by Gary Clipperton, 40-year cleaning industry veteran and President of National Pro Clean.

An office cleaning business, janitorial, or carpet cleaning service can be extremely profitable. It can be started part-time as a home-based business and built at your own pace. There are several critical steps you will need to master. Our free advice can help you overcome common start-up and expansion obstacles.

I.  Overview
 
What Can I Expect?

Commercial cleaning has built-in job security. Each day the same routine repeats in producing a clean facility. In fact, every occupied building in every city has to be cleaned by someone. Why can’t that someone be you? Even though large national and franchise operations are definite competitors, they represent only 30% of the market. Small, independent janitorial companies account for 70% of the cleaning contractors.

II.  Marketing

Starting a cleaning business requires taking positive action to locate prospects and close contracts. Learning to land your own accounts is the first step to success. An experienced consultant or mentor can help you develop a winning marketing program. Trial and error can be VERY expensive.

Building owners hire janitorial services to experience the benefits of a professional cleaning crew. Owners and managers are interested in the appearance of their building, the safety and health of the occupants, and the affordability of the cleaning service. They also want to avoid legal repercussions from inadequate maintenance.
 
Before you begin marketing, develop a list of target accounts, normally within a 20 mile radius of your home or office. Besides saving on gas, there is another benefit of focusing on customers in your neighborhood. When you talk to a prospect you can assure them you live nearby and can readily assist whenever they might need you.

It helps to prospect accounts where you have prior experience or inside contacts. For example, if you have previously worked for a day care, a church, a doctor, a realtor, a factory, a car dealership, or an attorney, you probably know how the business operates. With this experience, you can approach similar businesses and relate to their needs. Another prospecting source is friends and relatives who work at a business and know that the business is not happy with its present service.

Determine the scope of your services prior to developing any brochures. Decide if you can offer window washing, carpet cleaning, or floor finishing services. Professionally designed literature should showcase your services. If you lack graphic design skills, contact a mentor or consultant or enroll in a study course that will help you learn these skills.
 
If you are starting out part-time, you should decide which marketing approaches best fit your capabilities. Normally, over 60% of the buildings in most cities are cleaned by a janitorial service. By qualifying as the prospects back up (#2), it may not be long before you can become #1. In the DVD video “Secrets of Landing Cleaning Contracts” there are twelve strategies explaining how to develop a dynamic marketing system, approach prospects, handle the sales process, and negotiate contracts.

An account acquisition program can help you establish your marketing strategies. It reminds you where to go and who to see, and keeps you on track. Proper training to upgrade your sales skills is important along with using procedures and forms to track the process. National Pro Clean marketing materials includes a list of 25 tips on presenting your bid proposal.
 
Another helpful marketing strategy is to develop an elevator speech. This is a short (20-30 second) introduction. This brief introduction is prepared in advance to solicit a favorable reaction when meeting new people. To merely say, “Hi, my name is Gary and I own a cleaning service”, is not particularly earth-shaking.

Instead, you could preplan an interest-provoking opener such as, “Hi, how are you today?” Then, ask permission to give them a business card and state, “My name is Gary with National Pro Clean. We provide professional and high quality cleaning services for office buildings and we offer free price quotes. Do you know of anyone who might be interested?”  The second introductory speech has a greater chance of creating a favorable response.
 
A sales presentation manual should be developed that includes as many relevant sales points as possible. The objective is to show that you have value-added services that make your cleaning service superior to other companies.
 
During preliminary discussions with building owners or managers, keep in mind that they have questions about your capabilities. For example, they may ask if you offer Green Cleaning (http://www.epa.gov/oaintrnt/practices/janitorial.htm) - an environmentally friendly approach. To learn about and offer Green Seal (www.greenseal.org) products and procedures will require additional study and preparation. NSF Sustainability now has a new program to certify cleaning chemicals http://www.nsf.org/business/sustainability/product_greener_chemicals.asp?program=Sustainability
 
Another area of concern is if you have a procedures manual and proper training to reduce cross-contamination. With proper training, you can offer healthy building cleaning programs that reduce cross-contamination. The spread of disease including H1N1 and MRSA contamination has become a major concern for employers. Recent studies show that employees claim that 30% of their illnesses occur at work.

