Operator math, campaign insights, and hard-won lessons from running self-storage facilities and filling them with paid ads.
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Public Storage and Extra Space spend $250M+ a year on digital. You can't outbid them. But Google's local map weights proximity and reviews over brand size, and that's a fight you can actually win.
Most storage demand comes from four life events: not enough space at home, decluttering, a move, and a change in household size. If your marketing speaks to those moments instead of 'units available,' you catch the renter at the decision.
Storage demand follows the moving season: it builds in spring, peaks in summer, and cools in winter. If you spend the same on marketing every month, you're overpaying in the slow season and underfunded when the renters actually show up.
Every unit you lose to delinquency is a unit you have to refill, against the same competition, at the same cost. Operators treat collections and marketing as separate jobs. They're the same fight: keeping units full and revenue flowing.
The photos on your Google profile are doing more sales work than your website. Renters decide between three pins partly on what your place looks like. Blurry, outdated, or missing photos hand the click to the facility down the road.
Raising rates is nerve-wracking. Here's how I pushed through a 12% increase across 340 units without tanking occupancy.