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Once in a while, we will get some rather bizarre calls from people and at other times some rather touching calls.  I just received a call from a lady who lives not too far from one of our client’s facilities. The manager at that self storage facility lives there on site. 

 The caller proceeded to tell me that she was aware that a bit over a month ago the manager at the storage facility had lost her orange pet cat and was distraught over the loss.  The cat apparently ran away.   The manager at our client’s storage facility even put up flyers stating that her cat was missing.  According to the caller I spoke with, the manager described the missing cat but had not placed a picture of the cat on the flyer.  The caller said the cat she found matched the exact description of the missing cat and wanted to let the manager know.  While the caller was not 100% certain it was the same cat, she still wanted to double check and make sure.  I was happy to transfer the caller to the manager’s voice mail. I know how attached one can become to their pets; I have several of my own. I hope this turns out to be the manager’s cat and thus a happy ending.

We wear many hats here in the call center and sometimes our “messenger” hat leaves a warm glow.

Written by Carmen Huff, PhoneSmart call center reservations specialist.

Thank you for visiting our blog.  We offer an insider view of the self storage industry and life in a call center.

We are PhoneSmart your off site sales force call center in Columbia, Missouri.

Your storage unit provider at 9265 Berger Rd, Columbia, MD 21046

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Where in the world is your self storage located? Phone-Smart knows! If you live in Southeastern US, there are storage facilities in; Yellville, Arkansas Farmerville, Louisiana Soddy Daisy, Tennessee Goose Creek, South Carolina Peachtree City, Georgia Do you live in the Southwest?

You may have storage in: Chowchilla, California Caliente, Nevada Spanish Fork, Utah Tombstone, Arizona Tucumcari, New Mexico Making a move to the Northeast? You can find storage in: Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania Caribou, Maine Coshocton, Ohio Prudenville, Michigan Scotland Neck, North Carolina Need to store in the Northwest? You'll find storage in: Okanogan, Washington Shady Cove, Oregon Shoshone, Idaho Lame Deer, Montana Walhalla, North Dakota. Wherever you go, there’s a self storage business to help! It's big business even in the smallest towns!

Written by Laurie Cox PhoneSmart Outbound projects manager and business blog writer. Thank you for visiting our self storage blog, where we explore self storage trends, new and old ideas and sometimes a funny story. We are PhoneSmart your off site sales force call center in Columbia, Missouri. Your local self storage unit provider in 15601 FM 1325 Austin, TX. 78728 Total Quality Assurance Services has management coaching services.

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Welcome to the PhoneSmart call center blog an insider diary of the self storage industry. Blog Submitted by Laurie Cox PhoneSmart Call Center outbound projects manager and business blog writer.

Managers and call centers in the storage business talk to a lot of people over the phone. One of the best sales techniques when speaking to a potential renter is to establish some sort of rapport with the caller. Here are some ideas to help you in establishing rapport:If you are talking to a teacher try this: “Our facility definitely makes the grade!” Someone in the Military: “We outrank all of our competition!” A Pharmaceutical Representative: “Our prices are easy to swallow!” A Student: “We major in storage, and have a textbook facility!” Someone wanting to Park an RV: “We’re the most secure Camp sight in Town!” Someone in the process of selling a home: “Great! We rent to people looking to buy one all the time!” A business owner: “There’s no business like stow business!” (Stow-Away could really use that one)! Storing a Motorcycle: “We are proud members of the Freedom of The Off-Road Riders!” Storing a trailer: “You’ll get hitched on us!” Think of the type of storage users out there and come up with a few on your own.

A little smile in your voice always makes a good impression over the phone. PhoneSmart, your offsite sales force call center located in Columbia, Missouri. Your local self storage unit provider in 1723 E. Florida, Springfield, MO. 65803 Total Quality Assurance Services has quality written all over it.

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When I am taking calls in the evening at the PhoneSmart call center I am often speaking with a current tenant requesting information about a notice or bill received. In most cases I can listen to the complaint or question but am unable to offer much help other than transferring the caller to voice mail. This is not always a popular option as the caller may feel brushed off or perhaps they have already left a message and are feeling neglected because no one has returned the call.

We have a new company that we are answering for. This company does not have us send the caller to voice mail, but instead, we take the name and number and unit number and type out the message to send in the same manner as a hot lead is sent. Many of these callers seem to be more soothed and reassured by the fact that I am listening to the question or complaint and they can hear me typing as we speak. Perhaps more companies could follow suit.

