Gaining commercial customers

[Part Timer]

There's no incentives nowadays, I got slaughtered on here, told I didn't know what I was talking about, not that long ago, when I dared to criticise people trying to employ on minimum wage 

 

[P4dstar]

There's no incentives nowadays, I got slaughtered on here, told I didn't know what I was talking about, not that long ago, when I dared to criticise people trying to employ on minimum wage 

I'm with you mate. If you make someone work for £8 an hour and they see you puling in £50 they will soon jump ship. Let people learn the hard way!

 

[RWCleaning]

I’d love a few commercial jobs a month, nothing massive, but would be cool to do £50-£100 early one day a week before the domestic day starts.

But nothing good ever happens to me (violins please) so I can just throw that idea in the bin. 

In fact, as the old saying goes, if I fell into a barrel full of ****s, I’d come out sucking my own thumb! 

I don’t quite understand commercial pricing though, some say it’s ok, they just do it to fill up a early morning or a rainy day. Where some say “I wouldn’t clean that for less than £90 a hour you idiot!!”

I’ve priced 6/7 different commercial jobs here in Bournemouth, done two one offs of them. One was a little under priced, was a shop front with 3D signage, said £18 thinking it’ll take 30 mins (I was still using back packs and was slow at the time) took a hour unfortunately.

The other one was a fascia & gutter clean on a pub which was well priced. My best morning to date probably. I then quoted £12 a week for the ongoing external windows. He umm’d & urrr’d then said he’ll think about it. Texted him a week later and he said no it’s ok it’s sorted now. Strange. Oh well.

 

[scottish cleaning service]

The problem we have in this country is all the kids are educated with the internet. Old generation not up to speed with the net and like to plod along. Why work on a building site or outside in all weathers if you can get an office job working a computer. That's why all the poles are over here working on the sites. Funny thing is happening to my mum at the moment. She is getting her house clad with insulation and she keeps trying to talk with the workers and they all say, me no talk English. I think I will need to try that every time she asks me questions. If one is paying their employee the minimum wage then it shows that you don't respect them and you will have a high turnover of staff.

 

[Damo]

Do what I did and clean the wrong building ? 

 

[Damo]

In all seriousness a lot of it is who you know, being in the right place at the right time and don’t be fooled into thinking that free cleans for MD houses doesn’t count etc. 

With the increase this year and late last year I’m having a van just for commercial work

and will be sign written to that effect. Im not a 100% set on it but being doing my figures and it should be doable/ROI etc. 

 

[Clearview Lee]

I got the bulk of my commercial window cleaning (offices) on the back of a customers daughter who fancied me. A real minger too. She worked for a large motor company and she got me the job. They have 5 plots within a 8mile radius that I do also. From that I got another large motor company next door when it opened, and also got all their yearly gutter cleans for a handsome sum. 

Ive looked after these for 17 years now, and have been my ‘bills paid’ bread & butter money in that time. If I had them all lined up together nicely, I reckon I could to them all in 2 days easily.  So they are very handy to have - especially as you can literally start as early as you want. 

A lot just down to luck like this.

I owe a lot to that ugly girl that fell for a super-stud Prince! 

 

[showpiece]

Building up more commercial work takes a different approach from getting homes on the books!!!

Word of mouth works well, but waiting for calls can slow things down. Reaching out directly to decision-makers, like facilities managers or business owners, gets better results than stopping by reception.

Emails, LinkedIn messages, or well-timed phone calls often open more doors than walking in unannounced.

 

[spruce]

In the commercial motor trade most of our business came from telephone call prospecting.
First call was to the receptionist/enquiries. All we wanted was the name of the person responsible for, in our case, vehicle purchasing. We often had the 'gate keeper' refusing to put the call through with some or other excuse.

That was fine as we had a name. A couple of days later we phoned up and asked to be put through to the person by name as though we were old contracts. "Whose calling?" "Joe Bloggs from "Blogs & sons." "What's it in connection with?" "Your cleaning contract.". Usually that was enough to make contact. But we often had to make several calls. It was also good if we could get the receptionist/gatekeepers name. It seemed to get easier when we got the gatekeepers name.

 

[P4dstar]

In the commercial motor trade most of our business came from telephone call prospecting.
First call was to the receptionist/enquiries. All we wanted was the name of the person responsible for, in our case, vehicle purchasing. We often had the 'gate keeper' refusing to put the call through with some or other excuse.

That was fine as we had a name. A couple of days later we phoned up and asked to be put through to the person by name as though we were old contracts. "Whose calling?" "Joe Bloggs from "Blogs & sons." "What's it in connection with?" "Your cleaning contract.". Usually that was enough to make contact. But we often had to make several calls. It was also good if we could get the receptionist/gatekeepers name. It seemed to get easier when we got the gatekeepers name.

I worked in recruitment doing similar. It is awful. If people think customers telling them to jog on when they chap the door is bad they know nothing compared to business to business sales. My colleagues tried all sorts of tactics. Some would call and tell Janet on reception it was a person matter... then when they got through claim they said personnel.

My tactic was more to the point. We had a list and a half of contact details that failed recruitment consultants had built up and left when they left the job. Instead of trying to add to that list and start new relationships I just called the hundreds of people on there. Every Monday morning starting at 5am (factories) for weeks I got spoken to like siht and had the phone slammed down. Then the ones who needed temps realised I was consistent and started to use me. Meanwhile I had built a list of temps ready for work and started sending them out. The plan was always to have a handful of them in the office ready to go to work at 7am but we got a big contract elsewhere and my plan was put on the back burner. Consistency was the key though. The only reason I left that job was because the customers speaking to you like cr4p didn't stop when you got the contract. Recruitment is just a barrage of abuse from all sides. Never again!