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| Here's what our members are saying...
"I had my first strip and wax
job and it happened to be a VERY picky Client. Well I have the advantage of
living very close to Steve and Jean. Steve offered to come and help. With
Steve's help we completed the strip and wax job. I learned so much and I am
extremity grateful for Steve and his commitment to helping his members succeed.
Steve and Jean you both are a GREAT blessing to our industry and an example of
true selfless individuals that I am proud to know. Thank you for all you do."
Matthew Kitzmann
Air Quality Solutions
Rochester, MN
"Steve, thanks for your help. I can't even begin to tell you
how valuable your site and help has made a world of difference to how we do
business."
Rocky Lozano
Big Sky Mountain Enterprises
Great Falls, MT
"Steve thanks for all your
help. I got the contract. Just to let you know this site has been fantastic. I
have been in business for 4 months here and I have secured 6 contracts with your
help and info. Keep up the great work."
Tim Daniels
All Green-All Clean
Long Beach, MS
"Jean and Steve, this is a big thank you for your knowledge and expertise in operating your company. There is an old familiar saying, 'only in America'. Well that is how one should feel about The Janitorial Store. 'only at THE JANITORIAL STORE'. Where else can one go to find the wealth of information that you provide daily? Where else can one have experience people like you and people like Sharon Cowan, Dick Ollek and Debbie Sardone, just to name a few, share their knowledge of how to run a successful business. These are people who have been there and done that. Thank you and continue doing what you do best."
William Briggs
One Briggs Janitorial
Service
Woodbridge, VA
"You two have been a blessing to our business. Your knowledge, wisdom and tools on your website has allowed us to bid on our first contract feeling like an expert. We have continued to acquire more clients with your help. Thanks again for all you do."
Norman and Alecia Smith
Covenant Commercial Cleaning Services
Little Elm, TX
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Sales and Marketing
Having a successful cleaning business requires more than knowing the proper tips and techniques to effective clean residential homes and commercial properties. You have to know how to market yourself and your cleaning business. This will get you not only your first cleaning account, but can build your one-person shop up into a profitable cleaning company. Do you know where to find cleaning customers? Have you developed a networking circle so your business name will be passed around to others in the community?
It's not always easy to pick up the phone and make that cold call that may or may not lead to a new account. Doing the right research beforehand and knowing the right things to say might just get your foot in the door. Being successful in your business means looking like a professional. Have you developed the right tools to market your business to prospective customers? Do you know what tools you should have on hand when someone asks for information about your cleaning company? Once you've developed your core customers, what happens next?
You can grow your cleaning business by adding more customers, but you can also offer your customers more services. The articles in this section will help you market and grow your cleaning business, as well as give you tips on handling customer complaints and how to deal with price increases.
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How to Use Keywords to Drive Traffic to Your Cleaning Business Website
Jean Hanson
For a prospective customer to find your website through an Internet search, you need to focus on specific keyword phrases they might be using to search for your cleaning business. Build individual pages using keyword phrases...words that describe your business. When search engines visit your website, they'll look for these keywords on your pages. . . .
keep reading
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Press Releases: The Best-Kept Secret To Free Advertising
Sharon Cowan
One of the most underutilized and best kept secrets in effective marketing is the use of the Press Release. It is an easy, no-cost way to spread the word about your business. A well-written press release can be used to describe events, grand openings, new services you provide, new personnel, or even new products that you are using in your business. . . .
keep reading
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Gimmicks vs. Creative Marketing Ideas for Your Cleaning Company
Jean Hanson
So sales are slow and you need to pull out all the stops to get new accounts. Marketing, marketing, marketing. You have a good "product." You manage it well. Your clients are happy. Operationally, you seem to be doing well. The problem is sales are down. What to do? How are you going to set yourself apart from the competition? How about some innovative sales ideas? Those are always good, right? Well, whatever increases your sales is good for business, right? Well, not always. There is a fine line between an innovative marketing idea and a gimmick. Good marketing is a long-term effort to further your business's goals. Gimmicks may provide a short-term gain, but are they worth it in the long run? Gimmicks have also turned into scams, certainly something you don't want to be associated with. . . .
keep reading
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ONLINE VIDEO: WebNotes - Free Research Tool For Finding Janitorial Cleaning Prospects
Jean Hanson
ONLINE VIDEO: WebNotes is an online tool you can use for all kinds of research. Since we're always looking for ways to find janitorial cleaning prospects, this video shows how you can use WebNotes to do just that. Use whatever research tool you normally use (like Google), and then use the WebNotes highlighter and notes feature to highlight contact and address information right on a web page, and then put a sticky note on the page for your own use. See how powerful this tool can be by watching the video. . . .
keep reading
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Do You Have Minimum Prices In Your Cleaning Business?
