How to Promote an Office Cleaning Business

Copyright (c) 2008 Brent Wale

If you are thinking about starting up your own janitorial/ cleaning business, here are some low-cost promotional strategies & techniques you can use to get accounts for your office cleaning business.

Starting an office cleaning business is simple, and requires little start-up capital. For the most part, the only expense involves buying supplies and advertising.

Fortunately, cleaning supplies are cheap, and it costs even less to advertise in local newspapers, or online. Because most business professionals are busy, they are willing to pay a company or individual to clean their offices. You just need to learn how to brand your Office cleaning company in order to grow your business.

Remember, Almost anyone can clean. The trick is to hire others to do all the cleaning once you get things up and running. This leaves you free to generate new business. There are very simple and inexpensive ways to market your office cleaning accounts.

Here are just a few simple ways:

* Specialized Service:

If you offer your cleaning service for just one type of business.. let’s say , lawyer’s offices, by concentrating all your efforts in one type of clients, it will make your life easier, and your efforts far more better than being everything for everyone. Think about this, if a lawyer compares between 2 companies, company A is a general commercial cleaning company that offers service for all type of businesses, and company B specializes in just lawyer offices. Who would he choose?

By specializing in one or few types of service you give a message that you offer a service tailored for their needs,and that’s exactly what loyal clients want. Try to copy this idea by finding a small niche, like Doctor’s offices, dental offices, pharmacies, Real Estate, High Tech offices, etc..

Don’t misunderstand me here. You can still go after any type of offices to clean. But you can tailor your marketing towards each individual type of industy. In other words..You can have specialized services in many different industries.

* GIVE-A-WAYS:

One marketing strategy used by office cleaning business owners are giveaways”. Businesses love to try services for free. Once they see what a good job you do, and once you earn their trust, there’s a good chance you have just earned a client. If you’re running a cleaning business, you could give away a cleaning tips brochure, free cleaning guides, or color swatches. Once you begin giving away authoritative information customers will begin to perceive you as an expert in your field. (This may seem somewhat difficult and time consuming but I promise you it’s not).

* Business Cards:

This is one of the greatest marketing tool for any Janitorial/office cleaning business. The problem is most folks that are new to the office cleaning business don’t know how to do this correctly. If you know how to get your business card into the hands of the right people, at the right time you will generate a ton of business just from this one little strategy alone.

Simply learn how to Provide an irresistible offer on the back of the card for new clients. This has worked for office cleaning business owners many times over!

You don’t have to hand out 200 business cards and hope for the best. There are methods of getting leads that can actually help you obtain more business than if you were running an expensive full-page advertisement in the phone book!

* Print Advertising:

Start by setting an advertising budget. Once you set your budget, decide where to advertise. For a cleaning business it makes no sense and would be a waste of your money to advertise in a large magazine or buy a TV commercial that airs on a Saturday night. Besides being expensive, these ads will most likely not reach your target audience. The common print ad, run in your local newspaper or shopper, is the most basic unit of advertising.

Print ads have launched major office cleaning companies and created many success stories. Running ads in a local paper can be a great way to promote your cleaning business…but you must follow a few basic rules.

Your ad should attract attention! Although this sounds obvious, unless your ad attracts attention you are throwing your money down the drain. The most compelling way to have a “noticeable” ad is to have an interesting and visually appealing headline. If you are designing a large ad, think of using a subhead. This will provide added information and can be longer than the headline.

* Greeting Cards:

Greeting cards can be used as a great Marketing Tool when it comes to repeat business and referrals. Use them to thank clients for their business. Send them as greeting for most of the holiday occasions. Try to send cards as early as possible so they can be the first in your clients mailbox. Surprise them first so they can always remember you. Use handwritten messages to show more appreciation to your customers. If you use this marketing tool,you can always save money by buying cards after occasions, in quantity and keep them for next year.

* Electronic Media:

Buy banner ads in electronic media. Look for websites that target your potential customers, such as your local chamber. This can deliver your information right to the business that needs your service.