Basic Information

#1. Can you mystery shop our competitor?
PhoneSmart will mystery shop for competitor prices or to measure their selling skills. However, we must follow telephone recording laws that can vary by state. A majority of the states are a one-party notification state and only require that one party on the phone be aware of recording the call. In these states we can provide a recorded conversation and written report. There are a few states in which two-party notification is required. In the case of shopping a competitor, it is unlikely that they will consent to us recording them. PhoneSmart can still call and assess their sales skills and provide a list of prices.

#2. What is the Role Play Helpline?
PhoneSmart’s Role Play Helpline is exclusive to PhoneSmart and the self storage industry. Our inbound call center has taken over 900,000 self storage phone calls; our staff is a seasoned sales force and knows the ins and outs of selling self storage. The Role Play Helpline is designed to give your staff one-on-one training. They can call our sales reps and role play various scenarios and ask specific questions. Our reps will teach them valuable sales techniques such as: price stalls, overcoming objections, building value, gaining commitment, and closing the sale. The great thing about our Role Play Helpline is that your staff can call us in the down time, when it’s convenient for them.

#3. How do I start your mystery shopping program?
The best way to begin is to try us out. PhoneSmart offers 2 Introductory shops to any new client. These 2 shops are designed to let you see how PhoneSmart fits with your company. Once you’ve received the results you’ll be able to benchmark where you’re starting from. We can then begin monthly mystery shopping your facilities or employees. Using your monthly shops as a training tool is key in making any mystery shopping program work. PhoneSmart offers a completely customizable evaluation form and is here to help your staff improve.

#4. Can I change the evaluation form used to evaluate my calls?
Yes. PhoneSmart’s offers a standard evaluation form; however, any client is welcome to customize any part of the form to better fit their company’s needs. Many of our clients change the points to better reflect their goals and some of them even change the questions on the form. PhoneSmart is the most flexible secret shopping company available and we take great pride in our reputation as such.

#5. What is secret shopping?
Secret Shopping can be both a training and monitoring tool to measure your staff’s sales performance. PhoneSmart makes a call to your store and, posing as a potential renter, asks for help with storage. We record the conversation and later send it to you on a CD or via email as an mp3. We also send a written evaluation of each call. The evaluation is meant to determine the strength and growth areas of individual employees as well as the team as a whole. Secret shopping is the perfect tool to know how your staff performs in real life situations.

#6. What services does PhoneSmart offer?
PhoneSmart is really a complete sales solution. We offer services in training, sales, lead development and lead follow up. These are some of the services available at PhoneSmart:
Inbound Call Center- let your calls roll over to us and we’ll rent storage for you.
Mystery Shopping
Lead Generation
Sales Training Course
Role Play Helpline
Lead Follow-up

#7. How long has PhoneSmart been in business?
PhoneSmart celebrated its 6th Anniversary in December, 2006. PhoneSmart began as an inbound call center and has blossomed into a respected sales force in the self storage industry.

#8. Does PhoneSmart have a blog online?
PhoneSmart submits three blogs every business day. You can read our blogs at:
www.selfstorageblog.com and www.totalqualityassuranceservice.com (view the Quality Assurance and Property Management categories). If you think you have an interesting entry for one of our blog sites email is to us. We’d love to include clients and fans on our blog.

#9. How many mystery shops do you make each month?
We currently evaluate over 350 calls a month and our clients love us so much that they add new stores or tell their friends about us. Secret Shopping is a great way to assess the quality of your business. PhoneSmart’s mystery shopping program has clients both nationally and internationally and we’ll only keep growing.

#10. Do you evaluate your own call center employees?
Yes. PhoneSmart randomly evaluates 4 phone calls per month for each call center representative. We pick 2 calls in which the caller was inquiring about storage and we also evaluate 2 calls in which the caller had a concern other than storage. This allows us to maintain a high standard in our sales techniques and also measure our customer service to those callers who aren’t looking for storage.

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Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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