[richy27]

I have just done a run of leaflets with a price on for 2 and 3 bed houses. to try and get things movin for me good response so far from it. Refuse to turn into a busy fool though cleaning for nought. better to do one good job a day rather than runnin here and there for peanuts. Because of the geographics of where i am i do have to travel for work but generally the houses are bigger down here so worth the drive. Lets face and average 3 or 2 bedroom house dont want to pay the earth for a clean.

[Mike Osbourne]

Mike

Yes for ease I put a ref number by the phone number. Below ten responses is def. not enough 20 is ideal, any more and you are going beyond testing. If the leaflets alternate you make sure a street has an even number of each leaflet.

[Carpet Genie]

Gents, i've used leaflets with and without prices on them and by far the best response i had was the ones with approx prices on them.
I don't want to take loads of calls from people who just want a price off me because personally i don't want to waste my time.
I'd rather someone already have an approxiamte idea of the price i'm going to charge and they can make their mind up prior to ringing me if they want the job done or not.
Lets be honest i would say the majority of people who ring us for a job already know something about us. They've either been recommended to us or they've previously had work done by us.
If you take that you can fit in three jobs per day then if you work for 200 of the days of the year allowing for days off, holidays etc then you can realistically look to do about 600 jobs a year. Most regular customers have their carpets cleaned twice a year so your looking at 300 regular customers per year.   
If you look at your customer base i would say that the vast majority if not all of you already have that number on your books.

Now if the average job was between £60 to £100 then you could be earning between £36,000 to £60,000 which i would say is a very reasonable wage.

Now my point in all these facts and figures and getting back to the original point is that by putting the prices on the leaflets we are reminding our regular customers that we are still operating and reminding them of the prices we offer. They already know that we are professional and will provide a quality service. Therefore they just want to know whether they can afford to have their carpets or upholstery cleaned, and i personally would rather them ring me knowing this before i embark on a sales pitch.

Of course i accept that we also want to attract new customers but you have to remember that eventually you will reach a saturation point and cannot do any more jobs so then you want to be able to weed out the £60 jobs so that you are only doing the £100 ones thereby increasing your income for the same amount of effort. So how do you attract the new customers??? That's the million dollar qestion!!!

[derek west]

good post mike, all though i'm not sure about twice a year. be nice though.
derek

[Ricky M]

Im lucky enough to have a few ( 15/20 with out looking) clients that I go to 3 times a year
an a lot more 2 times a year .
Derek your an x market trader as have I for a short while in my Very early teens  , cant understand why you aint getting a program , plan or system to roll them over a time scale .

THEY WANT THERE CARPETS ETC TO LOOK GOOD ALL YEAR ROUND !!!

There like babies we just need to point them in the right direction

Ricky

[mark_roberts]

£36000 less your expenses at £20000 is £16000 which is a poor wage as the average is £25k.

When doing sums dont forget the unseen as well ie. pension, sick pay, holiday pay, critical illness cover etc.  I think this is where many cleaners go wrong in their pricing and that is why their so cheap.

Mark

[The Great One]

Hi

Genie , Good post and glad you have found something that works but I do also have to agree with Mark.

£36000-£60,000 is Gross wage, take out all your materials, capital expenses, wages (if any) petrol, car/van tax, MOT, vehicle ins, etc. Say that was £16000 on the £36000 Gross, which leaves you £20,000 you will then have to pay Tax and NI on this amount which will leave you with around £15,000, possibly less (depending on circumstances)

Regards

Martin

[M.Acorn]

On my last batch of flyers i put a 20% discount on the front,however when quoting i upped the price a little to compensate    ,customers are hanging on to them so they can use them again,have been back to several places.
Had 3 phone calls yesterday,didn`t get a booking out of any of them though,one bloke with 3 bed house said he had been quoted £80,and could i beat it ,said i wasn`t even going to tell him what i would be ! which is generally £150 upwards for a 3 bedder !

[Shaun_Ashmore]

largish Victorian terrace wanting stairs landing stairs landing was quoted £65 I quoted £100 ish also a rental out in the sticks the equivalent of 7 rooms £140 and could I beat it? only with a stick

Luckily I'm in a position that if I don't get them another omes along to fill it NOT all cleaners can say that and do tend to drop their prices to fill in the gaps in quieter times.

Shaun

[Carpet Genie]

Hi

Genie , Good post and glad you have found something that works but I do also have to agree with Mark.

£36000-£60,000 is Gross wage, take out all your materials, capital expenses, wages (if any) petrol, car/van tax, MOT, vehicle ins, etc. Say that was £16000 on the £36000 Gross, which leaves you £20,000 you will then have to pay Tax and NI on this amount which will leave you with around £15,000, possibly less (depending on circumstances)

Regards

Martin

  I've got my overheads down to less than £5000 per annum meaning my profit margins are much higher. I ended up buying all new gear this year so the taxman wouldn't get his hands on my cash!  Hope they don't view this forum!!

[Carpet Genie]

Cheers Clinton,   I've been lucky so far this year - January has been really good for me so far and the "credit crunch" doesn't seem to be affecting my customers yet.
Hopefully it'll stay that way but i won't be doing too much spending now just in case.

[Jim Gibbard]

Mike,
"So how do you attract the new customers??? That's the million dollar qestion!!!

A few years ago, I asked myself the question " Why do the Chem-Dry's of this world, take the cream off the Top".

I thought about it and reasoned that they rarely operated in "Working Class" areas but always seemed to target the "Moneyed" areas.  If you ain't do'in it, copy someone who is, I thought.  So, I had some nice leaflets printed, delivered them in a "moneyed" area and - "BINGO".  It actually worked.  In that area, average income per job went from about £60 to over £150 and did quite a few £300+ jobs, which was previously very rare.  

Successful marketing is fairly simple: Find enough customers willing to pay what you are willing to accept - the theory is fine - practice, may be another thing.
Jim G

[Ryan Smyth]

Good point Jim,but what if you get a lot of enquiries from working class areas,do you keep the same price structure and more than likely lose that business or do you adapt it

Ryan

[Jim Gibbard]

Good point Jim,but what if you get a lot of enquiries from working class areas,do you keep the same price structure and more than likely lose that business or do you adapt it

Ryan

Yes Ryan you adapt.  Try never to turn good work away, you might not have any when you most need it.  It's a horses for courses thing.

Jim G

[Ryan Smyth]

The majority probably would be working class to "comfortable" working class as i would call them,but in fairness i havnt really tried to target affluent areas yet.I was out this morning with my trusty flyers and i headed straight to the more well heeled areas so we'll see how it goes i am also going to take note of the addresses and find out the postcodes and send letters,information packs to these areas and see what happens.

Ryan

[Mike Osbourne]

Clinton,

People are still recovering from Christmas spending as well. There is 'bargain' fever out there though. Fuel down, food down, everything down.