Why do so many new cleaning businesses fail? For some reason, many people think they can create a house cleaning business out of nothing and that no real planning is involved. Yes, you can start by doing the cleaning yourself with your clients as your boss, but there may come a time when you want to expand into a real business with unlimited income potential.
Business planning is actually a road-map that you design to provide you with the steps you need to take to reach the success you want. For instance, how do you transition from doing the cleaning yourself to hiring workers to do the work for you? How do you guarantee the quality of the cleaning that is being done by workers to keep your existing customers happy? How many new clients can you service with the current inventory you have on-hand?
This site was created to provide others with the information I used to build a solid business with teams of workers doing the cleaning. Recently, I came across an interesting article that warned of the most common mistakes that are made by startup companies.
Table of Contents
Mistakes in Business Planning
Unrealistic Financial Projections
Your Business Plan should outline realistic projections of the anticipated growth of the company. Make sure you do your research and know what the industry standard is in your area.
Failure to Analyze Your Competition
You cannot ignore your competition and you cannot paint an unrealistic picture. Find out who they are, what their
weaknesses are and how you plan to compete in the market.
Poor Research
Many new business owners do not double-check and substantiate their claims. Make sure your research is current and provide statistical information.
Target Audience Not Defined
No business will appeal to “everyone,” even a house cleaning business. The market should be clearly defined and you should present a clear picture of who will buy your services and why. Dig even deeper; find out who these people are, where they live, why they want your service and what interests they have. Identify your target market for residential cleaning services with this special report on how to get it done correctly.
Over-Hype
Make sure you have sound business ideas and are not relying on hype.
PLANNING TO GROW YOUR BUSINESS
Business growth doesn’t just happen – it’s planned. Yes – you could take on too many new clients and negatively affect your business. Yes – you could quickly hire workers and negatively affect your business.
Are you planning to grow your business in the new year? Increase house cleaning revenue with this free plan to review your business before your start the planning process. This step-by-step plan will help you to know what areas of your business you should be paying attention to.
You see, if you take on too many new clients and fail to provide excellent service, you could actually have more negative news spreading about you and your business than good! And if you hire the wrong workers because you need to service your new clients, they may not do the work as you planned, and now you have more negative news spreading about you, your business and the bad workers you hire!
A business that tries to grow too fast could quickly go out of business. Planning your business growth is the only way to grow successfully.
How many open slots do you have in your schedule?
This is the number of new clients you can accept and service with your current staff. To bring in more revenue, you will need to schedule more clients and hire the workers to service them.
How many new clients do you want?
More clients increase revenue, but also increase your operating costs. Document what you want and what it will take to get what you want.
What inventory do you need to purchase to service new clients?
You will need more caddies and equipment to service more clients. This will also require that you invest in additional product volume for the workers you hire.
What advertising will you produce to get more clients?
Review what has worked best for you in the past and plan to use that for your advertising. If you already get more calls than you can service, then you really don’t need to spend the money on advertising.
What advertising will you generate to get more workers?
It’s not easy to find good cleaners – just having a body will not help you grow your business. The timing for placing your ads is critical – you don’t want new workers and no clients for them to service. And you don’t want to be left with new clients and no way to service them! Time your ads correctly and plan to use the method(s) you’ve used before that resulted in the best response.
How will you manage the new clients and workers?
You can’t be everywhere, so you will need a plan to manage the new clients and workers. Do you know someone who would like the extra responsibility? I always looked to my employees first before looking outside the business. You’d be surprised how many of them will be ready to take on more responsibility for more money. How will you ensure that all your clients are kept happy? You’ll need to plan surveys that you can use to get feedback.
How will you schedule new clients and employees?
It’s a tricky thing to schedule new clients when you don’t yet have the workers to service them. I never sent out new workers alone, so I always planned to work my teams with an extra worker until I knew I would keep the new person. Once the new worker was hired in a permanent status, I started to split the new clients onto their own schedule.
Good business planning will be your key to growing a successful business AND preventing your failure!
I created a report to help you discover if building or expanding a residential cleaning business is for you. Wouldn’t you like to know if you could be successful in this business before you dive in? Download a list of things needed to start a business in this FREE report now.
For more information on a range of related topics, click here to review the products I have created to help you plan, build, and expand a cleaning business.
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