Yesterday I was speaking with one of my favorite clients. He was telling me about a meeting he’d just finished with one of the five or six Yellow Page directories in his market.

They were there to do their dog and pony show and tell him all about how his great his cost per thousand (CPM) was and how he MUST keep his first page position in their directory because – heaven forbid – a competitor would get that position if he were to reduce the size of his ad.

Most YP salespeople are trained to use ego and fear as sales tools. Blatant manipulation.

But, you see dear friend, his Managers have told him all year long that they weren’t seeing any results from the book.

So, on one hand he’s fooled into thinking that he must maintain his position or a pesky competitor will get the front spot. On the other hand, he knows (or thinks he does) that the book is a waste of his money.

The YP salesman tells him there’s no way their precious book would perform so poorly and that his managers are simply messing up the tracking efforts.

Certainly a possibility, right?

Of course.

But, what these two clowns didn’t know is that we’ve been tracking the ad through a very scientific tool we have.

So, we knew all along how well the ad really did.

We knew how much it cost him to get the phone to ring from that ad.

We knew the cost per acquisition of a new tenant on that ad.

And guess what, the ad WAS a complete waste of money. His cost per acquisition was well over $500 for that one book alone.

Now, that’s painful. But not nearly as painful as not knowing or finding out five years later when you’ve wasted far more money on a lousy marketing effort.

I’ve put together a special video for you that shows you the tool we use to track your self storage marketing efforts. It’s free to you and you can find it here:

I hope you learn from the video. It’s not entertaining but you’ll see a tool in action that can help you become much more profitable next month, next year and in your bright future.

Enjoy,

Derek M. Naylor
President
Storage Marketing Solutions
800.941.4805

Wow!  Long time, no post for me.

Sorry about that, we’ve had our heads down working hard on new strategies and technology for our clients over the past few months.  I realize that’s a lousy excuse for not posting, but it’s the truth and that’s what we’re about around here.

One of the things we’ve been working on is an extremly robust and powerful Internet marketing program.

It’s no secret that the Internet is fastly becoming a major source of new tenants for self storage operators.  Those who utilize the Internet properly see 25%-35% of their new tenants generated from their efforts.  Not surprising when you consider that 51% of consumers now turn to online search engines to find LOCAL products and services instead of the Yellow Pages.

One of the fastest growing segments of online users is…BABY BOOMERS!  Kids get it.  But now Baby Boomers are becoming extremely savvy on the Internet.

“Alright Derek, I get it.  The Internet is hot and I need to be on it.  Quit rambling and tell me how to become one of those operators who acquires 25%-35% of my new tenants from the Internet!!”, you say.

Okay, okay.

I’ve created 3 videos just for you.  They are informal, plain english guides to Internet marketing just for you, my loyal readers.

I’ve posted them on YouTube for you to watch in three sequential parts.  Go here to see them:

Part one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2brBTWPfRA

Part two: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xaDK-8jIR_U&feature=related

Part three: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zacQCq-KrKo&feature=user

**Warning, if you’re looking for a hollywood production you won’t be happy with these videos.  They’re informal and educational.

**Warning #2, if you’re already familiar with the in’s and out’s of Internet marketing, parts one and two might put you to sleep.  Well, maybe just part one.

Now is the time to get good at Internet marketing.  Not next quarter, not next year…now.  If you’re a subscriber to this blog, you’re already a forward thinking operator so I’m sure you understand the urgency of this.

Let me know what you think.

I hope you find these videos extremely helpful and insightful.

As always, to higher occupancy and profits!

Derek Naylor | President | Storage Marketing Solutions | 800.941.4805

P.S. I’ll be posting more and more videos in the future on a variety of self storage marketing subjects.  You’ll be the first to know as they’re released.  If you have a particular topic you’d like discussed, let us know in the “comments” section.