By Megan Lynn

According to Google, 85 percent of consumers use the Internet to find local businesses, including self-storage facilities. They like to know what’s nearby and accessible, and even what other people are saying about these companies. No matter how small your storage facility is, you should absolutely have a website. Even a simple one that provides fundamental information for existing and potential customers can be extremely beneficial.

Once you have a basic Web presence, search engines can begin to index or list your site in their results. You may have heard the term SEO (search engine optimization), which is the process of maximizing the number of visitors to a particular website by ensuring it appears high on the list of results returned by a search engine. In layman’s terms, SEO helps determine where your website ranks on Bing, Google, Yahoo, etc., and how much traffic is generated to your site.

Let’s explore ways you can improve your website and social media efforts to obtain better search engine results.

Website

Getting a website up and running is the most important thing a storage operator can do to create an online presence. If you already have a website, ask yourself:

People spend a lot of time on their smartphones, and they like to find answers to their questions quickly. If your website isn’t mobile-friendly, it’s time to consider an update. The last thing you want is for someone to find your site and then leave it because it’s difficult to navigate or he has to keep adjusting the screen to read the content. Once the website has been built, you can consider what Web features are important to offer users.

In a custom-built website, you have the option of including an e-commerce page so customers can reserve a unit or pay their rent online. Many industry software providers offer pages that can be added to an existing website. Often, they can even customize the pages to match the look of your existing website for continuity.

Online payments and reservations are great features to provide since customers don’t always have time to visit the facility to rent or pay. When potential tenants see your website allows online payments and reservations, it’s a real selling point to choosing your facility over others. People love convenience, and finding everything they need in one place is always a plus. These are all factors that will contribute to the incoming traffic on your website as well.

Social Media

While a quality website is crucial in developing your online presence, you can’t forget about another important factor: social media. Not only do people spend a lot of time on their smartphones looking up this or that, they also log time interacting on social media. As of November, statistics show there are 1.5 billion monthly active users on Facebook, and more than 1 billion of those users are on the site daily.

Some self-storage operators might think there’s no point in using social media because their product is pretty self-explanatory. The great thing about social media, though, is you don’t have to talk about your business specifically. You can post information about local events or news, or even show your sense of humor with a joke or Internet meme—possibly one that’s storage-related! Even if what you’re posting isn’t directly related to your facility, the content allows your business name to be active in customers’ news feeds and timelines. It’s another way to get your name out there and keep it out there for the public to see.

Social media also allows you to easily notify customers about ongoing specials, promote your retail store or other ancillary services, or even remind people about office hours. If you have an upcoming auction, social media is a great way to inform the community of the date and time for the event.

You don’t have to be a social media expert to be on these websites, but you should know these platforms are available to you and can help you improve your business. If you feel as though the social media aspect is a bit too confusing and time-consuming, there are many companies available to do the work for you. Even if you’re not currently on Facebook, Twitter or other platforms, your SEO partner can help you set up the accounts you need along with tracking your rankings and incoming leads with search engines. Just make sure that when choosing a partner, the company has experience in the self-storage industry.

Google

Whether you’re thinking about building a website, adjusting your current one or still trying to figure out the whole social media thing, one beneficial step you can take is to get your facility on Google. If you have a Gmail account for your business, you’re already moving in the right direction.

Creating a Google Business page from your Gmail account is a huge help if you’re trying to get your facility “on the map”—Google Maps, which is now linked with Google Places. The more Google features of which you take advantage, the more frequently the search engine will recognize your facility name and address, which makes it easier for people to find you.

Building an online presence isn’t just about making it easier for people to find you or ranking high on search engines. It helps you and your business be much more personable to the public. Interacting with your existing and potential tenants and showing that your property is a friendly, welcoming environment makes people feel more at ease about leaving their belongings at your site.

Megan Lynn is the marketing director for QuikStor Security & Software, a one-stop-shop for security and software products in the self-storage industry since 1987. For more information, call 800.321.1987, e-mail [email protected], visit www.quikstor.com.