How to preempt what your Self Storage customers’ need
While more and more information about consumers is available online, it can still be difficult for business owners to know who their customers are. In fact, for some business owners, it’s even more difficult now to understand their customers’ wants and needs.
Why is understanding consumer needs difficult?
In order to preempt what your Self Storage customers’ need, you need to first understand why this process is difficult.
- Customers are less trusting and loyal to brands now than they ever have been.
- Unlimited access to social media and the ability to share their thoughts and reviews online 24/7 gives consumers more power than they’ve ever had before.
- The growth in small, start-up businesses has created a lot more competition for brands, meaning customers have more options.
- With more information readily available to them, consumers can make decisions without any direct contact with companies at all.
How can you learn to preempt your Self Storage customers’ needs?
Despite all the added difficulties, there are still ways for business owners, including Self Storage facility operators, to better understand and be able to preempt what your Self Storage customers’ need. Here are four things you can do to get inside your customers’ heads and help you preempt their needs:
- Stand in their shoes. Take a step back from your role as a facility operator and try and stand in your customers’ shoes. Think about the thoughts they need to have before making a decision. This is important for understanding who your competitors are as well; what would make a consumer choose their facility over yours, and what can you do to change this? What needs do your customers have that you’re already fulfilling, and what are some needs you’re not fulfilling?
- Follow a customer’s order process. The next time you gain a new customer, follow their journey from start to finish. Be involved in the sales process, ask them questions about why they chose your facility, and find out if they have any reservations about their decision. It’s important you follow the customer for the entire journey, including when they move out.
- Be open to learning. It can be confronting to ask your customers what they think about your brand and services. It’s easy to ask questions you know will have positive answers; however, there’s more opportunities for learning from your downfalls. If you want you customers to be honest with you, you need to remain objective and open to learning. You need to try and see things from their point of view.
- Learn to anticipate. Gather all the new information you’ve received and use it to anticipate the needs of future customers. What have your past customers told you about the needs your facility was and wasn’t fulfilling? How can you use this information to better fulfil the needs of your new customers?
Use RapidStor to fulfil customer needs
The only way to learn how to preempt your customer’s needs is to understand who they are and what they need from your facility. Leaning how to preempt what your Self Storage customers’ need is a long and difficult process. It takes a lot of time, and can be a mentally draining process to learn about all your flaws.
There’s one way you can preempt your Self Storage customers’ needs without all the extra work of getting to know who your customers are: using RapidStor. RapidStor lets consumers book their storage unit online through your website, and adds a box shop to help you cross-sell other products. If you’d like to learn more about using RapidStor with your storage facility, contact us today!