Some of your marketing options include:
- Flyers
- Phone Book
- Website
- Online Advertising
- Newspaper
- Magazine
- Car Magnets
- Business Card Distribution
- Valupak
- Word of Mouth
Flyers: Flyers are a great, cheap way of advertising your business. I don't recommend printing up mass quantities and distributing them door to door. This has been proven to be very ineffective and time-consuming. It is also illegal to put them in mailboxes, so you are going to have to walk door to door. People also do not like to have people walking on their property placing advertisements so that may be a turnoff for your potential clients.
You can print up a mass quantity and put them on cars in a parking lot, but you have to get a permit for that. Make sure you conduct your business legally to show you are a professional.
The best thing to do with those flyers is to print up a bunch of them and leave them in your car. Anytime you go to a store and notice a bulletin board, place your flyer there. Some of the best places are post offices, sandwhich shops, diners and coffee shops.
Phone Books: Phone books are becoming a thing of the past and are being replaced with the internet. However, phone book advertising still remains very expensive. If you have the expendable income, I would recommend trying it out for a year and see what kind of response you get. If not, I would pass it up. There are so many other ways you can advertise for much cheaper.
Websites: A website will be your BEST advertising tool next to word of mouth. Most of your clients will search for what they need on the internet while they are at work. I definitely recommend a website above anything else. Your website does not have to be fancy, just professional looking and informative. You don't have to spend a fortune on it, you can even make one for free.
I recommend Home Business Forms for a professional web designer who specializes in cleaning businesses. If you want to design one for yourself, I recommend using the services of Homestead or GoDaddy. Both of those have very user-friendly applications to help you complete a very nice website easily.
Before you start your website, you need to purchase a domain name. This is your www address. Try to pick one with your business name. For example, if you are Florida's Best Cleaning Service, see if www.floridasbestcleaningservice.com or .net is available. If it isn't, find something close to it. To purchase a domain name, I recommend using Go Daddy. They are cheap and easy to use.
Online Advertising: Once you have your website ready, you can advertise it online for free at many places. Even if you don't have a website, there are many places online to advertise. Some of those places are Craigslist, MerchantCircle, Backpage, Superpages, Google Maps, Yahoo Local and more.
Newspapers and Magazines: Newspapers are a good option to try out. Some areas do well with newspaper advertising and some do not. The only way you will know is to give it a try. You can advertising in your county paper or you can advertising in the community papers (pennysavers). Magazines are more expensive and do not focus on a certain area in which your service area lies. Magazines may not be a good option to advertise this sort of business.
Car Magnets: Car magnets are a great advertising option. They are a cheap, one time cost, so it doesn't hurt to try it out. You can get a car magnet at VistaPrint.
Business Card Distribution: Handing out business cards to everyone you see is not very cost effective. I don't recommend this form of advertising. However, always have your cards available should you see an opportunity to hand one out or display it. You can get your business cards at VistaPrint. They have some nice cleaning related ones and have some great deals such as 250 free cards.
Valupak: Valupak is, in my opinion, not a good option for this sort of business. For one thing, it is distributed to a large area most of which you may not be covering. Second, it is very expensive. If you have the money to try this form of advertising out, give it a try.
Word of Mouth: This will be your best form of advertising once your business gets going. If you have happy customers, they will tell all their friends and family about you. Always be sure to conduct your business and yourself professionally in order to get those referrals. Leave your clients will plenty of business cards so they can hand them out to their friends and family. It is also a great idea to offer a referral bonus such as one free clean for every paid referral or $30 off a cleaning. This is a nice incentive to get them to hand out those referrals.
These are the most common types of advertising methods people use for their house cleaning business. I recommend trying out what you can to see what works and what does not. In the beginning, you will spend a lot more money until you are busy enough to stop advertising . Once you hit a slow spot and think you need to advertise again, hopefully, by then you will know what worked and will only need to spend money on that form of advertising.
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