Work drying up over winter?

[adamangler]

My prices are reasonable.

I'm about £12 for a 3 bed semi.

8-10 for a terraced

 

[Leeds]

My prices are reasonable.
I'm about £12 for a 3 bed semi.

8-10 for a terraced

That's fairly good pricing Adam. Just see if you can put it across to the customer how much they're getting for the price. If they think it's worth it, they'll pay anything.

I.e. People pay £700 for an iPhone if they think it's worth it

 

[peter rogers]

This is my first winter coming up. (Well it's my 2nd but last year I was part time so didn't really notice)
Last couple of weeks have been noticeably colder on a morning. It's been windy and rainy, this week's forecast is shite...

Anyhow looking at my goggle calendar where I enter all my extra jobs booked in. (Valets,gutters and conny mainly) it's been pretty much blank this last month. Which is the first time since around Feb-March I've not been busy everyday, I'm ticking over but not really making much profit lately It's obvious I either need more windows or more add ons...

Anyways just wondered what the general trend is amongst everyone for add on work thru the winter? Do you notice a large drop off? I'm just wondering whether it's a marketting thing so I can look at maybe adwords or leafletting or is it just to be expected?

Cheers

the window cleaning is our main work everything else is just gravy

busy 5 days a week all year round then everything else is extra

 

[adamangler]

the window cleaning is our main work everything else is just gravybusy 5 days a week all year round then everything else is extra

But what do you do when the extras come in if our flat out with windows? Either turn the extras down or let your regular work down ?

 

[peter rogers]

i dont let anyone down mate

u say all the time u work till bout 2

i work from 8-5 every day and have the oprion of working later

int the winter not as much enquires come in which means it the round 8-5 every day

i have a new guy started with me and use to be a window cleaner and have took him on to put him out in a van which will be mid november

so now two of us work full time were always on it

when i take customers on its monthly or 2 montly like for instance whatever doesnt get done on friday gets done monday

if i get few new jobs in i sqqueeze them in and the worst case sceniro work gets pushed back a day no big deal

hope that answers ur question

 

[adamangler]

i dont let anyone down mateu say all the time u work till bout 2

i work from 8-5 every day and have the oprion of working later

int the winter not as much enquires come in which means it the round 8-5 every day

i have a new guy started with me and use to be a window cleaner and have took him on to put him out in a van which will be mid november

so now two of us work full time were always on it

when i take customers on its monthly or 2 montly like for instance whatever doesnt get done on friday gets done monday

if i get few new jobs in i sqqueeze them in and the worst case sceniro work gets pushed back a day no big deal

hope that answers ur question

ok so you literally just work more hours to fit it in, fair enough.

i was working 9-3 but now work has dropped off its been more like 9 -1 lol

But you make a good point i need to get out of the habit of working till mid afternoon and try and work till 4 at least.

I will see if i can do a half 8 till 4 tomorrow then that leaves friday free for canvassing. lol i shall try

 

[peter rogers]

ok so you literally just work more hours to fit it in, fair enough.i was working 9-3 but now work has dropped off its been more like 9 -1 lol

But you make a good point i need to get out of the habit of working till mid afternoon and try and work till 4 at least.

I will see if i can do a half 8 till 4 tomorrow then that leaves friday free for canvassing. lol i shall try

with them sort of hours u pay ur bills but there wont be much extra

we always push on and always want more i never say im to busy or that

 

[Clisty1989]

I've found the opposite, I've dialled down the canvassing for personal reasons and have had a few walk ups and referrals haven't canvassed for 2 weeks and gained 4 in the last 2 days!

 

[Chris33]

@Clisty1989 my recent few weeks have been similar. No chapping doors (in infact I haven't for a month or two), all now either walk ups referral or calls/emails.

Work still coming in. @adamangler do you have a website?I get more add on work through mine than window cleaning enquiries I'd say

If you work later you'll get more exposure too,more chance of walk ups etc,people seeing your van etc. Take the dive

 

[Clisty1989]

Also going out after 5 for an hour or 2 knocking does wonders, most people are in after work

 

[Duncs]

i,m still picking up loads of work

but I mainly just do window cleaning, the odd conny roof, I pass all my gutters on to another guy just hav,int got the time rather clean windows

 

[Duncs]

Also going out after 5 for an hour or 2 knocking does wonders, most people are in after work

gd for you going out after 5 i,m normally knackered after graft

mind I do tend to hold back and collect 5pm when folk are in

 

[Clisty1989]

gd for you going out after 5 i,m normally knackered after graftmind I do tend to hold back and collect 5pm when folk are in

I rarely do it, mainly knock on sunday

 

[adamangler]

Picked up a couple on fb today and managed to get 500 leaflets in the rain.

Going to stay out later next week and free up a couple of days to canvass/leaflet.

Website just doesn't get many hits, despite being near the top in my city. Just low searched terms, I'm going to try Google adwords to target a larger area.

