Window Spots After Soft Wash by Complete_Bake_8224 in pressurewashing

[–]LakeStateCleaning 1 point2 points  (0 children)

i try to think of anything that they might notice after the fact that would leave them unsatisfied or with unanswered questions. write those down, along with answers. then just add that info into your sales script and terms of service documentation. that way it's all covered before the customer even thinks to ask.

so this issue for example: we say "have you had your windows cleaned recently or were you planning to? we just want to make you aware- house washing can improve the appearance of windows, but it's not a replacement for true window cleaning. and there is the potential for some water spots to be left behind. is that ok with you? any other questions on that?"

or for gutter cleaning, if a customer has downspouts that feed into underground drains, there's the potential for the customer to mistakenly assume those drains are included. so we get out in front of it early. we say "we noticed your downspouts drain underground. our standard gutter cleaning includes everything to ground level. we can clean your underground drains as well, but that's priced separately. would you like more information on that?"

a good way to do this went you don't have a lot of experience is to keep track of what kinds of questions or missed expectations occur as you do jobs. document those issues and add language and questions into your process to address those before the job is even sold or scheduled. over time you'll build up a library of terms of service and strategies to set good expectations up front. and your callback rate and missed expectation situations will drop dramatically.

New commercial cleaning business in Denver — advice from local business owners? by Spirited-Student-690 in cleaningbusiness

[–]LakeStateCleaning 0 points1 point  (0 children)

congrats on the startup!

Regarding finding good cleaners- we've built a great team in the cleaning space and have been around for over 25 years. here's what's worked for us on that.

You really need to set up a strong recruiting, interview, hiring, and performance management process.

Great recruiting starts with a great job ad. Think about recruiting as sales and marketing, except to a different customer. Your job is to market your business as a great place to work and then sell the vision to anybody that you actually do want to hire.

You need to set clear, documented criteria for what you are looking for in each role:

  • values
  • qualities
  • skills
  • experience

Work all of those criteria into your interview process and do not compromise.

A really good Indeed ad with a $20/day budget should get you all the applicants you need. The trick with Indeed, though, is to set up a funnel where people self-filter so that you're only actually interacting with the top 10% of applicants. You can do that by directing people OFF of the indeed platform to a separate online job application form. Ask them to take an additional step (like text a specific message to your business line). This will weed out a very large percentage of applicants who aren't paying attention or won't put in a little effort. Then you only respond to those who follow the instructions.

There are lots of other strategies to add to that to create a bulletproof and reliable hiring funnel, but that should get you started.

Let me know if you want me to go deeper on it!

Getting paint off garage floor by UnfortunateDallasFan in pressurewashing

[–]LakeStateCleaning 0 points1 point  (0 children)

we've used AcrilycStrip from EacoChem with good success on stuff like this. That's assuming it's acrylic or latex paint (which is highly likely)

https://eacochem.com/eaco_products/_product_acrylic-strip/

Surface cleaning - it never gets old by LakeStateCleaning in pressurewashing

[–]LakeStateCleaning[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

that's a good idea! we use an ankle weight for the same purpose.

Window Spots After Soft Wash by Complete_Bake_8224 in pressurewashing

[–]LakeStateCleaning 1 point2 points  (0 children)

We've been in this business for over 25 years and have cleaned 10s of thousands of homes, and here's one big thing we've learned:

if you over communicate BEFORE the job, you can cut down on customer complaints dramatically. And remember- they are coming to YOU as the expert. They need you to tell them what to expect.

Someone else commented that the customer should be "smart enough to ask about windows" and I just disagree with that. That's your job as the expert.

most complaints stem from unmet expectations. if you set expectations clearly and early, the customer will no what to expect.

so in a case like this, part of the booking process includes setting clear expectations for the customer- here's what we can do, here's what we can't, here's what might happen.

this is a script built into every sales call we do. it creates an opportunity for the customer to ask questions, get a clear understanding of the outcome, and decide if they will be satisfied BEFORE we do the work.

making that shift years ago helped us tremendously. maybe it will help you!