Steve Hanson
Many new cleaning business owners get started by taking on smaller sized accounts with low frequencies of service. For example, they may clean offices that are as small as 1,000 sq ft up to 5,000 sq ft. Generally the clients of these smaller sized buildings need less frequent service than clients that have much larger office buildings requiring 5 days per week service. . . .
keep reading
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How to Clean-Up with Facebook
Jean Hanson
By now, most of us are at least somewhat familiar with what Facebook is. What started out as a social networking website on the Harvard campus has evolved into the fifth most visited website worldwide, and the fifteenth most visited here in the United States. With numbers like that, it is clear Facebook isn't just a place where your teenagers spend hours a day visiting with their friends. In the past year, the number of users over the age of 35 has grown by about 50%. Does that sound like the target market age of your prospective clients? It is a powerful tool that is being used more and more to market businesses around the world. Why not yours? . . .
keep reading
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Why You Should Diversify Your Cleaning Services
Steve Hanson
The cleaning business is one of the most obvious examples of what we call being in a service industry, the key word being "service." There are thousands of cleaning services, and therefore thousands of competitors. On the surface, many of them appear to offer basically the same thing: trash removal, restroom cleaning, vacuuming, dusting, etc. You may have a superior "product" by having the best training, best equipment, best employees, and best management techniques, but in a competitive market, an extra edge will put you at an advantage. One way to get that edge is by offering additional services that other companies do not offer. Diversifying your services gives you an opportunity to taking advantage of potential sales. . . .
keep reading
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Cold Calling for Cleaning Companies: The Right Approach Can Open Doors
Steve Hanson
Cold calling is the one marketing tool that strikes fear in the hearts of many cleaning business owners. In reality, it is one of the most effective tools to use if done properly. There are several right ways to go about cold calling and there are definitely WRONG ways to go about it. Don't be intimidated. When you prepare yourself with the right approach, you will find your efforts are worth it in the end. Business owners want to know what is in it for them. Look at the situation through their eyes and you will be much more successful. . . .
keep reading
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Diversify Your Commercial Cleaning Services by Offering Window Washing to Your Clients' Employees
Steve Hanson
Many cleaning business owners are looking for ways to diversify their service offerings during the down economy. One way to do that is to provide window washing services to customers you might not normally work with. For example, if you clean commercial buildings, you may find that the people working in those buildings need window washing services at their homes. See if you can post a flyer in the break room, offering window washing services to employees' homes. . . .
keep reading
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Using Your Proposal To Close The Sale
Dick Ollek, CBSE
Most of us have been to workshops or seminars that are aimed at teaching us all the right questions to ask at a sales presentation to get the prospect to say yes. We are told if the prospect says this, we say that and we are even taught the names of each of the different closes. . . .
keep reading
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Very Effective Selling On A Very Limited Budget
Dick Ollek, CBSE
After nearly 45 years in the Building Service Contracting business, the question I get asked most, next to where do I get good people, is" how can I secure the good customers"? This is a universal problem with the emerging company attempting to compete in the market against the larger, many times better known, companies. To complicate the issue, most of the time, we are attempting to compete with a very limited or sometimes non-existent budget. . . .
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How to Use Reference USA to Build Prospect Lists
Jean Hanson
One of the most frequently asked questions we get is about how to find prospects for a cleaning business. There are several paid services available, but there is also one resource that you can access for free as long as you have a library card and your library makes it available to you. The resource is called Reference USA. In this video, we show you how to search for specific target markets in your local area so you can start building your prospect list! . . .
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5 Critical Questions To Ask BEFORE You Hire a Web Designer
by Donna Gunter, The Online Biz Resource Queen (TM
Whether you're building a website or a blogsite, the investment in a designer can be fairly significant. It's at this point that many service business owners decide to cut costs and have their 16-year old nephew design their site. This works out well until something breaks (with technology, it's never a question of IF it will break, only WHEN) and your nephew is out of touch because he just started his first year of college and can't be bothered. What are you going to do? . . .
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BOOK: Selling Contract Cleaning Services 101
Dick Ollek
If you are new in the Building Services Contracting business or an emerging company wanting to grow and improve, this is the book for you. Dick takes you through who and what you are, to finding the prospects, getting the appointment, securing the walk through, preparing the proposal, and closing the sale. . . .
keep reading
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