Community Involvement Ideas for Your Cleaning Company
A janitorial business doesn't exist in a vacuum. From the local region where it operates to the industry it belongs to, a company is part of larger communities. Finding ways to give back to and get involved with those communities is critical for modern businesses.
Community involvement can be anything from sponsoring a scholarship to enabling employee volunteerism. However, it looks for your cleaning company, supporting your community is a win-win situation.
In this post, I'm going to share five ways community participation can help your business, a few ideas for how to implement it for your cleaning company, and how to maximize exposure for your efforts.
Community Involvement is Not Strictly Altruistic
Sure, businesses should create community involvement programs because it's the right thing to do. Giving back improves the community and its members and helps foster a sense of unity.
The truth is, however, giving back can also be a savvy business move. Here are a few reasons why your business should get involved in the community:
1. Raise awareness and trust
Businesses are far more likely to sign a janitorial contract with a company they know, like, and trust. Community involvement can help build brand awareness and establish trust.
The more involved you get in your community, the more opportunity you'll have to introduce your brand to—and build meaningful relationships with—other businesses. You'll put a face to your brand, project a generous image, and establish your company as a familiar fixture in the community. This goes a long way in building trust and planting seeds for beneficial partnerships.
2. Get good PR
The best advertising is free advertising, right? Community involvement can generate free exposure for your business.
First, your company name will likely be included in printed or online announcements for the event. Thoughtfully publicizing the event can also result in the local newspaper or TV news mentioning your company's name. This type of recognition can pay dividends.
3. Improve SEO
When a media outlet or another business mentions your company, they are helping increase your website's authority. Although the mention is great, be sure to ask for a link back to your website. Backlinks are a piece of search-engine optimization that helps your company name appear higher in search results.
Likewise, feel-good posts about your philanthropic activities are more likely to receive engagement on social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. When your followers like and share your posts, they can also drive new visitors to your website.
4. Improve morale and retain good employees
Employee retention is especially important in the janitorial industry, which has notoriously high turnover rates. Employees like to work for companies they believe in and being a responsible corporate citizen can improve how your employees feel about your company.
Nearly 90 percent of companies that measure the connection between volunteer participation and employee engagement found a positive correlation, according to a 2015 study by the Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship. Community involvement creates engaged employees, which translates into a more productive staff and less turnover.
5. Help locate new talent
In addition to boosting morale among existing staff, community involvement can help you attract new talent. Being visible in the community can help potential employees find you and show them that you are a company that cares.
Also, offering employees several paid volunteer hours per quarter or year can go a long way in attracting quality candidates.
How to Get Involved in Your Community
If you're convinced community involvement is worthwhile, but aren't sure exactly how to do it, here are a few ideas to get you started. Some require money, but others take nothing more than time from your company's leaders and/or employees.
- Donate money: Give a percentage of your yearly profits or a portion of sales for a particular day or time period to a charity that's important to the community.
- Donate space: Allow nonprofits to use your conference room after business hours for free. These groups are often desperate for space to meet but lack a budget to pay.
- Provide discounts: Consider giving a discount to businesses run by firefighters, police officers, military, or to nonprofit organizations. This is a straightforward way to show your values.
- Offer sponsorships: Purchase uniforms for a youth or adult sports team or provide funds to a local marathon. In exchange, you'll get your name in front of the crowd at the games or event.
- Create a mentoring program: As an experienced business leader, you have valuable knowledge to share. Consider becoming a SCORE volunteer, creating a job-skills training program for a homeless shelter, or offering an internship for high-school students.
- Scholarships: Set up a scholarship program for a local student to attend a community college or university. Even as little as $500 can go a long way toward books or other expenses.
- Donate time: Encourage your employees to volunteer by offering paid time off, either on their own or all together as a team-building activity. Organizations like Habitat for Humanity and Rebuilding Together offer construction projects for business groups.
- Host a donation drive: Encourage your employees to bring in donations for a local charitable organization. Homeless shelters (clothing, school supplies), food banks, and Toys for Tots are excellent options.
Make Your Community Involvement Efforts Public
It's okay to give yourself a (public) pat on the back for doing something good. Once you begin participating in the community in a more meaningful way, spread the word. Let your current and prospective customers know.
1. Tell the media. Write a press release about your community involvement efforts and send it to your local media and business blogs. If they write about your company, share the article on your blog and social media accounts.
2. Post on your blog. Regularly write about your company's charitable giving and volunteerism. Tell the stories of those you're helping, of how your employees got involved, of the impact of your work, and anything else that brings life to the story. Be sure to include photos of your employee's involvement.
3. Create a page on your website. Create a “We Support” “Giving” or similar page on your site dedicated to your outreach efforts. Talk about the organizations you support, why you got involved, how you help, and how others can get involved.
4. Use social media. Showcase your efforts on your Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn accounts. Tag the organizations you are supporting so it shows up in their feed and include links to your website. Using video and pictures will dramatically increase engagement with your posts.
5. Send an email. Include details of your community given in your email newsletter. Whenever possible, tell the readers how they can also support the organizations to increase your reach.
6. Get outside help. Ask the organizations you support to tell their networks (via website, email, social media) about your involvement. Encourage your employees to talk about your company's community campaigns on their social media as well. Having others boast about your company has a greater impact than your own bragging.
When possible, attach a dollar amount to your donations (including an equivalent amount for time or services) so customers can clearly see how much your company gives to the community.
Getting involved in the community (and telling others about your efforts) goes a long way toward highlighting your company's values, creating goodwill with your clients, and can attracting and retaining talent.
Successful businesses have a responsibility to contribute to their community. Not only is it the noble and right thing to do, it's also a sound business investment.
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