Today’s competitive storage marketplace means that businesses need to work harder to attract new customers and keep existing tenants. Three important elements in this effort are excellent customer service, a customer-friendly website, and consistent communication. In this age of social media and 24/7 information, maintaining communication with your tenants is more than a courtesy, it’s something that most of your customers likely expect.

Stay Connected with E-Mail

While it’s never a good idea to bombard your audience with too-frequent or unwanted messages, a quarterly e-mail newsletter from a facility to its tenants is a reasonable starting point and one that is feasible for most self-storage operations. Fostering the relationship with your tenants via a quarterly newsletter can go a long way toward enhancing customer service and creating a positive experience for your valued customers. E-mail is less expensive and requires less production effort than a printed newsletter, plus the facility will have an added incentive to collect valid e-mail addresses from every tenant, information that is very important and sometimes overlooked in the leasing process.

A quarterly newsletter is an excellent tool for distributing a variety of messages to your customers.

• Risk Management – Reiterate certain clauses in the rental contract such as the provision against storing flammable items, the maximum value of items to be stored in a unit, and the importance of insuring stored property. Ask tenants to report hazardous conditions they may observe on the property such as tripping, slip-and-fall, and fire hazards as well as damage to physical structures and possible criminal activity. Mitigating one loss can make a difference in your annual insurance costs.
• Marketing – Alert tenants to your referral program, remind them about your available insurance program and truck rental services, or let them know that you have new spaces available to rent.
• Operations – Provide guidance and information about upcoming events at the facility to include maintenance or construction on the property.
• Special Messages – If possible, target a special edition of the newsletter to your commercial customers to provide information specific to their needs.
• Generic Content – Include interesting content from online resources such as local events, “on this day in history” stories, or other entertaining items.

If you are considering an e-mail newsletter for your self-storage business, you could start with an all-text e-mail format to test the waters. When you’re ready to expand the program, review the available low-cost e-mail distribution services. Most are cost-effective for smaller operations, simple to use, and provide an array of ready-to-use templates that can be customized to include your logo, business information and photos.

Creating an e-mail newsletter to communicate with your tenants is a simple and highly effective way to enhance customer service and retention as well as provide a resource to convey important risk management information. Staying connected benefits both you and your tenants.

Mike Schofield

President and CEO