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How to Manage a Moving Company

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How to Manage a Moving Company

A moving company arranges for the transportation of goods, utilizes for-hire carriers to provide actual track transportation, helps people move their goods from one place to another, and offers services like loading and unpacking. Chances are, you already know all of this because you may have started your own moving company. But do you know how to manage one?

Managing a moving company is a complex task. It demands attention to detail, careful planning, organization, and effort. Here are some key pointers when it comes to managing your business:

  • Recruit and Train Competent Staff
  • Cultivate Sustainable Processes 
  • Invest in Appropriate Equipment
  • Prioritize Customer Service
  • Execute Efficient Marketing Strategies
  • Be Up to Date

You need plans and procedures for managing a moving company. Read on for the details on how to manage a moving company.

Recruit and Train Competent Staff

Employees are the backbone of your company. You need to hire personnel who are appropriate for the job. 

Due to the physical nature of the job, your staff must be in good physical strength to meet the demands.

Your employees will be responsible for the care of your client’s items. Employees need to be mindful of taking care of important items. You’ll want a staff that you know you can trust to do the job efficiently but carefully.

Since they will interact with clients, your staff should have good people skills. They should be friendly, courteous, and professional.

Cultivate Sustainable Processes

An established moving workflow and processes for pickups and deliveries will make for smoother, more efficient jobs.

Training all of your staff to know and fully understand these processes is a big part of successfully managing a moving company.

No one likes to be overworked, so make sure you are managing the business’s calendar appropriately by not taking on more jobs than your staff is capable of handling. If managing a calendar is something you struggle with, there are softwares available to make that part of managing your company easier. Supermove has an excellent, user-friendly software for movers like Supermove..

Prioritize Customer Service

Train your staff to prioritize customer service and provide high-quality service.

Handling inquiries of customers must be at the top of your list, as it helps your company’s image. Ensure your team is always polite and respectful to your customers and address any concerns or complaints promptly and professionally.

Managing Business Growth through Marketing 

Everyone wants their business to continually grow and succeed. Managing your business growth through marketing is an important part of making sure your business succeeds. 

Have a strong online presence. You can create an optimized website that is easy to navigate, informative, and visually appealing and use social media to advertise your business.

Utilizing online advertising, such as Google or Facebook Ads, isn’t the only way to manage your business growth.

  • Offer referral discounts and loyalty rewards
  • Create valuable content (blog posts, videos, or infographics about helpful tips and advice for moving)
  • Partner with other businesses (real estate agents, storage companies, home renovation businesses)
  • Attend local events (trade shows, fairs, or community events)

Be Up-to-Date

Be competitive in the evolving moving industry, and keep your moving company up to date by:

  • Using technology to streamline your operations
  • Train your employees on the latest techniques, equipment, and safety procedures
  • Monitor customer feedback to identify areas for improvement and improve your company image
  • Update equipment as needed
  • Offer new services (packing, storage, cleaning) to bring more value to clients
  • Implement eco-friendly and sustainability practices (recycled packaging or electric moving vehicles)
  • Follow laws and regulations related to your service and moving industry.

Successfully Manage Your Moving Company

A successful moving company is more than a fleet of vans and trucks. One of the best ways to make managing your moving company easier is by using software built specifically for moving companies. Management incorporates all aspects of your company, from recruitment and training to having sustainable processes and prioritizing customer service. 

Utilizing the tips provided in this article will put your business on the right path to becoming one of the top rated moving companies.

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Safely Moving Your Business During COVID

COVID-19 has changed the way we dine, shop, socialize; it’s even changed the way we move. Moving your business is stressful under the best circumstances. Add in a global pandemic, social distancing, and an ever-changing list of public health guidelines, and the situation can quickly start to feel unmanageable.

But organizing a business move during COVID-19 isn’t impossible. Things may take more planning and involve smaller teams, but at the end of the day, you will have executed a safe and efficient business move.

