many times your email address is also, so be sure to track
emails. And lastly, do you have your address posted or any
maps or driving directions on your website? Because of this
you also will be receiving walk-in customers. We'll talk
more in depth shortly about how you can track each of
these, but just keep in mind that with every marketing
source you need to carefully analyze every avenue prospects
use to contact you.
Tracking Rentals. Here's where it matters most...you want
to be able to track how many rentals each of your marketing
sources is bringing you.
The main reason for tracking rentals down to each marketing
source is to determine your Cost per Acquisition, or Cost
per Rental. Simply put, Cost per Acquisition (CPA) is how
much it costs you to get a new tenant. CPA is the most
effective way to evaluate which marketing sources are
working and which ones aren't.
Once you're effectively tracking your prospects and tenants
CPA is easy to calculate. Just take your monthly or annual
cost for that marketing source divided by the number of
tenants it produced in that time and you will have your
CPA. Once you know your CPA for all of your marketing
sources you can compare them head to head to see which ones
are most effective. In fact, CPA is the only way to
effectively compare marketing sources that cost you $3,000
per month with those that cost you $100 per month. You may
find that the marketing source that costs $100 per month
only brings you two new tenants ($50 CPA) and the marketing
source that costs $3,000 per month brings you ten new
tenants ($300 CPA). At first glance, you might think that
the one that brings you ten new tenants is more effective
because it's bringing you a higher volume of tenants; when
in fact, you're paying 6 times as much per tenant with that
marketing source as you are with the other one! In some
cases you'll find that some of your marketing sources are
so ineffective (have such a high CPA), that you can make
the decision to cut them immediately. This is where the
value of tracking really kicks in!
Where do you start? Now that you know how valuable it is to
ensure you are tracking, what can you do to ensure your
tracking methods are accurate? Two tracking methods I
recommend most (beyond just asking the customer how they
found you) are unique phone tracking and unique coupon
tracking. Both are pretty simple and entail using a unique
phone number and unique coupon code on each marketing
source you want to track. By doing so you can know that
when a customer calls in on a specific line or mentions a
specific coupon code he or she has found you from the
marketing source connected with it.
Phone Tracking. Phone tracking technology is inexpensive,
very simple to use, and the data is foolproof. It allows
you to run reports on your calls such as volume of calls,
duration of calls, time of day most calls are being
answered or missed, and more. Also, most phone tracking
technologies allow you to record every call. Once you have
all of this data, you can then start to get a feel for the
number and quality of calls being provided by each
marketing source. By listening to the calls you can know
without a doubt whether or not a prospect rented.
I recommend you use unique tracking phone numbers in as
many places as possible ' definitely on Yellow Page ads,
any direct mail pieces or newspaper advertising, your
website, and on any affiliate websites you may advertise on.
Unique Coupon Codes & Specials. Unique coupon tracking is
also very easy to implement and can be a useful way to
track all forms of prospects, walk-ins, calls, and emails.
Just make sure that on each marketing source you'd like to
track your coupon code is unique. That way when customers
mention the promotion, your managers can ask what the
coupon code is and give credit to the correct marketing
source. For example, if a customer calls and mentions that
they saw your ad for a free truck rental and you know that
the only place you have that printed is on your sign you
can know for sure that the customer saw your sign while
driving by. You can then, with confidence, call this
customer a drive by customer.
With all of the advertising you are doing it's most likely
not feasible to come up with a unique special to feature on
each one ' the alternative is to use a unique coupon code.
For example, maybe your special is First Month Free and you
want to promote it on all of your advertising. That's
great, but make sure that you put a unique coupon code on
each one (First Month Free!* Mention coupon code ABC) so
that when the prospect mentions that he or she saw your ad
for First Month Free you can prompt them to mention which
coupon code they saw. Doing this will once again allow you
to track that coupon code back to the marketing source it's
featured on. Be sure that you or your managers really
prompt the customer to mention the entire special or coupon
code. Since you're running the First Month Free special
everywhere it is extremely important that you get the
coupon code, or your data may not be accurate.
Many management software programs allow you to input these
coupon codes and/or marketing sources. This makes it very
easy to run reports on how many coupon codes were redeemed
in a certain time frame. You can also run reports on the
sizes that were rented and how long the customer stayed to
get a good feel for how valuable these customers are to you.
All of this might seem like it will take more time than
it's worth, but I guarantee you that once you take the time
to set it all up and get your systems in place you will not
regret it. You will be able to make more informed and
confident marketing decisions and will eventually be able
to cut ineffective marketing to trim your marketing budget!
----------------------------------------------------
Megan Eckert is Executive Vice President for
USstoragesearch.com, an online storage directory providing
service to more than 9,000 self & mobile storage facilities
in the U.S. Their unique online marketing program allows
operators to instantly put their facilities in front of
customers searching the Internet for storage in their local
area for a very reasonable fee. For more information call
866.880.0742 or visit http://www.usstoragesearch.com .
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