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Canvassing for expansion

Green Pro Clean Ltd

Well-known member
Messages
8,103
Location
Nottingham & Derbyshire
I have commented on canvassing many times before as a few of you will know from previous posts and have never had an issue canvassing for myself (or others for that matter)

What I have discovered is in the winter you can still achieve 3 - 4 new customers per hour which is not too different from my summer time averages.

My only issue with canvassing is after a day out cleaning the windows I do like to have my cuppa and chill for half hour after which I am not really in canvass mood so to speak.

I have considered hiring other 'canvassing companies' to canvass for me but my issue with this two part.

1: There are so many mixed reports on this that it seems a bit like do I put my money on red or black at the roulette table, seems I have just as much chance of winning or losing either way.

2: We are not in desperate need of customers as I have more than enough to keep busy but now we have gone Ltd and are planning expansion the only way to do this is to take on more staff and vans.

Now there seems to be a lot of thought as soon as a windy is busy full time about taking on another 'helper / mate' to help with the work load but I think this is the premature demise of many budding enterprises (I have traveled this road myself)

I think the only way to truly make it work once you are flat out is to first hire a full time canvasser for your business, that can continually bring in fresh business day after day and expand the customer lists rapidly. Prior to hiring the canvasser I think you need to ensure you are in a position (financially) to put another van on the road as soon as the time comes.

Once the canvasser has you at a point where you can not physically fit any more jobs into the day you split the round in two and take on the new guy at this point, stack a healthy amount of work to fill up 8 hours a day five days a week for him and you keep the left overs which will still be growing on a daily basis as your canvasser will still be in full swing, then once again when your round is above capacity add another van and divide again.

You all probably think 'yeah but hiring a canvasser full time is expensive' but you have to remember full time for a canvasser is only about 4 - 5 hours per day, any more than that and they will knacker out within a week or two.

I have just started to realize I am again in a position to take on another employee but don't want them in my van, I want them out in their own van working hard, whilst i pick up the left overs and new cleans etc. As I am in this position I have just hired a canvasser to work for me on a full time basis, she has not done door to door before but came out with me yesterday, was told the pricing system and pitch sent to the first door on her own (I feel two of us at a door together might be too much so threw her in at the deep end)

Three hours later we stop for a cuppa, she still has not a single customer, working the same street I am up to 9 new customers already. After the cuppa, she cracked her first 'sale' then bagged two more in the next twenty minutes once she had faith and confidence.

I will give her Monday and Tuesday by then end of which I will know whether she can 'cut the mustard' If she does as well as yesterday afternoon she could bring in 10-12 new customers per day.

Now I am paying her hourly at £8 per hour so already that's £1.69 above minimum and 55p above living wage so by comparison to factory work or McDonads not too bad with the added condition that if she get's 12 or more new customers in a day I will pay her a £50 bonus on top.

I have told her she can work as many hours as she wants, starting at 10:30am but I expect a minimum of 4 hours per day, so the bonus is there so if she manages 10 or 11 in 4 hours she will stay out to get that last one or two to make up the numbers.

So by reasonable maths lets say she does 4 days per week that's £128 of basic pay, if she hits 12 per day that's £200 in bonus so £328 for the 4 day week and with my policy of a £10 per job minimum she will have bought in a monthly revenue of £480 of ongoing monthly work.

So in effect she cost me 0.68 of a first clean to keep on the staff full time so I am already in profit by 32% on a first clean.

Even if she only manages 1 customer per hour I am still 20% in profit on a first clean.

From what I can gather many canvassing companies out there would want to charge between £960 and £1440 for £480 of work and you would have to wait for 4 months before you see a penny of return.

So I figure but that logic I can afford to have her canvass for 45 days before I will have paid her a base pay of £1440 and even if only 1 customer per hour over the 45 days she will have produced 180 new customers with a minimum revenue of £1800 so I am still in profit by £360 in month one, £2160 in month two, £3960 by middle of month four and so on.

So obviously not a system for someone that wants to just build a one man round and be happy with that (nothing wrong with that) but for those considering expansion then I think this could be a system worth looking deeper into.

Now I feel as if I have started rambling a bit :whistle:

 
set yourself a goal and go for that

eg. if you want 2 vans and 2 or 4 or 24 extra employees and the rewards coming with it -well that should be your goal

how you go about getting that isnt really important

 
@Green Pro Clean Ltd nice post with some good info, one concern I'd have with taking on a canvasser is how would track their hours each day, and be sure they are out there knocking the door for the 5 hours or so they said they did that day?
 
@Trev81 your point is valid and it is a three part answer:

Part 1: for those of us in the game long enough we are all pretty good judges of character so a bit of faith in ones instinct to begin with.

Part 2: For those of us in the game long enough we all know most people are lying b@stards so I have ordered a GPS tracker with real time tracking info that will show exactly where they have been and also where they are at any time o within ten seconds of real time.

http://trackit247.com/gps-leaflet-distribution/

Part 3: I am hoping that not being as tight ar$ed as some on here and actually paying a fair wage instead of minimum wage will be enough to inactivate people to stay honest, cause if they aren't I wont waste my timer or theirs.

As with all employee situations you will go through five messers to get to one good one.

 
thinking of going down this route as well I need my 3rd van topping up and go from there , i will be watching your updates please keep us posted even if it all falls to bits , posts like this are worth there weight in gold

 
@Green Pro Clean Ltd what age is this girl ?? to be working for 6.29 per hour min wage she must be below 20 ??

its fair u do pay higher than the min but remember that it is 6.70 per hour for older people and the wage structure is changing in may to include a 50p pay increase on the min wage which u will still be ahead of but just wondering what age she is ??

