Start a Cleaning Service

A cleaning service can be a great way to start a profitable business with almost nothing and can be very easy to scale to levels you may not even imagine. In this section we will go over how you can start a cleaning service from scratch and grow that business into something you can pass down for generations of wealth.

The first step to starting your cleaning business will be to set up an LLC and business bank account to track all of your income and expenses. You can check out our section on how to start a business entity to learn exactly how to start an LLC and EIN which is essentially the social security number for your business. Once you have your EIN you can go to the bank and set up an account for your business. TD and Bank of America are great for business bank accounts, but you can also check out some credit unions in your area as well. Now that you have all that set up you will simply deposit and take your payments from your customers through this account. You will also purchase all your expenses from a debit card attached to this account or a business credit card (allowing you to get points and cash back for your purchases) once you have built up some business credit. This will keep the IRS happy if they ever decide to audit you, because you will have easy to track statements that will keep everything recorded. Then you will want to use your bank account to pay for a business license from your state and begin getting quotes for insurance. You can simply search for janitorial liability coverage on Google and get a few quotes from different companies to see what makes the most sense for you. This will keep you covered in case there are any damages to property or even if a homeowner claims that you or an employee have damaged or stolen property. $1,000,000 in liability coverage should be plenty especially when just starting out and it won’t cost too much each month.

Now you want to set up your bookkeeping so that you can track your expenses and send invoices to your customers so that you can get paid. You can use a service like waveapps.com which is free to track books and send your invoices.

Next you will need to get all the supplies you will need. A great place to get cleaning products in bulk is from membership clubs like Sam’s Club, Costco, or BJ’s if you are focusing on residential cleaning. You can always go somewhere like Walmart if you don’t want to spend more money to save in bulk when buying residential products, but this can save you about 30% on your costs if you buy in bulk. If you plan on doing commercial cleaning for businesses, you should go to a place like Home Depot or Lowes to get your starting materials.  Another thing to keep in mind when buying supplies is that you should always buy washable options rather than disposable if you have the option. Instead of solely using paper towels you should get rags that you can reuse. Instead of using mops with disposable bottoms, get one that you don’t have to replace. These minor expenses will add up over time and you can use the money you save to start scaling later. You will need thick microfiber cloths, eco-friendly disinfectant spray, 1 gallon OdoBan Disinfectant, a 55 gallon large trash can with a roller (for commercial cleaning), a backpack vacuum, a mop bucket, wringer and a mop, multiple mop heads, dust pan and broom, carrying caddy (for commercial cleaning), microfiber flat mop, window cleaner, toilet cleaner, and a toilet brush. If you are just doing residential cleaning at first then you can start with just the basic spray, cloths, mop, bucket, broom, pan, window cleaner, toilet cleaner, and a vacuum.

Once you have your materials you will need to start marketing your cleaning service. The first thing you should do is get business cards made on Vistaprint.com or staples.com and get some flyers made from either as well. Then you will want to set up a website where people can reach you that paints your company in a professional way. You can check out our how to make a professional site section to learn how to do this. Sites for cleaning services should go over the services that you offer, whether you do commercial cleaning or residential cleaning and separate the services into those categories if you offer both. That is also a decision you should make starting out and I recommend starting with residential if you don’t have a ton of money to start with. We will show you how to move up to commercial later on. Make sure your site has plenty of calls to action with a form to fill out so you can contact them and that it clearly shows your contact information so they can reach you right away.

If you are starting with residential cleaning on your own, you can make posts on Facebook and other platforms you are on to let your friends and followers know about your new business. Introduce your company in a heartfelt post and offer a discount or the first cleaning free with signing up for a month of service. People may reach out and from there you can ask them for referrals if they are happy with your service. Be sure to ask for referrals when appropriate but often and offer a free clean for every new customer someone gets you. This can be an amazing way to get new long-term customers fast! You can also stop that promotion or start doing 50% off a service if you start getting busy.

