Should be busy through this month until Christmas, after that seems to be a crapshoot until March. Being at home and not working/making money drives me crazy. Get cabin fever after about 2 slow days. Seems to affect my mood, motivation, and drive.
My logical part of my brain is saying you should be relaxing, you just kicked ass all year and now you get to relax and slow down until March. But part of my brain get anxiety - will I have enough work/money.
Maybe I’m just venting off here but has anyone else experienced this feeling?
I worry that I won’t earn as much business next year as I did in my first - I’m trying to grow my business and carry my employee through this winter with me…
I don’t remember being this stressed since I started my business.
I have one full-time employee who rocks, so I really want to keep him on so I can get a running start this Spring.
Sometimes I just wonder if its all a fluke, like I’ve gotten lucky to get where I am at ya know?
I feel your pain, im working on my fourth year in business now, and this is the first winter where it isn’t as dead as it has been. Last 3 times i went through Nov and Dec with no jobs. This year I have booked multiple jobs in November and just booked 3 gutters and 2 wc jobs for next week. You just need to get your name out there more. If you were busy last year , why not call you past customers from the last 3 years from same time frame, or 6 months prior and ask if they need a winter cleaning.
Why not run a holiday special were you go in to do inside cleaning before/after the holidays? It might be too cold for the outsides but you can always just inside the places.
And for us in the southern hemisphere Summer rocks, I had most of December booked out a few months ago. Everyone wants those clean windows for our sunny xmas.
With that said January is my quietest time of the year, is just like my winter as winter here is generally 75 so I get just as much work in winter.
I’m right there with you. I 99% shut down “paid” operations in the winter months. Relaxing down time only goes so far. Once I find the motivation winter is my time to market and stay in touch with old potential clients. I work on redoing all my proposals and updating contracts. Also, what I love doing is trying to replace my lowest paying 20%+ of clients with higher paying ones.
Also, find something meaningful to do. Example: take care of an old neighbor, volunteer, go to to the gym etc…
Use this time like I used my summer: Redo your marketing materials to hit the ground running when the season is ripe again. Door hangers, flyers, kick around some plans for the coming year on the forum here.
Dont allow cabin fever to foment frivolous spending though.
And stay busy, even when you’re not focused on the business. Like others said, exercise, volunteer time, family time, etc. will go miles toward fixing your mental state. Humans NEED meaningful work, even if money isn’t the goal.