 
Actually @peter rogers I quoted a slightly dated adult rate of minimum wage.

For someone of her age minimum wage is actually £3.89 per hour.

However I do believe that if you are doing the same job as someone twice your age you should still get the same pay. After all the work is the same.

 
what actually is her age /?
Is there and actual relevance to this question Peter? I personally do not see it if there is.

It holds no relevance to me weather shes 18 or 48, she is doing the same job hence I will pay her the same wage.

You seem a little obsessed with the age of my canvasser Peter.

 
Quick update.

Her second day, first day working solo. Total 4 hours, only spoke to 12 people she found home, knocked loads of doors but hardly anyone home today.

2 Customers @ £10 ea

2 Customers @ £12 ea

1 Customer @ £15 (Bi-Monthly)

1 Customer @ £16 (Has a small conservatory.

After the first cleans these six houses will bring in £67.50 (Monthly average) increasing turnover by £810 per year.

Cost to me, 4 hours at £8 per hour. £32 - so once I clean these tomorrow morning I am already £35.50 in profit.

She seems to be loving the job and still seems keen so fingers crossed she sticks with it.

 
glad to see it working , where did you find her from ? if she packs in have you a idear where your next ones comeing from ?

 
I advertised on Gumtreee Noddy,

I had 3 replies, 1st was from her.

2nd was a text that read 'I have seen the job and like thee look of it' I wonder what sort of reply they were expecting?

3rd was a call from an eastern European with broken English even though the advert says 'fluent English essential'

I will keep you posted as to how it works out.

 
Good info green.

Im going to go this route myself, tried it before and it was ok, but in my situation it would be one day a week for now.

thinking female this time also

 
an angle on this is your canvasser/you can also promote other services while out on the street .

iv recently been promoting a new startup in my area a gardener cum handyman guy given his number to no end of people and hes offeing me money . iv not taken any yet but once hes got propely going i might as i often meet people who need his sort

 
Been thinking a bit out of the box lately myself, i have posted an ad for a canvasser for just one day a week (4 hours) paying £7.50 p/h so its going to cost me £30 per week, but it has the bonus of making me canvass as well so even if w only pick up say 2-3 custies total between us it is not wasted money and at the very least gets me say 300 leaflets or more out.

Also like you said boar what we could do is find another local business/businesses and offer to post there leaflets at the same time or even go one step further and execute my marketting plan i have codenamed "gamechanger" which i am not sure i want to share as i have only heard of one other windy doing it (and it works amazingly)

I think sometimes we try to do everything ourselves and forget the art of leveraging other people, i mean lots of people employ window cleaners but marketting is a massive field in itself and really is the key to unlock a businesses potential.

 
@boarcity I have to disagree with you (again /emoticons/tongue.png ) My canvasser is not their to service other 'businesses / trades' there is the post office for that or leafleting companies.

The reason for my disagreement is that the canvasser is doing just that, 'Canvassing' she only gives flyers to people she talks to, she is not just stuffing them in letterboxes, if no one is home, onto the next property. She is there to get new customers for my business, not to drop leaflets for pizzas, taxis etc.

I also do not have an interest in promoting any other tradesmen, eg: gardeners, painters, handymen etc, cause if it goes tits up then it will come back to bite you when the customer says, 'well you recommended them' I don't care if a gardener wants to bung me a tenner I am not here for the quite buck I am here for the repeat customers.

If you want to earn money by having staff drop leaflets then start promoting a leafleting service.

@adamangler My disagreement with your statement is that the canvasser is costing you £30 for 4 hours 1 day per week, if they are any good you can reasonably expect 1 customer per hour say at a minimum of £8 per hour so hence the canvasser is making you £2 per day from day one, not costing you a penny in reality.

I do agree that having a canvasser working for you also motivates you to get out and canvass yourself, free exercise and get your backside promoting your business.

Today my canvasser only managed an hour before the rain started hammering down.

She got 1 x £18 and 2 x £12 - £42 per month total. I paid her for two hours for coming out (not her fault the weather kicked in) so that cost me £16. So I am instantly £26 up when I clean these 3 tomorrow morning.

 
Green when i said costing me £30 im talking worse case scenario and its not going to break the bank to try it out

In reality like you say it will make money from the off, i posted an add this morning and had a couple of replys already.

I did this on two occasions earlier this year the first lad we only got 1 custy between us in 2 hours, the second lad we got 5 between us in 3 hours then picked up 2 more from leaflets we dropped.

Neither wanted to do it again and i gave up looking for someone but i was only paying them about 6.50 p/h

This time im advertising it as £30 per 4 hours and maybe a bonus like you say to make them graft

 
will be intrested to see the following on effect. how u handle employing is the test of you as a person . in my own town is a guy who i once admired,he had 2 vans and probably 3 employees but HE couldnt handle employing,BUT blamed the lads for everything . now hes on his lonesome downsized ,iv had a few chats with him,only employed less than a yr couldnt hack it and very bitter he is. reading between the lines he isnt a employer type but wont admit it

 
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Green is your canvasser youngish or oldish. most of my custies are mid 30s + and was wondering if a younger or older person would interact better with potential customers. Im thinking of putting an advert on gumtree as the system seems to be paying dividens for you and its not a massive outlay if it does go tits.Thanks

 
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