There are several effective marketing approaches including:

1. Canvass your territory and leave a brochure and business card. This approach works quite well if you have a proven presentation.
2. Approach all the people you know (especially other company owners you do business with) and ask them for referrals. Tell your neighbor that you will buy them dinner if they help you land a contract at the business where they work.
3. Phone prospects from a target account list available from many local libraries or from Info USA. Use a script that offers a free estimate. Consider learning the skills to hire and train your own telemarketer or contact a company that specializes in prospecting and setting up bid appointments such as www.mycleaningbiz.com.
4. Join a leads exchange club (www.bni.com). There are several to pick from in most cities. It requires an investment of time and money. Networking with other business owners can be an effective way to locate customers. Your local Chamber of Commerce may offer networking opportunities.
5. Visit general contractors, commercial realtors, owners of the various building trades, and janitorial supply firms. Make sure they have plenty of your business cards. Post your card on bulletin boards.
6. Use a post card mail-out to reach your target account list. Make sure it is professionally designed as a direct response mailer. Offering a discount and free estimate for your cleaning services can attract new accounts. 
7. Implement a consistent follow up program for all persons previously contacted. Use post cards, phone calls, and emails. When the “itch cycle” hits, and they are ready to make a change, they will know how to contact you.
8. Consider the advertising power of calendars, note pads, pens, and other inexpensive items from advertising specialty companies. You can find a list of the advertising specialty and promotional products suppliers in your local yellow pages.
9. Ask for referrals from present customers. Once you secure a new customer, work extra hard to impress them and then ask for a letter of recommendation and referrals. The power of “Word of Mouth” advertising can never be overlooked.
10. Consider a small, yet professional website. It may not generate a tremendous number of leads, but it definitely lends credibility to your service.

One final way to assess marketing responses is to track all of your closing averages. This could include: number of phone calls that must be made to set a bid appointment, numbers of mailers to generate a lead, number of appointments that must be made to locate a qualified prospect and number of bids submitted to secure a contract. Keep in mind that if customers are not rejecting your price about 20% of the time, this could indicate your prices are too low.
 
There is a lot to learn about bidding psychology. Contractors, who consistently bid too low, may do so just to get new contracts. They, in turn, may sell off these unprofitable contracts to unsuspecting new startup companies. It doesn’t hurt to remind a prospect that they usually get what they pay for. There can be a high turnover in contractors who over promise but can’t deliver the goods consistently.
 

Prepare a Professional Bid Proposal Package

Develop or purchase an impressive and professional-looking bid proposal package. It should include attractive fliers describing your service, a thorough cleaning specifications chart, a user-friendly service contract, and details about your service. Remember: failure to discuss itemized and detailed cleaning tasks in advance can lead to problems later on.
 
Most prospects want reassurance that you employ trained and qualified workers. They may ask if you have a comprehensive training program and an operations manual. They may even ask to see a written copy of your cleaning procedures, your safety program, your procedures for pre-employment screening, background, and drug checks, procedures for ensuring building security, and your quality assurance program. Before starting a cleaning business, make sure you have documentation for your internal operational systems.

III.  Bidding

A cleaning proposal would include an annual, renewable contract quoting a monthly fee. It is a serious mistake to offer a bid that is priced below your own cost. Do yourself a favor and master the bidding process before you begin submitting proposals. Whenever you price your service too high, you may lose the contract. If you price too low, you may secure the contract and wish that you hadn’t.

Customers don’t feel obligated to help you construct and price your service fees. They figure if you are a qualified contractor, you will know how to submit an accurate price estimate for all the required services. A bidding formula takes into consideration all of your expenses, the desired net profit, and what the market will bear.

Start by estimating how many hours a night it will take to clean the building you are bidding. Next, determine what the going labor rate is for your city. Then, add your labor burden that includes all payroll costs. Next, add all of your anticipated expenses including chemical, equipment, and overhead (such as office supplies, phone, insurance, advertising costs, etc.).  Finally, you calculate a fair profit to add to your price. The net profit is amount of income available to you as the owner. 

Since bidding can be a complex task, an accurate and efficient bidding software program (http://www.nationalproclean.com/id25.html) provides many advantages. For example, a building survey form should be available to collect and record the cleaning specifications, frequencies, and special needs. Most importantly, the cleaning variables must be rated to determine if the cleaning demands will be light, medium, or heavy. By scoring at least seven cleaning demands on a sliding scale, accurate production times can be projected for each separate bid.

Another consideration is whether a customer desires a full and complete cleaning each time or whether they would be interested in a partial cleaning with just a trash pickup and rest room touchup on given nights. By offering these options, a customer experiencing severe budget constraints can then pick and choose service levels. Using a thorough bid checklist is helpful, especially in identifying customer expectations.

During the building tour, a prospect will observe your appearance, grooming, and self-confidence. To make a good first impression, refrain from uneducated questions that could reveal your inexperience. Don’t criticize the current service provider because it could be a family member. Be punctual for all appointments and try to bond with your prospect.

If you are making a tour in response to a Request for Proposal, make sure you have studied the proposal in advance. During the building inspection or bid walk-thru you must identify all the cleaning demands and needs. It helps to evaluate the quality of cleaning currently being provided and note all deficiencies.

Determine if the prospect requires carpet and floor care services. If so, plan to offer these services or locate a sub-contractor who can perform the work for you. It is best to price additional services separately and invoice the customer as the service is performed. 

