Hello guys i am still pretty new i only been at it for a year. Right now i am pretty much broke with only 2 storefronts. My wife is the one working and i am trying to build the business i also do pressure washing and roof washing but right now its really slow. My question is what do you guys say is the fastest way to get new customers or store front accounts when getting a lot of NO’s in storefronts or we already have a window cleaner. Thanks for all the advice guys.
I just started in March. As soon as the weather warmed I put out about 200 door hangers I prob got 10-15 calls from 200. That’s an amazing call back success. I landed prob 4 of the jobs. Then landed a couple from 5 around door hangers saying we just cleaned your neighbors house. It’s a ton of work but numbers speak. I have not gotten any more out and I have no calls coming in. So I just made a summer door hanger and once we get back from vacation I’ll put out as many as possible. I am betting the calls start to come in. Store fronts suck I hear tons of no’s but I put my business in google business and I landed two last month from the google search. I have learned jobs are not coming to you and you will remain broke unless your willing to put miles and miles and miles on your boots. That is until you have enough to pay for EDDM. But you and I both are far from that.
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The fastest way to get customers is to buy a route.
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Thanks for the advice man yea i need to do more marketing and fylers.
How would you go about finding one are there anyways you recommed on getting one.
Don’t stop at store fronts. Hit residentials hard. Store fronts don’t really pay much unless you can string together a bunch of them. And that is fine but takes time. Residential can pay $300 to $400 pretty easy and you can schedule two a day conservatively. Even if you land 3 a week, that is major bank. Chase the store fronts but do not ignore the higher paying residential market.
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I recommend contacting all of the cleaning companies in your area and asking them if they want to sell.
If you get familiar with the search function for this forum you will find many posts discussing setting value for routes and purchasing options.
I also strongly recommend networking with other facility service companies, such as landscapers, painters, handyman, etc. Ask them for their cards (get several cards, that shows them you are serious about helping them) and give them several of your cards. They will appreicate getting referrals from you and will return the favor. Jobs from referrals have a MUCH higher percentage of getting landed than just cold call contacts.
Thank you garry i will do that. I live in south florida i am still trying to figure out the market here. I know there is a lot of window cleaners so thats something i have to deal with
Wow great advice i didnt think about that. Thank you so much
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Don’t let a lot of window cleaners stop you. I live in the Tampa Bay area of Florida. How many times do you see a McDonalds and Burger King within a block or two of each other? Gas Stations across the street from each other? How many different lawn services are working the same street or neighborhood? Just be confident and get out there and get you some.
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This time of year, the real money is in residential. Especially power washing. A few decent days of power washing will get you un-broke really quick.
But you gotta be efficient in your process to sell it well and make bank. Research on pressurewashingresource.com about “soft washing”, “downstreaming”, and “house washing”.
Even in a highly saturated market like Florida, you should be able to pull $100/hr fairly easily washing houses. I have a moderately good setup and typically pull $175-250/hr on-site, here in New England.
As far as acquiring those customers, you should follow anything @squidskc has to say about marketing on the PWR forum (though be cautious about signing up with HomeAdvisor)
Website, google business page & other directories, yard signs, flyers, door hangers, facebook local buy/sell pages, boosted fb ads, newspaper, etc. are all viable options.
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Thanks man! This popped up in my email so I had to check it out. Any bigger and my head will start needing grease to get through doors.
I should definitely say, that as much of a fan as I am of HomeAdvisor, I’m a little on the fence lately after seeing the videos of how their in office culture works.
I’m with Alex on adding PW. Since your main line of business I assume is window cleaning, you can call all your previous customers or set up a mail chimp campaign designed on Fiverr letting them know you now clean concrete, or something easy to start. You’ve got a market already. You can realistically get set up for <$2000 and $140 an hour isn’t unrealistic.
I won’t even send my guys up North to jobs in their area or the other two we have now Southeast for less than $140 an hour unless they want it and I don’t take any of it. Otherwise, I don’t even hook up the trailer for less than $300.
It’s a beautiful thing. I just wish I wasn’t a caveman and could get good at cleaning windows. I’ve said it 100 times, but a window cleaner can pressure wash. A pressure washer getting into window cleaning is like a carpenter trying to drive screws with a hammer.
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Wait until you have some reputation and numbers going before even considering HA. They can get expensive for someone new. You bid with other cleaners and still have to pay for the lead. Get the flyers out. I do 500 at a time…that costs me about 40 bucks. I bid all my work at 50 an hour. Hit it hard now. People want their windows done right now. Have fun, enjoy the journey, do good work. Get Window Cleaning Marketing Blueprint. Do a search above and you will come into a link for a free copy. 
You don’t need a pressure washer to do house washing & roof washing right? I’ve heard some just have a safe up with a 12 v pump.
What would be your recommendation on entry level equipment with the intention of eventually getting a nice trailer set up.
@Infinity and @steve can fill you in probably better than I can since they’re doing both with regularity as I understand it.
If your intention was to get into pressure washing as your main line of business I’d have a different answer. But if it’s your intention to wash a couple houses a week you can start with something like this https://shopwindowcleaningresource.com/hurricane-cold-water-gas-belt-drive.html
Or you can find a 3.5 gpm machine so that you can always hook up to house water and don’t need a tank. 4.0+ a buffer tank is a good idea, 5.5 gpm and higher it’s required.
But most simply, a 3.5 gpm pressure washer (PSI rarely matters between 2500 and 4000 psi) with a Honda horizontal shaft engine (don’t get a big box vertical shaft engine machine), a garden hose, a down stream injector, a 5 gallon bucket, soap nozzles, a surfactant, and 3 gallons of pool shock and you can wash an average two story house in a couple hours.
If you intend to do more than that I’d say buy a bigger machine, a trailer, some reels, and a tank. If you’re doing it full time 5.5 gpm is better, 7+ is best. But if you’re gonna go that route head to the pressure washing forum or I’d ask the gents above if you don’t want to wade through an ocean of info.
Sorry. I scrolled down and this part disappeared. Anyway. That’s tough because you have to rinse. And you need two tanks or garden hose to rinse and that limits you to maybe a two story home.
It’s simpler and easier to do it with a pressure washer. And the costs will be similar enough to make the pressure washer the best choice IMO.
NOOO! What are you doing?!? Lol. Use the search, Luke
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Haha is there much PW stuff here to search? Plus, you two are balancing both lines of business. If he heads to the PW forum he’s gonna get all of us telling him he needs an 8 gpm and dual axle trailer and roof pump and 5 reels no matter what. Lol Or IBS will just tell him to walk away.
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True. Lol.
But in all honesty, if I were starting over with just a part time schedule of window cleaning work, I would go all-in on the PW’ing, and make wc’ing an add-on.
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