How many recurring residential customers do you have?

I’ve been averaging one new recurring residential customer per day since 1st September this year, having started my new business around then also. I’m about to hit 100, and I’m wondering how many regular customers you guys have? I’m a one man operation currently, but at the current growth rate will need to find employees soon.

2 Likes

Congrats man! We don’t count our residential as reoccurring. Most do have you back at least once per year but you never know. Our storefronts and commercial is what we count as reoccurring. Right now service a little more than 400 per month give or take. But there is 3 of us.

2 Likes

I’m planning on working on my organizing skills on the office side while getting ready for taxes soon. Til then I don’t have a number to give, I am curious of how you’re marketing though. Just starting out, new in the biz gaining 1 new client per day? Sounds great!

Holy hell, that’s wild! Are these The same 400 every month?

A mixture of Google, Facebook and a website called Oneflare has been working really well. Word of mouth is now becoming a thing.

I’ve stayed away from the storefront stuff in my area as that’s where there’s saturation and I’m not willing to work for $20/hr. Residential is where it’s at here (Newcastle, Australia).

1 Like

Just started this new business, yes, but I’ve been cleaning windows on and off for 10 years or so.

1 Like

Yes these are the same clients. I understand stand that. But you are in control of that. I refuse to make that type of pay as well. But it’s taken time to grow our route and isnt for everyone.

I will say that our route buisness has given our company a very solid foundation. We still service residential and commercial properties, but our main focus has been and still is route work.

3 Likes

I certainly count residential as recurring if you serviced them yearly or more times per years. Loyal resi customer is the way to go if ya build it up. It very lucrative. Its not uncommon for me to make 1000 per custy per year in resi. Being 2 of them pays me 11k per year to clean for them and consistently for last 4 years. Word of mouth landed me the jobs tho. So it hard to find those clients…

3 Likes

I do have one day a week where I help out storefront customers, but I service their houses and really only do it out of good will (even though my minimum charge for storefronts is ridiculously high - but these customers will never go anywhere else and they are aware I am expensive)

1 Like

You’re absolutley right! Residential is considered reoccurring. It’s just not as consistent as route work or at least not for us. But I’m sure this is all how you setup your company.

Yeah its same with any cleaning services. Its all how you set it up. Whatever the path you go down, repeat rate is so important to have.

©Number of clients you serviced the past 2 years, more years the better.
® how many of them used you more than once.
(R/C) x 100 = repeat rate %.

With this formula and other biz formula i quickly discover that ya better price ya self correctly or you’ll screw yourself major especially with store-fronts that wants the job done paid with peanuts and you have to haul ass to get the number up…

Like you said, its not very everyone and its definitely not for me currently.

1 Like

Absolutely! Well said.

1 Like

Fuddlecupz, I would be careful thinking you Clint’s love you and will always be loyal to you. Clean windows are clean. And if someone comes around how seem to be just as good as you but cheaper. More often then not the Clint will switch. That is was makes storefronts hard. And if you loss your storefronts of Clint’s your also clean them homes for you could loss the home too.

I appreciate your concern, but I have established an amazing working relationship with these clients. A lot of them have originated from a website where they have already received significantly cheaper quotes but have still picked my services from the get go. A few have been burnt by unreliable providers and are happy to pay the extra, and others have told me they know they can get it cheaper but they know I’ll be there and will do a great job and will interact with their customers properly where necessary.

Me being more expensive is part of my initial sales pitch, so I establish it early but educate the customer and manage their expectations so they totally understand why they’re paying a little more.

Yep, and this is why I don’t chase them. I don’t canvass for them at all - these clients have asked me to do it because they’ve been impressed by the work Ive done on their houses first.

1 Like

I have to agree with @Fuddlecupz. I find myself to be much higher than some of my competitors and still manage to retain our clients. Even in the commercial side of things . That dosent mean that some clients wont switch. Meh let em go. I’ll find clients that are willing to pay for quality and reliability.

1 Like

Thank you guys for not low balling the market! This is what makes commercial so difficult in my opinion.

2 Likes

I’m (at a minimum) twice as expensive across the board (storefront, commercial, residential and CCU). I’m sure I’ll have some clients that will bail, but I’m happy to let them go.

No worries :slight_smile: although I’m sure my market here in Australia won’t change anything for you! I almost make a point with my pricing. I’ve had many, many people who are almost shocked by my prices call back the day of or day after the initial quote to schedule. One lady even showed me the message conversation she had with a lowballing competitor (which was very eye opening and gave me a lot of confidence)

I have found that really high prices in an unsaturated market (residential in my area) automatically causes prospects to be cautious of the other guys and question why they are so cheap.

1 Like

Convinced a client today after quoting $425 to clean the windows. She was shocked of of course… She says the other competitor does it for $275… so i thought…i most certainly can do it in under 3 hours, in and out…if they were clean to begin with!

So i said ill do it for $275 for every 3 months, 4x in 12 months.

Guess what?

She baked you cookies!?
Lol! That’s awesome! That’s kind of like one I have they said it was being fone for $300 in/out/screens. I quoted $650 to start with, let them talk me down to $450. “But” I can now finish the whole job in plenty enough time for $450 to be worth it, and with screens being inside, I have cleaned the outside only for $200 each time every 3 weeks from spring, up til 2 weeks ago.

I hate compromising on my initial bid but im so glad I did on this one!

2 Likes

She paid it all up front and wants me to do her carpets as well. Sweet!

2 Likes