We are currently looking at proposals for a web site for our 450 units.A few of our locally owned competitors have sites, but none have the capability to accept payments or reservations on line.Can anyone give us feedback as to the return versus the cost involved for initial cost and annual upkeep?
Any comments would be appreciated.
Billsay

eMove has the features that you ask.

https://storageaffiliate.emove.com/a...e/sign_in.aspx

I created our website - we have the ability to do on-line payments. The on-line payment option is powered through PayPal - the cost to us for this service is only slightly higher then our normal credit card service. We do between 10 and 20% or our rent payments through our on-line service. I wouldn't trade it for anything!!!

Our website costs us about $75.00/yr for hosting through MocaHost and they are great.
I don't have a lot of web experience, but I do like to experiment a bit.

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Wayne
All American Self Storage
Palmdale, CA.
webmaster@all-americanselfstorage.com

We own a Karate School and placed an ad on Craigslist to build us a site in exchange of free Karate lessons. We have a really nice site for free and the guy who designed it didn't take us up on the classes. How ever if you let someone else build your site, make sure they show you how to change things on it. Ours didn't and we don't know enough about web pages to change things but i am trying to learn. Just a thought. We are also looking to do payments online with our site , as soon as we figure it out

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Proud Karate Mom

I switched to SiteLink Web about 3 months ago, and the web payment gateway was one of the top reasons on the list for switching.

The conversion took about a day in clock time for SMD to import all of my customer data into SiteLink web. Putting the payment button on my website to accept payments took about a half hour.

First customer made a payment via the website approximately 3 days after it went active.

Just a couple of other thoughts that popped into my head:

How have we publicized web payments? It's on our voicemail message, there is a sign posted at our office (between the office door and our Insomniac kiosk), and customers who get a SiteLink e-mail notification receive a reminder in the message body as well. The "Pay Now" button is on the front page of our website.

Side note there - SiteLink Web's e-mail billing notification is light years ahead of the e-mail function in the standalone product. SiteLink Web attaches a full invoice in .RTF format to the e-mail message, where the standalone product basically sends out the short form/postcard invoice in text format.

I can't classify the users who pay over the web into any one group. Certainly out-of-town tenants like the service. I like it because it reduces the number of tenants who call to make a credit card payment by phone...this makes it self-serve. We also offer autobill service, the aforementioned Insomniac kiosk, and the old standbys of mailing or dropping a payment in the drop box.

It sounds like some facilities have also had success with PayPal and similar payment methods. What was compelling for me with the web interface built into the tenant management system (SiteLink isn't the only software that has such an interface) is that it can quote the customer what they actually owe right now (I know it's no shock that some tenants don't pay on time, and therefore have additional fees), and when they make the payment, the tenant management system is updated instantly (and by extension, so is the gate system, and so on).

I also consolidated my merchant accounts under the gateway included with SiteLink Web, so now all credit card payments, whether they be online, over-the-counter, or through the kiosk, run through a single merchant account. Helps a little bit with the monthly minimum fees.

I'm not convinced -- yes they have a fantastic product, but, call me old fashioned, I am not comfortable with my customer information anywhere but in my office.

They probably have outstanding security, but then so did everyone else that "lost" customer data. I don't want to have the expense of trying to recover from a data loss suck as that.

That is why I chose to use PayPal - there is no link to my customer information. Customers can not look up any information all they can do is send me money. If they don't know their balance they give me a call.

At first some of our customers thought it was a pain not being able to look up their account information, but when the security was explained to them they love it.

As I stated earlier I have between 10 and 20% paying each month (out of 500 tenants!) I have another 5 to 10% with CC authorization on file. I also have a lot that just like to come in a chat.

That is just my .02 for now (stepping off the soap box to applause)

everyone have a great weekend and rent 100 units (if you have them!)

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Wayne
All American Self Storage
Palmdale, CA.
webmaster@all-americanselfstorage.com

I agree. In SiteLink WEB editons case the data is on your PC and on the server.

Given some of the disasters I see with our clients somedays having the data at least on an external server can be a godsend.

I know a few have hangups with the data being off site, but security of that data is far higher than at any Self Storage site.

WEB payments are a service for customers. We should do what we can to ensure its easy for them to pay. After all they use the WEB every day to book tickets, pay bills etc and Self Storage should be no different.

Everyone need to look at all the options available and use the system that they are most comfortable with.

Some of you use SiteLink, I use PayPal and others will use what best fits there system.

The important thing is to make sure you have as many payment options as possible to make it easy for your tenants to pay. The easier it is to pay the longer they may stay.

A website is a must these days and on that website you need to have the option to pay and an area to request more information. This will bring more web savvy people to your location -- from my experience these people pay on time more often (not sure why, but it works for me)

Anyway that's just my .02

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Wayne
All American Self Storage
Palmdale, CA.
webmaster@all-americanselfstorage.com

If gas prices keep going up you might have to put in say 5c worth!

$1.75 per litre here now. Thats $6.56 a US Gallon!