[daysdeepclean]

Just gone down to check my bank transactions and Thomons have helped themselves to £61.00... I thought the £500 I had paid them was for the whole thing but upon reading the "Small Print" I was wrong.... another 9 months of £61.00 to go....

So this is to all you people out there just starting up, be careful, advertisers are parasites and are out there to get at your hard earned cash... Study what you're letting yourself in for and don't be allured by seeing your name "Up in lights" so to speak.

My biggest mistake was not looking at forums like this at the off set!

And I suppose you're wondering how many calls I've had via Thomson Directory..... 1, that's right 1.... In 2 Months!

[JandS]

I've had 10 since it came out in I think it was July.
Funnily enough that's what I was paying almost exactly since I took on the deal in February for 10 months but no deposit of £500??

John

[clinton]

Thompson local arnt the best to get qality work from :

Has always had the cheaper cleaners offering cheap prices.Thompsons were the first to let you print your prices in and some of the ones in our area were cheap 

[daysdeepclean]

I'm looking forward to them ringing back with their patter, I'll have great pleasure in telling them where to get off 

It does seem to be the van livery and referals that do it for me.... If YP picks up a bit more pace I'd be happy

[clinton]

Colin

 

[Joe H]

Colin

So the end bill is about £1100 .?

How big is the adv for that price?

[clinton]

Must be half page at least i guess for the thompson local

[daysdeepclean]

Oops, I've just gone through all my records and it appears I've made a monumental F**k up! And it's not the first time today either Sorry again Nevil : : :

It actually transpires that at the same time I took out advertising with a local directory who I'd had paid up front, I've confused the 2. It is an eighth of a page and comes to £464 for the year... I feel a bit of a tit now but hey, I have to hold my hands up and come clean!

It's really been one of those days today!

In my defence though your honour, £464 is still bleedin expensive for 1 call every 2 months and that was a price shopper!!!

[AJB]

I had a box in Thomson directory 11 years ago, i was promised
10 - 15 enquiries a week, for the size i had.
I recieved 13 in the whole year, so told them where to go. I get
as many enquiries off the free single line entry, that you get as
a previous customer, as i did from the paid box.

[clinton]

Think its v poor now and also has gone down futher than y pages.

Trouble is the less quality adverts go in the less the customers wil enquire

[dave123]

Thomson 's  & YP are rip offs . Knocked Thomsons on the head a few years back and I'm going to do the same with YP this year .Total waste of hard earned money . Yahoo is another one that I gave the big E to . As from now just going to stick to leaflets , direct mail, & the reminders .

[JandS]

My best campaign is still the local papers.
£50 a week though.

John

[Neil Williams]

Thomsons got the boot 2 years ago even though they do put up some fight to keep you on. The best one was
"We will have to send someone around so you can sign the cancellation forms" 
Tell you what mate stick them in the post
They insisted on sending someone around so when he came around I kept him outside and signed the form (after careful reading) on the bonnet of his car 
Yellow pages will get the kick this year

keeping the web site listings though. 

[Gerry Styles]

thompsons and yell, both rip offs

[cleaningmaster]

Colin
I gave them the big E 2yrs ago
I paid out£1700 in my first, and only, year(with them)
I got one, YES ONE job, £45.00 minimum charge

Great return dont you think??

Daryl

[nevil]

Hi Colin. No problem with the biting off my head incident.

I too have had a bad day. Started cleaning carpets in a two bed house earlier. The coupler that drives the blower decided to give up in spectacular fashion. Damaging the throttle assembly and some electrics on it's way down.

Had to get the porty out to finish the job.

I now know what I'll be doing next week. I think I will do what Mike H has done and fit one that was designed to to rotate a small planet on it's axis.

[Aquakleen Restoration Services]

Hi Colin

£61 a month would almost get you 5000 leaflets printed up by Printcarrier.com (glossy, full colour 2 sided). £500 would get you 55,000 leaflets from them!! If I was you id put 200 a day in peoples letterboxes and youd get a better response than one call believe me! Ive started doing it and although its not been amazing (2 jobs for 4 hours leafleting worth about £200) so far it has been worth it. It takes around an hour for me to do 200 (sometimes a little longer) and thats semi detached houses. It isnt exciting work but your running your own business! What would you be rather doing, leafleting for an hour a day or working in a factory some place? I only do an hour a day, any longer than that and youd get sick of your life and soon give up! One hour out of your day is nothing! Put your ipod on and listen to some music while you do it! Its good exercise, will keep you fit and get you work!! For me there are only 3 ways to get regular work in this business...leaflets, website and direct mailing. Referals, repeat business and keeping in contact with your customer database goes without saying. Spending money on yellowpages, thomsons directory, yell.com is throwing your money away. Im not saying you wont get any work from them Im saying spend your money on better forms of marketing to get better results!
John

[daysdeepclean]

Skywalker,

You make some very good points, the benefits of leafletting far outweigh giving those greedy b****rds my hard earned! It is often said you can target certain area's too!

An hour's walking a day is what I need (The wife would agree) to loose my beer belly!

[robert meldrum]

It's good to WALK

Colin

Did you get the machine fixed ?

[Aquakleen Restoration Services]

Hi Colin

Im not wafer thin myself but an hours walk a day will soon get you trimmed up in a few months!! Honestly mate £250 extra a week makes £1000 per month, £12,000 a year for an hours walking a day! It's hit and miss. Some weeks you may get nothing, other weeks you might hit on and get some major jobs! Thats the name of the business!

John