 

[Duncs]

talking of canvassing

guy was talking to me few weeks back ,you can pay so much to top mobile providers (orange, 02,virgin etc) they will text all there customers in certain post code areas with your advertisement

whats your thoughts,mobile phones with your advert on them great idea for folk starting off

 

[StorminNorman]

I dont know what exactly happened since Sunday but my phone and my fb page keeps buzzing constantly! I dropped few leaflets a week ago in two large estates where I would love to build my new rounds (I got a lot of customers saying they love the idea of my advertisement, so I attached the pic for you to judge). Turned out they never seen a window cleaner in they life! In fact I am so busy atm that I dont know what to do and how to explain to all those people without upsetting them that I am booked out for the next two weeks (and all of them are first cleans..) and on top of that there is at least one gutter cleaning job every single day till the end of october.. and bookings for inside and out window cleaning for December are flying in! Everyone wants them as soon as you mention CHRISTMAS!

And how do you manage answering calls and taking notes while working on windows/gutters?

Work is definitely not drying out atm, but I am afraid of January when everyone will be broke and I will have to live on bread and butter only..

View attachment 8758

 

[Adams0211]

I dont know what exactly happened since Sunday but my phone and my fb page keeps buzzing constantly! I dropped few leaflets a week ago in two large estates where I would love to build my new rounds (I got a lot of customers saying they love the idea of my advertisement, so I attached the pic for you to judge). Turned out they never seen a window cleaner in they life! In fact I am so busy atm that I dont know what to do and how to explain to all those people without upsetting them that I am booked out for the next two weeks (and all of them are first cleans..) and on top of that there is at least one gutter cleaning job every single day till the end of october.. and bookings for inside and out window cleaning for December are flying in! Everyone wants them as soon as you mention CHRISTMAS!And how do you manage answering calls and taking notes while working on windows/gutters?

Work is definitely not drying out atm, but I am afraid of January when everyone will be broke and I will have to live on bread and butter only..

Nice idea with the business card. There's a wheelie bin cleaning firm round my way who have been doing something similar and attaching their details to every wheelie bin. It makes you look rather than just pick up another leaflet off the door mat.

 

[adamangler]

Its picked up for me this week, had 4-5 calls for extras and 4 first cleans from last weeks FB assault. still no where near @StorminNorman level but the extra work this week will cancel out last weeks poor one,

Bumped into a leafletter the other day that does it for £25 per 1000 which i thought was quite good.

To be honest i just want to build a full round now and feck everything else off until im full, too much to remember, too much written on bits of paper, too much shite in my van and sick of driving all over the place. tommorrows schedule, 9am first clean, then drive 20 mins away to another area for 1 windo clean and a first clean at 11, then maybe do another clean on the way to 1pm car valet, then a gutter clean at 4pm. A full day of ******* about for less money than i could earn on the glass in 4-5 hours. its all work and all money but life will be so much easier if i just did windows,

 

[Adams0211]

Its picked up for me this week, had 4-5 calls for extras and 4 first cleans from last weeks FB assault. still no where near @StorminNorman level but the extra work this week will cancel out last weeks poor one,
Bumped into a leafletter the other day that does it for £25 per 1000 which i thought was quite good.

To be honest i just want to build a full round now and feck everything else off until im full, too much to remember, too much written on bits of paper, too much shite in my van and sick of driving all over the place. tommorrows schedule, 9am first clean, then drive 20 mins away to another area for 1 windo clean and a first clean at 11, then maybe do another clean on the way to 1pm car valet, then a gutter clean at 4pm. A full day of ******* about for less money than i could earn on the glass in 4-5 hours. its all work and all money but life will be so much easier if i just did windows,

Have you tried paid advertising on Facebook? I've done it two or three times before but haven't done it for a while.

I decided to give it another go last night and paid £20 for seven days advertising. I also plan on sharing the same advert twice a day on ten different local 'for sale' type groups.

In the first 24 hours my advert has been seen by over 4200 people and I've been contacted by eight potential new customers for quotes. It will be interesting to see how many jobs I get from the advert once the seven days are up.

I reckon that you just need to keep going as you are and things will eventually fall into place.

 

[Dave B]

I love the add on jobs

Already lined up a few patio softwash jobs and a render job for march ready for spring

It's how you sell it to your existing customers

Also been pointing out green mouldy pathways etc that they "don't want to be slipping all over it when the winter comes"

Need to be clever in how you sell yourself

 

[adamangler]

I love the add on jobsAlready lined up a few patio softwash jobs and a render job for march ready for spring

It's how you sell it to your existing customers

Also been pointing out green mouldy pathways etc that they "don't want to be slipping all over it when the winter comes"

Need to be clever in how you sell yourself

I love them too but for me they were taking too much of my time this year so when it dried up I was left with a big hole because u hadn't enough windows.

Yes you are right @Adams0211 it will fall into place eventually. I've tried fb ads a few times and never had much. To be honest it's not getting the interest, I get a fair bit of interest from fb but not many conversions.