Data: Who Owns Yours?
By Travis Morrow, National Self Storage Management Inc.
AZSA President
Recently I came across a back issue of the SSA’s Globe magazine from July of 2013. The focus of that month was Software and Storage. In it, self-storage technology providers from across the industry cited the importance of words such as data, integration, choice, and innovation. One property management software provider was quoted as follows:
“To find the vendor with the best service and rates, software programs should offer owners a choice in these and other services, like credit card billing and tenant insurance. More owners demand that their software offers a choice in these providers. More owners enable these integrations and link their management software. For example: reservations and inquiries from websites, kiosk and listing service funnel directly into the management software and allow managers to convert leads to rentals.”
This quote accurately depicts the cooperative environment that existed between self-storage operators and the vendors that serviced the industry in 2013. Vendors were supportive of offering operators freedom of choice in selecting which products they used to operate their facilities. Unfortunately, in the world of Property Management Software (PMS), I’m starting to see a shift away from this supportive thinking, because in 2016, Data has become King, and the PMS companies are trying to dictate to the industry how we use it.
Every day your facilities collect and use large amounts of data: move-in data, tenant information, pricing, occupancy, payment information, office hours and unit amenities, just to name a few. This data lives within your PMS. In the modern world, the data you collect becomes more and more essential to running your business. One would think that you should be able to use, share, and manipulate your data in any way you’d like in order to better run your facilities. I’m here you tell you that in many instances, this just is not the case, and the spirit of cooperation and integration is no more.
The issue at hand has to do with software companies’ willingness to provide access to your data through Application Programming Interfaces (API). Think of an API as a virtual wire that securely connects your data, that lives within a PMS, to other applications of your choosing, to use and display as you see fit. Data from either side can travel back and forth along the “wire” and be viewable and updated in real time. A common use of the API in the industry today is with storage directory websites where your pricing and unit information are displayed on the website of a directory to create new leads for your property, but this is the only the beginning of what can be done with a truly open API.
Every PMS today offers some level of API access to their customers. The quality of their API “wires” varies, but the access is there. The developing problem is that even though the PMS companies often claim to offer you full access to your data, in reality they are becoming restrictive as to who YOU can share YOUR data with. I have witnessed first-hand that often you cannot use your data as you see fit. If I choose a vendor or programmer that I wish to do business with for some other function, the PMS can and does restrict their access to the point where I’m unable to work in any meaningful way with my vendor of choice.
To be clear, the “wire” to carry your data out of your PMS does exist, but the PMS providers are starting to tell operators who they can plug into on the other end. Hence, our data is being metered out at the discretion of our management software vendors. They are determining what we can and cannot do with OUR data. In addition to restricting our use of our data, this restriction is stunting NEW innovation in the industry.
The Arizona Self-Storage Association exists to serve and educate the owner/operators in our state, and I felt that this topic was of great enough importance that I wanted to bring it to your attention. The word is starting to spread about this situation and the topic will be covered by other publications in much greater detail than I can provide in my little corner here Behind Closed Doors. Please educate yourself and make sure that your data, and what you choose to do with it, remains your choice. Work with those companies that choose to work for the self-storage industry, and not against us.
Travis Morrow in Vice President of National Self Storage Management, Inc. and its Designated Arizona Real Estate Broker. He is also President of AZSA and a Director of the SSA.
Source: Behind Closed Doors, AZSA Newsletter Archives