From my experience in customer service I have learned that an unhappy customer can be soothed if they believe that someone is taking the time to acknowledge the problem and take some sort of action on their behalf. I think that all of us would happy to type out a simple message for the caller if it will help improve customer relations with their self storage facility. This would be a powerful sales technique as well because that person could become a powerful ad agent for the facility.

One happy customer can lead to a sales increase.

Written by Kay Johnson PhoneSmart call center blog editor. Thank you for visiting our blog we offer an insider view of the self storage industry. We are PhoneSmart your off site sale force call center in Columbia, Missouria href=” http://Illinois-Aurora-60540-self-storage.storage-mart.net ” target=”_blank”>Your local self storage unit provider in 819 N. Eola Rd. Aurora, IL. 60504

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Welcome to the self storage blog, our diary of self storage trends.

Why do we often say, “How may I help you?” when we answer the phone at our self storage properties? Maybe we should say something else?

I asked our team at PhoneSmart to come up with some different ways of greeting callers. Here are some of the things we came up with. Tell me if you like any of them.

“What storage questions may I answer for you today?”

“How may I assist you with storage today?”

“Would you like to take advantage of our ______ special today?”

Thank you for calling… This is ____, Would you like to hear about our specials today?

This is ____ Let me help you plan your storage reservation today.

“Thanks you for calling _____________ where we offer a clean, secure, and friendly environment.”

Thanks for calling _____, the answer to your storage needs. What may I help you with?

_(store name)_ My name is ____ and I’d love to help meet your storage needs

StorageMart, this is ____.are you needing to rent a storage unit today?

StorageMart, this is —I am happy to help you with your storage needs.

What storage needs can I help with?

…let’s get you a unit reserved.

Hi, this is ____ … How can I service your storage needs?

Hi, this is ____… your storage specialist, how can I be of help?

Hi this is ___Thank You for calling Storage-Mart, Do you need storage?

Hi this is ____Thank You for calling Storage-Mart, are you a current tenant or do you need storage?

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Today’s self storage blog comes from one of our newer sales reps Wendy Amy. Our self storage diary is a great place to share…

Some Of The Most Bizzare and Dumbest Questions!

Here are the crazy things people say when asking about storage.

1. “Can I have the number to the storage place that is next door?”

2. “If I don’t pay my bill what will happen?”

3. “Can I run my business out of a unit?”

4. “Can I store my things and when my bill becomes delinquent come and get what I want before you auction my things”.

5. ” I’m being evicted and need storage today, can I pay when I get paid next week and still move in today?”

6. “I just got out of jail and I need to get out of the state, can I store my stuff there I need it ASAP!”

7. ” I haven’t paid my bill in almost two months but I’m going on vacation and I need to get my suitcases out. Can I have a code to get through the gate, my code is saying DENIED on the key pad.”

8. “I need to get a storage unit for today but first I need to know how long before not paying my bill will they auction my things?”

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Even though PhoneSmart has operated as a self storage insider for several years, you may not be familiar with the company’s background.

You can add this to your self storage diary entries.

Although PhoneSmart has only been in operation since December of 2000, its founders have been in the property management and self-storage business since 1974.

PhoneSmart is a subsidiary of Warburg-StorageMart, a 300 million dollar company with over 40 self-storage facilities in 7 states. StorageMart is operated by the Burnam family. Many people have met Mike and Cris Burnam over the years at self-storage conventions and expos.

Prior to StorageMart, the Burnams had built their Storage Trust business into a 250 facility REIT.

After realizing what the potential impact could be from gaining one or two additional rentals per month at 250 properties, Storage Trust decided to capture its missed calls.

Storage Trust developed call center technologies and systems for an outside call center provider that took calls for all of its stores. Storage Trust spent about $500,000 in development and service fees over a one year period in which more than 60,000 calls went into the call center.

It was a shock to see that the average facility was missing about 20 rental inquiries per month. The end results: additional rentals and an increase in the bottom line were very impressive. Although it became apparent quite quickly that the typical call center model was not what was required.

So plans were drawn up to bring the technology and experience in-house and establish a Storage Trust call center. By handling the call center internally, Storage Trust felt it could control costs, significantly increase the number of net rentals and be able to direct the technology and development.

Before the in-house call center could become a reality, another storage company bought out Storage Trust. However, there were about 15 facilities in the package that did not fit into the takeover plan, so the Burnams bought them back and started all over again as StorageMart.

