[Neil Jones]

We mainly do domestic cleaning, carpets, upholstery, houses, hard floors and I have a few commercial jobs that use us on a repeat basis but these have always been found through luck really from them just choosing us online.

I really want to push the commercial work over the next year, some people will probably question why due to payment terms, unsociable hours etc but I just think there is more money on this sort of work.

I need some ideas on how people get their foot in the door, what works and what doesn't. How to retain a commercial customer etc etc I know there a few on here who do a lot of commercial work but any ideas from anyone would be great.

Cheers

[Mike Halliday]

I did a £1200 commercial job last weekend which is the biggest I've ever done, this came from a guy who I see every morning in Cafe Neros, he has a facilities management company. He just rang me out of the blue and asked if I could clean some carpets for him

When I get back ( on holiday at the moment) I have another big job which came from a newspaper drop I did on an industrial estate 2 years ago, this is the second time I've done it. My 'newspaper drop' was when I bought 200 newspapers, stamped them with....

' COMPLIMENTS OF HENRY HALLIDAY YOUR LOCAL CARPET CLEANER' ....

and walked into reception and asked if I could leave a newspaper for the staff to read.

[Neil Jones]

Nice idea that Mike, might have to give that ago. I was also thinking the donut one where you leave donuts on a Friday. Probably cost a small fortune though

[Mike Halliday]

I bought the 'I' paper which is a quality paper but only cost 20p.

I did think of buying a quality magazine like 'prestige cars' for men or 'vogue' for woman and putting a letter in side, then getting my wife to ring up the companies on a local industrial estate and ask the sex  of the MD, then walk into the place and just say...." here's the mag the boss ordered"

I bet there's lids of ways to get in touch with companies, it's just having the gumption to do it

[Len Gribble]

Neil

Look at who you know 1st family, friends and what they do for a living and who do they know.

On the off chance one day I stopped at referb (scaffolding) North London the company was based Catford the md and I went to the same school it takes a bit of tenacity 

You could look at managing agents? They want it cheap which is not in the carpet cleaner vocabulary

Payment days bit like how long a piece of string is, I often get paid via Madras, Prague, Bologna and Vauxhall

I now put my iban nbr on the Vauxhall jobs to show I’m an international player