A bid proposal package should be customized for each prospect. Include information about your company, cleaning experience, management experience, scope of services, a detailed cleaning specification chart, advertising fliers explaining the advantages of using your service, the contract or service agreement, and possibly your insurance coverage. Consult with your business coach or mentor to match your bids to each customer.

It is critical to outline and discuss all the cleaning duties with the customer before you start. If you omit certain items, a customer may come back later and claim you are responsible for cleaning certain areas that you were unaware of. Janitorial Success is a comprehensive marketing manual that assists contractors in providing a detailed bid proposal package.

As mentioned previously, it’s beneficial to offer carpet cleaning and floor care services. Many businesses are in need of regular traffic lane maintenance or deep extraction of their carpet. The IICRC (www.iicrc.com) - Institute of Inspection, Cleaning and Restoration Certification - is a non-profit organization that provides training programs and certification of carpet cleaning technicians. Recently they have approved an online carpet cleaning training program from National Pro Clean Corp.

Floor care is another way to expand your service. Customers with tile floors will need them cleaned, buffed, and periodically refinished. This technical side of the business can be easy to mess up. Be sure you are trained and equipped before you start offering this service. Normally carpet and floor care services are bid by the square foot. JanBid Estimating Software is a bidding program that calculates all phases of carpet and floor care along with the janitorial price.

IV. Managing your Business

Good management is a key ingredient to business growth. There are things to master such as: time management, proper business image, negotiation skills, managing people, customer service, and the list goes on. The more you learn about starting and running a janitorial business, the greater will be your success in avoiding costly mistakes. In addition, there are home study courses for cleaning contractors that can teach you the ropes. 

Crunching the numbers

Accounting is another important skill for contractors to learn. Regular monitoring of income and expenses will identify trends and profitability. You should develop (or purchase) a system to track productivity for each building, and monitor equipment and job costs and all financial trends.

Tracking monthly income and expenses is critical in order to locate over-expenditures. Part of JanBid Software includes recording the cleaning income and expenses. In addition, there are accounting software packages that help with all the details of invoicing and tracking accounts receivable.

Part of the responsibility of starting a cleaning business is to initially keep expenses on the low side. Put off temptations to borrow large sums of money or take on unnecessary debts. Each month compile a profit and loss statement from your checkbook to assess the financial health of your business.

There are other areas of business management to learn including: contact management, sales quotas, follow-up of leads and prospect calls, cost projections, customer history, accounts receivable, quality inspections, customer satisfaction surveys, and complaint resolutions.

Recruiting and hiring workers

You have probably heard the saying, “Good help is hard to find”. In the office cleaning business, bad help can be a sure way to lose a customer. Finding competent personnel is difficult, but not impossible. Consult with your business coach or cleaning mentor to explore the best sources for workers.
Cleaning contractors should also have a HR (human relations) system to process and manage new workers.

Forms can be used to process and track activities. Examples are: employment applications, applicant evaluations, verification of previous employment, employment interview questions, employer hiring liabilities, employee orientation, on-job-training checklist, work orders, daily schedules, time records, employee performance review, employee or sub-contractor checklist, disciplinary action, job descriptions, exit interview, and termination forms. These forms are included in the book Janitorial Success.

IV.  Setting up your Cleaning Process

Although many people who start a janitorial or office-cleaning service have experience, there are a lot of challenges that can trip up a newbie. After you land a contract, the work begins. You must purchase the appropriate equipment, develop a cleaning work-flow system, and ensure that all the required areas are being properly cleaned.

The equipment you select must be maneuverable, productive, easy to use, cost efficient, and transportable if it is moved from building to building. You might select two or three sizes of machines that will efficiently access a given area. Small machines are required to maneuver in and out of tight or congested areas. Large machines are best suited for wide-open areas such as halls, ballrooms, and gymnasiums.

Next, test-drive the selected equipment to verify maneuverability and suitability. Consider transportation time, cost, and human energy consumption to move the largest piece of equipment to remote locations, such as other building levels. Use benchmarked cleaning times to calculate productivity for each given machine.

It is not unusual for the first night to take twice as long to clean a new account than it will after several days. The learning curve must be mastered. Among other things, you must locate all the waste baskets and electrical outlets. There will usually be a number of neglected areas that must be cleaned to bring things back into shape. It’s wise to put in extra time initially to impress the customer.

There are basically ten skills to master in order to provide fast, efficient, and quality work. These are outlined in “Cleaning Performance Handbook”.

Not only must the right people be matched to the right job, but there are a host of demands in workloading the project. You will need a uniform and thorough process so all workers can flow efficiently through each building. Jobs must be assigned so that the entire team finishes at about the same time.

No two buildings clean the same. Cleaning with a team (where appropriate) normally leads to labor savings. You must decide whether to use zone cleaning or clean with a team. Master the art of employee motivation, coaching skills, and excellence in leadership to build a winning team.