One of the first things that StorageMart did was to hire the former IT chief from Storage Trust, Monte Ellis. He took their plan for a call center and developed it into PhoneSmart.

In December of 2000, Tron Jordheim was brought on board to run the call center. Tron came from a sales and customer service background in the bottled water and pet care industries. He had been the GM for one of the top Culligan bottled water franchises in the nation.
StorageMart has invested well over $1,000,000 to recreate and improve upon the call center systems that Storage Trust had developed a few years earlier.

In December of 2000, PhoneSmart began taking calls for 15 StorageMart stores. By December of 2002, PhoneSmart was answering phones for over 40 client companies and 300 stores.

In December of 2002, PhoneSmart undertook two projects to assure great performance and service over the long term.

PhoneSmart totally rebuilt its call center, tripling the number of sales rep stations. It added sound proof walls and ceilings to give a great sound to every phone call. It re-wired the entire portion of the building to protect the phone center’s power supply and to allow for back-up power in case of catastrophe.

PhoneSmart also established an off-site back-up phone center, so that it can continue seamless operations in the event of telephone line interruptions at the local Switching stations or T-1 lines and in case disaster ever struck the main phone center.

So when you deal with PhoneSmart, you are dealing with a well capitalized company lead by leaders in property management, who have invested huge dollars and resources to create an effective and efficient off-site sales center for you.

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Roasted and toasted.

PhoneSmart employees and friends had a great time on December 16th at the PhoneSmart 5th anniversary party. As a part of the fun, there was a roast of PhoneSmart director Tron Jordheim. People came up with some very funny material and every one had some great belly laughs. Then we pulled out the karaoke machine and all of our talented people had a chance to belt out some tunes.

We did this as a fund raiser for the Rainbow House, a shelter and service provider for children of families in crisis. We raised over $800.00 for them. Not too bad.

We don’t have much time to rest on our laurels. Yes, we’ve built a good company and we have developed a lot of great sales reps. But we live in a fast paced world where things develop and change quickly. What will PhoneSmart be like in another five years? What will we be doing? How will we be doing it? It will be interesting to find out.

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Welcome to the self storage blog.

The Turning

Kay Johnson

The beautiful maple trees in our town are dropping the burnt orange and deep crimson velvet jewels that graced them just a few short days ago. Cold winds and cold rains have gathered them to the lap of Mother Earth and spindly stark branches are showing through. Storage facilities across the country are filling up. Their tenants have put their summer dreams and memories to sleep until the warm winds blow again.

Here at PhoneSmart we are keeping busy with special projects to help our customers with training through our Secret Shops and Evaluations. We are doing follow up calls for some stores and working leads from many sources to help our customer stores maintain income flow. There are so many projects to help our client stores increase their profits. This month PhoneSmart will celebrate a landmark 5-year anniversary.

Our representatives are planning for feasts of Thanksgiving and making plans our December Holy celebrations and gatherings of family. Some will be traveling and others hosting guests. In our community charitable organizations, houses of worship, schools are all participating in programs to share the bounty with those less fortunate.

There is a chill in the air but our hearts are warm. Soon we will be talking with store managers across the country through our “Manager Buddy Calls”. This has been a year of challenges for some of our “sister” facilities. There has been so much loss and human suffering. We are looking to the horizon of a new year with hope that there will be better news in the months ahead and that the recovery will be strong and complete.

As a nation we have rallied to the aid of our families and communities. Once again, we have shown that we are “One Nation”. There is no challenge that we cannot meet together.

Here in Missouri there will soon be colder days with frost and snow sparkling in the sun. On a clear, cold night when snow lies on the ground it reflects the ground lights back to the heavens and midnight is as bright as day. On those nights “all is calm, all is bright”. We gather our hopes and dreams; hopes for a year filled with Peace and dreams of the return of our loved ones fighting in foreign lands. We wish for peace but stand ready for any trouble that comes.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Kay

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I went to the dentist yesterday for a cleaning and a quick check up. I just let the hygienist and the dentist do their thing. I relaxed in my reclining chair and waited until they were all done. This is how it is supposed to be. I felt like I was in the hands of professionals and I felt good about it.

Isn’t this how the self storage experience is supposed to be for our clients? Shouldn’t they feel as if they are in the hands of professionals so they can let us handle the transaction and help them move in? Maybe we should think about ourselves as the storage doctors who are here to take away people’s moving and organizing pains. That’s not such a bad idea, is it?
bye for now, Tron

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