Another thing you can do to grow with residential cleaning is go to nice neighborhoods in your area and leave flyers at houses that offer a free first cleaning for signing up for recurring services or a discount. Starting out the name of the game is growing your customer base quickly. You can always charge more later on but don’t start off a reputation as a cheap worker if you can avoid it. If you have offer deals for first time service you can still charge market rate for your area for everything after that.

You can also post first cleaning discounts to places like Groupon. You can market your services on Yelp or Angie’s List (more expensive though). You should join groups on Facebook that are focused on communities in your service area as well. Start out by responding to other posts and adding value to these groups and eventually once you are known in those groups you can post about your cleaning business. You can even cold call on people in your area or buy warm leads for cleaning services online with a simple search.

When you first go to a house to clean it, you should go over the services that you provide and build value to what you will do for them each visit. Then do a great job with a smile and try to stay out of their way while you clean. Just keep in mind that people still want to go about their day while you are there cleaning. When you are done you can tell them what their neighbors typically do twice a week which is just x dollars per visit. Always refer to what the neighbors are doing when asking for something in the home service industry and they will be less likely to change anything. When pricing your jobs make sure that you are checking your competitors’ pricing in the area, so you don’t over or under charge. You do not need to undercut pricing especially if you got them hooked by a great first service offer like we talked about.

Once you have gotten some residential customers, you can start hiring people to work for you and relieve some of the work you have so you can focus on growing your customer base. You can go on Indeed and start hiring cleaners in their area under a free trial and you can cancel it before it runs out without being charged. You can also make new profiles anytime and attach prepaid cards from Walmart. However, you should get plenty of candidates just from your first trial because they tend to boost trial posts to get you hooked on their service. This should work fine for finding work, but you can also check out our section on recruiting and hiring on how to start a business for even more tips. Just be sure to do a background check since they will be going into people’s properties and to add them to your liability insurance. You can also use this process for hiring for commercial as well but be sure to differentiate that with a new post.

Once you have mastered residential cleaning and have saved up enough to buy everything you will need for commercial cleaning, you may want to start focusing on finding commercial customers. You can simply search for businesses in your area on Google and do some cold calling introducing yourself and your services and trying to get in touch with an owner. You can also buy commercial cleaning leads to call on as well. The best way to find commercial cleaning customers, however, is to check public records to see new businesses that have been applied for in your area. Most businesses that need a cleaner already have one, but businesses that are under construction or just starting out will be in need of a cleaning service. You can try to find the registered owners on Facebook to contact them on there or you can use a skip tracing service online to get their phone number and call them directly! Once you have some commercial customers, be sure to make great use of the referral program we talked about for getting residential customers. Business owners typically know other business owners and half off of a cleaning for them can save a lot more than a residential customer. You can also join business owner groups on Facebook and offer services there as well or col email or message business pages on Facebook. Get creative and get in front of business owners and you will start landing commercial customers in no time.

Once you get a commercial customer you will want to find out what other commercial cleaning services are charging by calling some and asking for a quote by square foot while pretending to be the owner of a commercial building. Call a few places because some will only give quotes in person, and you also want to find a good average price. You should also buy a laser measuring tool so you can measure square footage of commercial buildings or a walking tape measure to do the same thing. Once you do it a few times it will become very easy, and you can always practice before walking your first commercial property and placing a bid. A lot of times with a commercial property they will be getting multiple quotes and they will ask you to submit a proposal. A proposal should include the full scope of work for your services and the price and schedule you talked about. Once you submit a proposal you should always follow up later on to see if there is anything else you can do to earn the business.

If you followed these steps, you should be able to get a big book of business very quickly and start scaling to multiple employees in no time. One last thing to keep in mind as well is that cleaning is your business. So, aside from finding customers you should also focus on learning and improving on the efficiency and quality of your cleans. You can find great tips on cleaning houses and commercial businesses on places like YouTube and be sure to do a great job for your customers because this will ultimately be your reputation as you grow. Even if you are really nice and provide a good price, people will not want to keep you around if you do a bad job cleaning.