Marketing

[paddy84]

Hello,

I have recently started a Commercial Cleaning Business, I have a couple of contracts in a large town doing office cleans. I really want to advertise my business in the same town to gain further contracts enabling me to employ someone to eventually to cover that town.

I am having a web site built at the moment, so will soon be on the web, until then, Id like to advertise directly to other businesses in the area to try and win new contracts. I was thinking either a by mail directly, email or flyer (I do have flyers made up, aimed at commercial and domestic) but I was thinking something more specifiec to the indivdual companies, that are mainly offices, and small shops and resturants etc.

I am new to all this, whilst I do have alot of ideas, I would like opinions from others, who know more than me!! Does anyone have any ideas?

Cheers

 

[SBOnline]

Hi Paddy,

You could personalise a letter quite easily using Mail Merge in Word and Excel - get the addresses for the businesses you want to target online and mail them.

If you have a logo you can insert the logo into the header in Word so it looks more like letterhead and be sure to mention the work you are already doing (especially if they are willing to give a recommendation or quote you can use!).

You can use the mail merge function to personalise aspects of the letter and maybe include one of your flyers.

Possibly one of the easier ways to mass market without over-spending.

Maybe let them know you have a website coming soon and once it is online you can mail them again with the address etc.

Hope this helps.

 

[hwglassuk]

hi friend you have to carry on the momemtum

 

[jonmcculloch]

I am new to all this, whilst I do have alot of ideas, I would like opinions from others, who know more than me!! Does anyone have any ideas?
Cheers

Test, test, and then test some more.

One of the hurdles you're going to have to get over in your business is getting clients to change from their current provider to you (unless you find new start-ups like your own, for instance).

It's not really enough just to compete on price, either. That's the quick way to the funny-farm, and in any case price is important only when you don't give them another reason to buy from you rather than your competitors (there's always the unspoken question going through your prospect's mind -- "why should I buy from you rather than from your competitors?").

What makes you different? What makes you better? What do your competitors do their own clients hate, and so you can promise NOT to do it? What do your competitors NOT do that they ought to... so you can promise you WILL do it?

These (and others) are questions you need to answer before you even think about marketing yourself.

If I was in your position, what I'd be inclined to do is do my research on my local businesses and make a shot list of the dozen or so I'd give my left nut to work with and then target them with a well thought-out and focused campaign.

Since your clients are going to have to switch to you from someone else (meaning there's huge inertia for them to do nothing), you might have to offer something pretty spectacular, like a guarantee if they're not happy after a month you'll give them all their money back and walk away. Takes balls but that kind of bold guarantee does work.

Something else you can try if you're going into brand new territory is an endorsed mailing from other companies who have the same kind of clients you want. You'll probably have to do some kind of revenue-sharing, but, then, that's just your marketing outlay if you think about it (Jay Abraham is a master at this, so it's worth Googling him. His stuff isn't cheap, though).

Direct mail does work for small businesses, but I suggest you study a few books on direct response advertising and direct mail before you put your money into it. It's a skill - and one you're better off learning before you spend money on a mailshot.


Warmly,

Jon

 

[kate1]

OP

I maybe be able to help

 

[truesilver]

Hi

Letters, flyers and emails are great, but because they're passive marketing (ie you are waiting for people to call you) they can be really hit and miss and take a while. A great thing to do if you're starting out is to call the company, speak to the person who deals with cleaning contractors and then email them or post a letter.

The advantage of doing it that way is when the email or letter arrives they're expecting it. If you get it there quick you'll impress them straight away. The conversion rate is much better than cold mail outs. Plus you can save a fortune on postage and buying data. You never know, you may even speak to someone who needs your services there and then!

If you want some examples of scripts etc we've used, I can email them to you. Just DM me.

Good luck.

L

 

[kate1]

Thats right truesilver, its what I do on behalf of several contractors, you must ring and send info out almost immediately, they are expecting it, youve spoken to the decision maker.

 

[Phil Richardson]

Hi Paddy,

They key to success for me is research. I'm not talking about spending weeks on this but enough to answer a lot of your questions.

Competitors - Who are they, where do they work, what do they offer, why do people buy from them, how do they market themselves etc.

Market - Yes you can probably sell to 10,000 companies in your local area but it probably isn't effective or economically viable to market yourself to all of these effectively. I'd focus on a few industries or niches where you can really add value to your clients. You can always widen your target market in time. Once you have chosen a target really understand that market, what motivates them, how they buy, who are the decision makers in the organisations, what are there contact details.

Once you have this information you can then put together a marketing plan to target them. As Jon said try not to focus on price as if you win on price you are likely to lose on price as soon as a better offer comes along.

