Self Storage vs. Rocket Science

It is only self storage, it is not rocket science. When training your employees on how to sell self storage these two statements are good to remember and important to mention to your new hires. Although it is only self storage there still needs to be requirements for your employees to follow in order for them to become self storage experts. Product knowledge should be first and foremost in any business. Secret shopping can help with training your self storage company. It is an important requirement for each self storage member on your team to be trained accordingly. Having a secret shopping program in place will allow you to connect with your customers. As with any business if you know the product well then the rest should follow. How can you sell a product if you do not know anything about it? Get your employees to know every product and every service inside and out so they can answer any question regarding them that may pop up. With self storage it will be the unit type and sizes that are appropriate for each type of self storage customer. Or it could be the moving and self storage supplies that people want to know about. Your employees should know what type of boxes a customer needs based on what they need packed. Every lock and the benefit of using the different types and styles will also help your customer. Each of your employees from the part timers to the full timers should know all self storage product information so they can confidently answer any customer questions. Up-selling is an important part of the self storage and secret shopping business. If your employees are only familiar with self storage units then they are not being of maximum use to your customers. Your customers should feel very comfortable with every one of your employees, not just the ones that work full time. A company is only as good as the worst employee, right?

Once this phase is well versed by your employees then the next phase of your secret shopping training should fall in which would be the actual presentation to someone who has never rented self storage before. Secret shopping involves a person that poses as potential customer and tries to rent self storage. Those tend to be a bit easier as normally you would simply take the customer by the hand and walk them through the entire self storage process and the caller is o.k. with that. The next phase would be the types of self storage questions that need to be asked of the potential renter so you know what is important to them. You can help them make a decision or suggest to them something that they may not have thought about when storing. Now the employee should be pretty confident in knowing what they are talking about. Now they need to understand what the different types of questions are that they should be asking of the potential customer. Yes and no questions will not lead you to the end of the call by itself. Sloppy transitions to cover other topics of the self storage rental process could also hurt you by losing some of the callers interest. So those too need to be practiced, memorized and used to obtain the maximum effect for the secret shopping training.

Once the above has been completed and successfully versed in the new employee, then it is time to put it in writing. Some sort of scripting always helps the memory and the secret shopping training. A secret shopping tip, have a quick script handy with you at the front desk so in case you are having one of those days you can refer to it in order to get everything covered. Each conversation will be different and you do need to be prepared for each type of scenario from the easy going customer who wants to rent right now, to the just shopping around caller to the irate current customer who has an over lock on their unit because there bill was not paid. Secret shopping evaluations can even help your employees with how to handle manger calls.
 
If we do not know how to answer a callers or customers questions then how does the customer feel when there is not an answer available for the current tenant at the moment. A good secret shopping program can help your self storage business succeed. And when you have a better self storage business, you will have more rentals. Check out a secret shopping program today to help your self storage business.

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Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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