How to Clean Business Success!
If you’ve already opened your cleaning business and bought your house cleaning insurance, you’ve taken a huge step forward and that deserves a big thumbs up. But now, you might be wondering how to make your business grow to become a success in the industry. Your potential clients have plenty of house cleaners to choose from, so you want to make your business stand out from the rest! Here we’ll look at a few tips to help your house cleaning business flourish.
- Offer Personalized Service and Fair Prices
Spend some time giving free estimates. This will help you see a potential client’s home to work out how much time it will take to clean. Don’t charge the same price for a large house and for a small apartment. Clients will go running to a cleaner they believe is giving them a fair deal. Sit with the client to find out what they want. According to surveys, customer experience with a company has a huge impact on how likely they are to be repeat customers, and that holds true for you, too. Sitting with your clients to understand what is important to them gives them this personalized service and shows that you care about them and their needs, allowing you to develop a pricing plan that is fair to them and worthwhile for you. And when you need to raise your prices? They’re more likely to understand.
- Manage Your Time Carefully
To be a success, you need to fill up your schedule. Working on your time management will benefit both you and the customer, as expectations are clear and match reality. Schedule your jobs in a way that allows you to fit more than one job in each day. Slots starting around 10am won’t leave you enough time for an afternoon customer as well. On the other hand, starting at 8am will allow you to finish by lunchtime and go to another customer afterwards–or even take some much needed time off. It also means that your customer won’t have to have their entire day blocked off. Always be on time and efficient to keep to your schedule and keep your customers satisfied.
- Find Your Niche
In a crowded market, it can be difficult to make a place for yourself. Spend some time looking online at reviews and social media to see what clients wants and what competitors are offering. Then, create a niche for yourself. Perhaps you guarantee all of your products will be environmentally friendly. You might be able to offer flexible scheduling, such as evening or weekend time slots. Perhaps you work more on marketing with a weekly newsletter or blog posts with free cleaning tips, introductions to your cleaning staff, and product reviews. Having a niche will give you a unique place in the market.
- Use Quality Products
Cheap products may save you money to begin with, but using more expensive quality products will help you attract a unique clientele that will benefit your business in the long-run. Using non-toxic and ecologically friendly products is better for the furniture and doesn’t leave any irritating fumes or smells around the home. These safe and healthy alternatives are better for both your cleaner and the client. Keep learning about new products through suppliers, from industry publications or from trade organizations to stay on top of your game.
- Treat Your Employees Well
Your employees are key to the success of your business. To offer a cleaning service that stands out, you need to attract the best and most professional cleaners. Some ways to encourage your employees to stay with you include:
- Spend time on training; show them how to clean windows, scrub a sink and more
- Don’t micromanage – show trust and respect once you’ve trained them
- Offer perks such as paid sick or vacation time to employees have shown their loyalty
- Provide bonuses for quality work
- Spend Time on Marketing
Don’t become complacent once you have a solid client base. You need to spend time on marketing to ensure you always have new clients. There are many ways to advertise your business to the right markets. These include:
- Networking – Networking may not cost money up-front, but it can lead to business opportunities immediately or down the line. Let people know what you do.
- Contact real estate agencies or home builders – Make contact with companies who might refer you to others. This gets you right out in front of the competition with a potential client before they are even in their home.
- Advertise around the community – This is a great way to find local jobs. Put up flyers, pay for ads in local brochures or magazines and get your name out at local community events. This will help you build brand recognition.
- Focus on the Business Aspect
Building a successful house cleaning business is not easy, in terms of the cleaning itself or the business aspect. Businesses need to be run professionally to be successful. For your house cleaning business to grow and expand, you need to take care of much more than just cleaning. Make sure you have a business plan in place, that you’re filing taxes as you need to and that you have the insurance you need to grow and thrive.
Use Social Media Marketing
Using social platforms like Facebook and Instagram is an effective way to reach potential customers before they even search for a cleaning service on Google. For just a few dollars a day, you can create ads that can reach thousands of people. Our guide on how to create a Facebook ad will walk you through the process.
Register Your Business With Google
Creating a business profile on Google is completely free. If you register your business, it will show up on Google search results and on Google Maps. Plus, you can include information like your website, phone number, and business hours. Registering your business also lets customers leave a Google review. Positive reviews can help draw in new customers. Overall, registering your business makes it much easier for people to find your cleaning company.
Location
A Homebased Location
One of the hottest business trends today is to be homebased, and cleaning services are excellent candidates for this type of setup. After all, your customers will likely never come to your facility since all your work is done on their premises. But that’s not the only issue influencing your decision to operate from a homebased office or a commercial location.
Many municipalities have ordinances that limit the nature and volume of commercial activities that can occur in residential areas. Some outright prohibit the establishment of homebased businesses. Others may allow such enterprises but place restrictions regarding issues such as signage, traffic, employees, commercially marked vehicles and noise. Before you apply for your business license, find out what ordinances govern homebased businesses; you may need to adjust your plan to be in compliance.
Low costs to start
Opening the doors to your cleaning business requires minimal start-up costs. This is a good thing especially because it lets basically anyone start with very little money. Basically, the only things you need to get started are a few cleaning products and the passion to succeed.
A few overhead expenses — There are very few overhead expenses when it comes to cleaning businesses. This means that as a cleaning business owner, you don’t need to rent or buy premises, buy a company vehicle or pay utility bills. Obviously, these can all be standard tasks at a later point — but for starters, you can start with minimal monetary concerns.
The Main Reasons People Fail At A Cleaning Business
The number one reason why people fail with their cleaning business is that they do not seek expert advice and mentoring. They assume they can figure out everything they need to know as they go. This may be possible, and it happens, but it is risky. For one thing, how do you know what pitfalls await you if you do not consult with someone who has done it before? The chances are that your business will run into the same traps and limitations, and that nine times out of ten, a mentor could have helped you from falling into trouble.