In terms of marketing i'd use an integrated approach, website, Twitter, Adwords, Telemarketing, letters, flyers etc. to both get your name in the market and to generate sales leads.

It's difficult giving ideas until you know exactly what types of company's you are going to target.

Hope this helps

 

[aapkae]

you still looking for help?

 

[MJ Britton]

Hi Paddy,

Jon McCulloch's response is probably your best advice here. Most small business get hung up on tactics before thinking through their strategy.

If you're going to succeed you've got to start thinking of marketing as a system - it's not an event, but an ongoing process of being discovered, liked, trusted....right through to being referred.

First off, think about what makes you the best choice for your ideal type of customer. Coincidentally I've just written about differentiating yourself from the competition and typical types of attributes your business can choose to stand out in the market. Follow the link in my signature and take a look at today's article for more details (it's entitled 'How to Differentiate Your Business From the Competition).

However, for your chosen competitive 'attribute' to have any credibility you've got to have others telling your prospects why you're so good. You need proof.

This is the challenge you face in helping your business gain traction.

How about you offer a select few local business a free spring clean in exchange for a donation to charity? That way you get the chance to showcase your work and generate some local newspaper publicity.

I'm sure you can come up with a name for the marketing campaign that ties in with cleaning and the charity.

Good luck!

 

[paddy84]

Thanks to everyone for their contributions, there are some good ideas out there.
I do like the ideas of Jon Mcculloch regarding trial periods etc, this would appear to give a potential customer a risk free commitment to using our services.

The business around the area I am referring to are mainly offices, shops and resturants.

I think I may have a walk around and 'eye up' potential customers and contanct them directly, to discuss our services with their cleaning contracts manager, as discussed by truesilver.

Once again, thanks for your input so far, any additional ideas gratefully received!!

 

[truesilver]

You're welcome. Hope it goes well.

 

[XanderMarketing]

What about taking the view that you're going to educate prospects? So create some kind of guide for example:

Free guide: how to get your commercial cleaning done properly at the lowest possible price

At the end of the guide you could offer to clean a small room for free.

The guide can be promoted in: letters, emails, your website, through landing pages, social media, in advertisements.

If you've educated your prospect and given them stuff for free (which is hard to turn down) why wouldn't they use you over your competitors?

This strategy has been used by a famous carpet cleaning company in America and we use it with a number of our clients in different industries to generate leads...

 

[Fresco_Creative]

Hello,

I have recently started a Commercial Cleaning Business, I have a couple of contracts in a large town doing office cleans. I really want to advertise my business in the same town to gain further contracts enabling me to employ someone to eventually to cover that town.

I am having a web site built at the moment, so will soon be on the web, until then, Id like to advertise directly to other businesses in the area to try and win new contracts. I was thinking either a by mail directly, email or flyer (I do have flyers made up, aimed at commercial and domestic) but I was thinking something more specifiec to the indivdual companies, that are mainly offices, and small shops and resturants etc.

I am new to all this, whilst I do have alot of ideas, I would like opinions from others, who know more than me!! Does anyone have any ideas?

Cheers

An idea I have is to maybe really sound off this idea to small businesses local to yours that don't have a website.

I do like this idea and it is one to put to the test. Its also a great way to get networking from the offset with other businesses local to yours. Consider the businesses without websites though, as mentioned.

 

[eventdomain]

I agree with giving some sort of trial period, or another freebie - then they can try you out at no risk. Its tough starting out, but free trials/offers are great for building relationships and you'd be surprised how quickly you can build up a list of clients that actually use your service.

I built up 500 new clients doing exactly this, now they all pay me. This works like a dream, but the downside is no profit for a few months, while these prospects try you out.

Use these new clients and get testimonials, which you then place on your website and/or quote in sales letters - also dont forget to put lists of your new clients into a blog and use the blog lots by adding 'our latest news/developments' - which gets indexed by search engines.

 

[paddy84]

Thanks for the additonal contributions, there are some excellent ideas being put forward, which I never thought of.

I do agree that a free trial period is an excellent idea. After recieving all this excellent advice, I am now going to put this into practice, and get some additional leaftets drawn up offering some form of free trial. When the website is up and running, I shall also promote this on the web. Hopefully with all that some some helpful word of mouth, I can begin to expand my customer base.

Once again, thanks for all your excellent advice.

 

[juicyonline]

Can be made ​​in the form of a website to show to more people see ah. Spread of the Internet back to the mail faster than

 

[kate1]

Hi Paddy

I really dont think you need to offer anything for free.

 

[elisnov]

Direct mails should be ok for you

 

[royalmatt]

if you want to generate traffic to you business, reviews from existing customers plays an important role in marketing also mouth publicity is the best strategy by customers, afterword you can market your business via website with the one of SEO specialist. IT WORKS