5 Tips for Relocating Your Business During COVID-19

If you’re reading this guide to COVID-19 business moves, chances are you are either in the midst of pandemic relocation planning or you’re about the start. To make things easier and less anxiety-ridden for you, we’ve compiled these tips to make your business move safe, secure, and efficient. Let’s get to it:

1. Limit the Personnel Involved. This one may seem like a no-brainer but moving is usually a team sport and an “all hands on deck” activity. Pre-COVID-19, office moves usually involved as many people as possible to make packing, loading and unloading, and set-up quick and painless. But during a pandemic, the more people involved in one activity, the higher the risk of infection or illness. By selecting a small moving team, you can easily test each member before the move and track everyone’s health and COVID-19 status throughout the process. If one member of the moving team does get sick, contact tracing and quarantine procedures become more manageable, and you can avoid quarantining your entire staff.

2. Make Sure You Partner with a Moving Company With COVID-19-Specific Procedures. While we’re all trying to adjust to this new normal, some moving companies have already implemented policies to help their clients move safely and efficiently within this new public health environment. Look for vendors that have COVID-19 information on their websites. If you have your heart set on a company that doesn’t offer information on their COVID-19 protocols, make sure you ask about what operational changes they have made to comply with social distancing regulations and other health and safety guidelines. While there are things you can do on your own to enhance the safety of your corporate move, it’s always best to have experts with you that know what they are doing and that have experience in coordinating COVID-19-compliant relocations.

3. Use Storage Units to Lighten Your Moving Load: One of the changes that COVID-19 has brought to the workplace is fewer people in the office at a time. That means you need less furniture and supplies. Instead of moving everything from your old space into your new office site, you may want to consider renting a storage unit to house items that you don’t need immediately. By limiting the number of items that need to be unloaded in your new space, you can reduce moving personnel and potentially decrease the risk of COVID-19 spread. Additionally, by storing unused items, you create more open office space, which means greater opportunities for social distancing.

4. Sanitation is Everything. For many of us, hand sanitizer, masks, and other personal protection equipment (PPE) have become daily staples. Your office move is not the time to relax your reliance on Purell and surgical masks. Throughout your move, make sure that all personnel involved in packing, loading and unloading, and new office set-up are using hand sanitizer and other cleaning supplies regularly. Vaccinated or not, everyone should wear a mask; shared surfaces should be cleaned and sanitized regularly. A pro tip is to give everyone in your moving crew a bottle of hand sanitizer with a built-in clip or rope so they can attach it to their pants or jacket and have it on them 24/7. With masks and gloves, it’s always a good idea to have multiple boxes of each on-hand at all times since these items tend to rip and tear easily during moves and periods of heavy exertion.

5. Make Sure Your New Space is COVID-19-Safe. Before you move everything into your new space, complete a walkthrough and identify ways to make your new office space COVID-19-compliant for your employees and guests. When setting up your new space, make sure to:

-Space desks or cubicles as far apart as you can to allow for proper social distancing. In situations where six feet of space between desks is not realistic, try installing partitions or plastic shields to make up for the lack of physical distance.

-Create PPE stations for your employees and guests. By creating easily accessible PPE stations (stocked with masks, gloves, and anti-bacterial gel or lotion), you provide ample opportunities for people to stay safe and protected.

-Ventilate your space as much as possible. Whether you open windows or find ways to optimize artificial airflow, ventilated spaces tend to be safer.

Moving your business during COVID-19 will look and feel different, but different isn’t always a bad thing. While you may not be able to amass a moving team of 50+ employees or crowd everyone onto a loading dock to unload trucks of supplies, with some planning, forethought, and a few modifications, moving your business during COVID-19 can be executed safely and efficiently.

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Davida Redmond is the leader of the Marketing team of Mobile Mini; the world’s leading provider of portable storage solutions committed to providing our customers with superior services and access to a high-quality and diverse fleet.