Build your self storage marketing plan from scratch

The self storage industry is booming. With space at a premium, homeowners and renters are choosing to offload their excess items into storage rather than risk having them clutter up their homes. Self storage is also ideal for short-term arrangements, helping homeowners to keep their possessions safe while they move house or renovate their homes.

If you’re on the cusp of opening your first self storage venture, you’re going to need a self storage marketing plan on your side. A marketing plan will help you to bring in a steady stream of new customers – because even when you reach capacity in your facility, you should never stop generating new leads.

Your ready-made self storage marketing plan

In this guide, we’ll outline the steps you need to take to build your self storage marketing plan from scratch and share some additional resources to help you on your way.

Get to know your audience

Audience research is an essential part of any marketing plan – and don’t forget that this isn’t something you do once and then forget about. Audience research is an ongoing process that will help to shape your strategy moving forward.

You can discover our self-storage industry market insights here, or learn about how to visualise and optimise the customer journey here.

Build your website

A good website is not just a branding tool. For many self-storage companies, it is their bread and butter and their main source of leads. A fast and secure website is non-negotiable, but you could also upgrade your website experience with lots of added extras. Consider adding online account management or an online booking form to make it even easier for visitors to become customers.

We share the most common elements of the perfect website here.

You can read our tips on the tried and tested website design tips that help to convert self-storage customers here.

Or you could read about how website photography will impact your conversion rates here.

Set up your other marketing channels

Your website shouldn’t exist in isolation. You’re also going to be using other marketing channels to get the word out and bring people to your site. Now is the time to set up your social media channels and any other channels you might need, such as email marketing or automation.

self storage marketing plan

Drive traffic to your website

Driving traffic to your website will become the foundation of your business. Getting noticed in an increasingly busy online space is all about having a clearly defined offering. When you know exactly what sets you apart, it’s easier to target things like keywords and social media audiences. Here are just some of the ways you can drive traffic to your website:

SEO

SEO might be more about playing the long game, but it is certainly worth it. With SEO, there are no guarantees, but if you play fair and don’t fall for the quick fixes, you could enjoy a steady stream of organic traffic to your website month after month.

You can read our advice on the SEO strategies for self-storage companies that get results here.

You can also find our tips for designing your website with SEO in mind here.

PPC

Unlike SEO, PPC can offer instant results – provided you have the budget. When you have a brand new website and you want to start seeing results, prioritise PPC budget to help bring traffic in during the early days of running your business.

If you want to add PPC to your self-storage company marketing strategy, you’ll need to read this guide first.

Social Media

While it might not be a priority, you can’t neglect social media. Make sure you have an active Google My Business listing and that it is verified and regularly updated. You should also add your business details to Facebook to make sure users can contact you through the platform. Enabling the reviews function and encouraging your customers to use it could also help you to generate some social media referrals.

If you want to expand your social media platforms using paid advertising, we recently shared some tips to help you achieve this.

Automate your interactions

When the very first enquiry lands in your inbox, you’ll be a little excited to handle it yourself. But before long, you’ll be drowning in enquiries and worried about dropping the ball. This is when automation can help.

By automating certain interactions, you can free up time to focus on the enquiries that need your attention the most. Automation might include email journeys to onboard your new customers, or it could be a simple Facebook Messenger bot to help pick up any missed enquiries.
You can read all about our tips for automation in the self-storage industry here. And you can find more general automation advice here.

Remarketing to capture lost leads

Once you have paid to direct users to your website through various channels, you need to think about how you can pick up lost leads. Remarketing is one of the best ways to achieve this. You can read more about our thoughts on remarketing here.

As users are shopping around and looking for the best deal on self-storage, your website makes a note of their visit. You can then share this information with marketing platforms including Facebook and Adroll and more. Once a user leaves your website and browser other sites with display network advertising enabled, they will see adverts for your site. It’s a great way to stay at the forefront of customer’s minds.

You can read more about remarketing for self-storage companies here.

Need help putting it all together?

We’re experienced in helping the digital marketing for storage process, trust us – we have done this a few times now. If you need help taking your self-storage company to the next level, or if you want to explore new marketing avenues, get in touch today.