A lot of customers come to SpareFoot to research storage facilities in their area - check the prices, amenities, locations, and read reviews. Some of these customers aren't at a point in their storage search where it makes sense to reserve a unit. SpareFoot has options for them to make inquiries instead of full-fledged reservations.
Origins
This article explains the different ways that SpareFoot lets customers inquire about facilities. You should take a look at the article to get the full scoop, but the two ways are:
- On the phone with an agent
- Get map & hours on SpareFoot.com
Value
Inquiries add lots of value for storage-seeking customers as well as for facility operators. Here are the big wins:
Better quality of full-fledged reservations
- Customers don't feel pressured to reserve a unit if they're still browsing facilities or their storage rental timeline isn't yet finalized.
- Facilities don't need to hold a unit open for customers with low rental intent.
- A greater percentage of the customers who pull the trigger and do reserve units wind up renting.
Stop these customers from renting at another facility
- We send these customers periodic updates reminding and incentivizing them to reserve a unit with you.
Notifications from SpareFoot about Inquiries
In your MySpareFoot.com Account
There's a tab in the Customers area of your account dedicated specifically to these types of customers:
We'll send you an email every day letting you know which customers have inquired about your facility on SpareFoot. You can disable these notifications in your email preferences.
Contacting Inquiries
As you can see above, the only information that's shared about inquiring customers is their name and the date and time at which they inquired. You can't see contact information, like phone number and email address, so it's not possible to call them or follow-up about their interest in your property.
We explicitly promise these customers that we will not sell, share, or use their information in any way. That's part of the reason inquiries are so successful - these folks like that they won't be contacted. While it's a shame that we can't make these inquiries more actionable by sending you contact information for these customers, fear not! Inquiries are still a very successful tool for getting new tenants into your front door.
Billing for Inquiries
SpareFoot only bills for customers who find your facility on SpareFoot and then ultimately move in. Inquiries are no different - they'll only appear on your bill after they're confirmed as a rent-paying tenant.
If the customer makes an online reservation
After customers inquire about your facility, we follow-up with them and encourage them to head back to SpareFoot and reserve a unit when they're ready. When this happens, you'll be notified by SpareFoot that you have a new customer from us, just like any other reservation.
Additionally, the customer's name will move from the Inquiries tab of MySpareFoot into the Reservations tab, where you'll see their full contact information and reserved unit.
If the customer doesn't make an online reservation
You'll see these tenants on your monthly billing statement. They're differentiated from the other customers on your statement with the label "offline reservation."
To keep the reconciliation process quick and uncluttered, SpareFoot only adds offline reservations onto your statement if your statement is Auto-Reconciled because we're integrated with your management software and we can confirm that they've actually moved into your facility.