Steve,

My father and I purchased your book back in the spring and have been studying it and planning our window cleaning business. I have a few questions for you, but before I get into that I will have to say we are very impressed with your book, marketing, and resources. My dad and I own several pizza restaurants and we have been saying lately to each other that we wish our pizza franchise had a book as detailed and resourceful as the one you have written. The sad part is that we pay a big monthly royalty to a franchise that we never see, where we pay $90 to you and a small monthly fee for your window cleaning software, The Customer Factor, and that’s it.

We launched our window cleaning business in July. We are the only professional window cleaning company in the area. All of the other local window cleaners are "fly by night", or just do a bad job. To get commercial accounts, I got the phonebook and my laptop, and typed up addresses of local business. I put together a mailing using the commercial flyer you supplied. I mailed to about 200 businesses and got 4 calls and 3 accounts. I didn’t think that was too bad.

We are in the process of getting postcards printed up, and using smartmail to send them out. The question I have for you is.. when is the best time to send out marketing for window washing. The postcards are a bit of an investment and we are eager to get out there are start picking up residential accounts. So we would like them to hit at the right time. We where thinking about mailing them out in September. Or maybe even waiting till next year to send them out. We are just stuck on the situation. I didn’t know how many window washers you have dealt with in the midwest. but if you could give us any advice we would greatly appreciate it. Thanks again for your time and I will be looking forward to hear from you.

Kyle

My Response:

Hi Kyle:

Good morning.  It’s good to hear from you.  And I appreciate your comments.  Thanks so much.

Right…most window cleaning businesses do have that "fly by night" mentality.  So it makes it quite easy for a professional window cleaning company to come in and secure business right out from under them. 

Good idea on the mailing/commercial flyer.  Not a bad response at all.  And more will come over time.  A bit of advice on securing commercial accounts though would be to simply walk in off the street.  It is real easy to get these types of accounts.  Of course their focus is mostly to save some bucks, so you’ll need to keep that in mind when you give them the estimate.  But almost all commercial acct. managers/owners will be open to at least you giving them an estimate. 

As far as postcards, september is the perfect time.  As we head into the holidays, business will be strong across the country for window cleaners.  I do want to provide you some advice on this though.  Repetition is critical to your response rates with postcards and flyers or any other advertising method you use.  So I urge folks to plan postcard campaigns over time and hit people repeatedly.  In other words, it would be best to take that same 15000 piece mailing (assuming that’s the amt. you were going to do) and split it up.  Choose 4 or 5 solid routes of homes that contain your preferred homes and send them repeat postcard mailings multiple times spread out over a 2 month period.  This works so much better than just a single one-time mailing.  If you’re working with Dick at Smart Mail, he’ll tell you the same thing.  One time mailings give you the lowest response, and then it goes up from there.

A quick side note, between postcard mailings, I saturated the same routes/areas that I sent postcards to with flyers.  This provides you a double whammy of exposure.  Again, think "repetitive".

Hope this helps.  If you need any assistance or have questions, please give me a call.  My number is 256-546-2446.  Take care for now and thanks again for your comments.

Regards,

Steve

Tagged with: • • •

Filed under: All Blog Posts

Like this post? Subscribe to my RSS feed and get loads more!