⚠️  This article applies to clients on the OneTime pricing model. If you are on the RentPercent pricing model, you do not have the option to bid. 

What is bidding?

Your bid amount determines the price you pay for each SpareFoot customer who moves into a unit. Additionally, your bid factors into where your facility ranks on our site. In total, there are five factors currently used to determine a facility’s rank in SpareFoot's search results. For more information about the other factors that are used to determine facility ranking, check out our help center article titled “How does SpareFoot rank/order facilities in search results?”.

Adjustments to facility bid can be made by using the Bidding Tool found in MySpareFoot. Only account administrators have the ability to change a facility’s bid.

Why change your bid?

The number of reservations SpareFoot can generate for a facility strongly depends on the rank in our search results. For example, a facility that ranks first will typically get more than four times as many bookings as a facility ranked seventh.

SpareFoot uses a complex algorithm to determine rank based on Move-In rate, Reservation Rate, facility location, and unit availability. The goal of this algorithm is to promote facilities based on their performance in order to best serve our customers. A facility that demonstrates strong quality factors may not need to bid in order to rank highly in our default search results.

However, the amount a facility is willing to pay for tenants is a factor — the higher the bid modifier, the better the facility will rank in search results. But note that when a facility’s distance or quality factors are lower or less relevant than local competition, it will generally be more expensive to bid to a higher rank.

How do I adjust my bid?

Step 1: Log into your MySpareFoot account at mysparefoot.com

Step 2: Click on the Bidding tab on the left-hand side of the page.

Step 3: Edit your bid

You can view a chart of possible bid modifiers and the rank that those adjustments would yield at the bottom of the page. You will only be able to select one bid modifier that will apply to both city and zip code searches.

Enter a new bid modifier in the box labeled "Update My Bid" and you’ll see the change to your facility’s rank by zip code and city. Click Update My Bid to save your changes and Note: You won’t be able to adjust your bid lower than the minimum that is set for your account.

If you would like to update bid rates for multiple facilities on your account at the same time, you can use our Bulk Bidding tool.

There are also many ways you can improve your rank factors just by optimizing your listing to show customers what makes your facility their best choice! Remember, a facility that performs strongly for the Move-In Rate, Reservation Rate, and unit availability factors included in our algorithm, may not need to bid in order to rank well. Be sure to check out our Help Center's Maximize Your Performance section for our recommended best practices.

Download bidding opportunities and metrics

You can access more data about your bidding opportunities and listing metrics by downloading a Bidding Opportunities Export.

At the bottom of the Bidding page, you will see buttons to export data for your entire account by either City or Zipcode. 

Keep in mind that you can only pick one bid per location which will apply to search results by both city and zip code. However, your placement in search results may vary depending on whether a customer searches by city or zip.

Click the button to either Download by Zip or Download by City. Once the file is ready, you will see a link to download a spreadsheet. This may take a few minutes depending on how many locations your account has. 

Tips for reading the Bidding Opportunities Export

Column C: Facility ID - The ID number we use to identify each facility. This is important to note if you are using our Bulk Bidding tool.

Column G: Facility physical occupancy - The occupancy rate at the facility. You will only see data in this column if your Facility Management Software is integrated with SpareFoot and sends occupancy information through the API. 

Location

Any column headers containing the word “location” refers to the city or zip code that each facility is located in. For example, if you are viewing the spreadsheet for city and one of your facilities is located in Austin TX, location refers to Austin. If another facility on your account is located in Denver CO, location for that facility refers to Denver.

• Column K: Distance from location - The number of miles your facility is from the center of the city or zip code it is located in. 
• Column P: Facilities in location - The number of facilities with an exact match for the city or zip code being searched. We include facilities within a 15 mile radius from the center of the city/zip, so facilities in neighboring areas may be included in search results.

Metrics that factor into our ranking algorithm

• Column L: Submit Rate is what we typically refer to as Reservation Rate - Reservations ÷ Listing Clicks
• Column M: Move-In Rate - Rentals ÷ Reservations

Bidding

• Column N: Rank - The facility’s current rank in search results by either city or zip code depending on which file you are looking at. 

• Column O: Facilities in search result - The total number of facilities that a customer will see when they search by either city or zip.

• Column Q: Bid - The current facility bid (not your minimum bid).

• Column R: Min bid - The minimum bid for that facility.

• Column S: Delta bid - The difference between the minimum bid and the current bid at that location. 

• Bidding Opportunities (starting with column T) - The bid modifier you would need to select in order to rank for each position in search results. A blank cell in any of the bid columns means that there is no bidding opportunity for that position.