Top Habits for Success in Self-Storage Businesses


Every successful person in business develops a set of habits after many years of trying different things. They know what works for them and what doesn’t. In this guide, I want to share some of my own habits that help me achieve success in self-storage every day. Running a successful business and still having time for yourself, your family, and other interests can be a tough balancing act. My approach helps me maintain that balance.

Time and Activity Inventory

The first step you should take to build good habits for becoming one of the many successful self-storage investors is to take a full inventory of your time and activity. No matter what the task, there is always a better way, or a workaround, to help you eliminate any time-wasting throughout your day. To find time-wasters, you need to have a thorough account of your daily time and activities. Whether they are work-related or not, you need to track your time.

To get an accurate depiction of where your time is going, track it for at least thirty days in fifteen-minute increments. You can use some computer-based apps to track, but the best way to do this is to use an old-fashioned pen and paper. You should track even the smallest items that you use every day, such as how much time you spend on emails or talking on the phone. Make sure you include both personal and work time to get the most accurate picture of your time.

Once you have a thirty-day time tracking sheet, you will be able to see how much of your time is going to tasks that other people could be doing for you or how much time you are wasting on busy work. You should calculate your productive time that will move your self-storage business forward.

Steps to Forming Good Habits

Prioritize Free Days

This part of the process is all about prioritizing your time to focus on the things that truly matter to you. For success in self-storage, or in anything, you need to be happy, healthy, and satisfied. Part of the beauty of being an entrepreneur is that you have freedom. Many people get involved in self-storage investing because they want flexibility and a passive income. Now is your chance to take advantage of that freedom and spend time doing the things you love with the people you love.

Calculation

The first habit for success in self-storage, and any entrepreneurial venture, is to schedule your free time just like you would a meeting. If your goal is to have your weekends free every week to watch your kid’s sports games, then schedule that time in your calendar.

For some people, this prioritizing might be shutting off your work-life at 5:00 PM on the dot. Once you start scheduling this free time in your calendar, it turns into something you must do, which is the ultimate goal. Once you start scheduling weekends off, then you might be able to start taking Friday afternoons off as well.

You should also schedule vacation time in the same manner. Plan ahead so you can spend that extra day or two on the beach with your family.

Schedule Focus Days

The next step in building habits for success is to schedule focus days and productive time. These time slots should be filled only with things that will move your business forward. You should have a good idea of what will be the most productive projects for your business from your time and activity log. For many business owners, these focus days should be geared toward shutting everything off to minimize distractions and generating creative ideas and solutions to further your business.

If you have an issue you know needs a creative solution, focus days are your time to come up with a solution. This time should also be spent taking a look at current business plans and enacting ways to execute them. Productive time slots might also be a good time for you to figure out who you will hire next to take over some of the time-wasters you discovered from your time and activity log.

Utilize Buffer Days

Buffer time slots are the “leftovers” from the rest of your week. These should be used for completing administrative tasks that do not necessarily further your business but that must be done to maintain your current business strategy. This might be replying to important emails and returning phone calls that might lead to more sales. Administrative tasks should not be the most important thing on your list since they are someone else’s time priority for you. Just because you can do something very well does not make it important. It might be time to delegate that task to someone else.

Execute

Now that you have a solid plan in place for building top habits into your life, you need to execute it. Part of the execution phase means you should be sticking to your schedule no matter what. Of course, things happen from time to time, but staying focused on your intended schedule is of the utmost importance.

To keep you focused, you should eliminate time-wasters. You should only touch something once. For example, if you begin to check your email and read halfway through, then move to something else, you are not using your time effectively. If you plan to do something, make sure it is completed in its entirety.

Another way to execute this strategy is to make deadlines and urgency tags for the important and unimportant items in your business.

Summary

Building good habits for success in self-storage can be accomplished by prioritizing personal days, scheduling focus days, and utilizing buffer time. You should be able to identify this time by completing a time and activity log. Once you have these mapped out, you need to execute your time effectively. In this guide, I have given you my ultimate game plan for forming the top habits for success.

For more advice on how to ensure your self-storage business is a success, check out our FREE Blueprint that will provide you with all the information and guidance you need!