[Xtremely Clean]

What questions do you ask customers when they ring you?

Cheers

[gwrightson]

DO YOU WANT IT DOING FOR NEXT TO NOTHING ?  if so, goodbye  only joking .

What are wanting to be cleaned ?  What area do you live ? Can I make an appointment to visit the work in ?question ?  this is so I can judge the best method etc. and give you an accurate quote.
Many more questions can be asked, especialy if you do not survey.
Has it been cleaned before ? is their any staining or is it just general soiling? What is the fibre.fabric ?
what size are the rooms ?  What rooms?  can I park ok ?   the list can go on ............ but i will let others enlighten

geoff

[Mike Halliday]

Where do you live?

 what's it made from?

any specific reason you are having it cleaned now?

I'm driving past your house later on.... Can I have a quick look?

[neil 47]

Anything that keeps them engaging in conversation with you for over 3 to 4 mins if possible
a reason to ring you back other than price
what you do
why you are better, dryer, cleaner, eco,
anything you can find in common
use their name regularly
where they live you may know there area and people they know
be likable
 I did a house near them last week , did a carpet like that last week came up really well
is there a problem area
Have you had any quotes how much ?
have you had them done before , was there any problems how much did u pay

I could go on for ever

[Xtremely Clean]

Ok cheers lads 

[Neil Jones]

What do you wear to bed........sorry wrong forum!

[*Hector*]

What do you wear to bed........sorry wrong forum!

Right forum....... just the wrong section... 

You need the nutters part 

[peter maybury]

Most things have been said, but if you can get the customer relaxed and talking then you have the better opportunity to sell.
Ask open questions as opposed to closed questions. Ie do not ask them questions that they can answer yes or no to. But questions where they have to elaborate.
It will never be scripted because you have to listen to the customer. You have their attention until you have given them a price after that they will just want to end the call.
Before you give the price you have to become the one that they are comfortable to let into their house. You will not get the customer relaxed if you are not.
With the way that we market the telephone call is probably the most important aspect of our business.
Although I do not hard sell it would be good for you to read some direct sales books to learn about open and closed questions, alternative closes etc and when to shut up as it is all very relevant to any business that needs to sell to a customer.

Peter
www.carpetcleanercardiff.comhttp://

[ian harper]

when a prospect calls it should just be to book. your sales message should do the job. many just want to check they have what we offer right, its a real waste of your time having to sell on the phone

[mark_roberts]

You do if you want more than £50 for a suite.

Mark

[ian harper]

cleaners always think that low price equals low job price, not true. people spend up to their budget. one cleaner might do less rooms and charge the same job price as one doing more rooms. its the value thing again. some people think that high price equals safe and good workmanship.

if someone has a bad experience with a low priced cleaner chances are they will not go to that part of the market again, and will go for a more expensive priced cleaner thinking that its going to deliver a better job, no so as the outcome will be the same a clean carpet at whatever price they pay. they just was unlucky first time, and might be just as unlucky at the top end.

at the low end we just have to work a little harder proving that its not cheap but value and that the outcome will be the same. thats why you would have to sell more on the phone and not leave it to your sales message. apart from having to do a face to face sales call

Low end customer are better repeaters in my view. these are the people that buy carpet cleaners and hire (competition comes not just from other cleaners). they want clean carpets and know they need to get them done regular.  when they find a cleaner that can do it a a price they like they are regular.

switching from front end profit to both front and back end will make you more money plus save on overheads and what's the most expensive item? sales & marketing

JP says, Profit comes from

1. Increase the number of clients you have.
2. Increase the price tag of your average job
3. Increase the number of times that they use you.

I would add one more

4. keep overheads under control

great book on pricing

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Undercover-Economist-Tim-Harford/dp/0349119856/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1378855847&sr=1-1&keywords=Undercover-Economist

[Simon Gerrard]

If you're just bonnetting with encap then you need to ask your prospects if they will accept a maintenance clean rather than a full clean because with the best will in the world encap will seriously struggle to get the kind of results on a cross section of domestic jobs that will help you build a loyal following of past customers. You're not just carpet cleaning, you're business building and only top notch results will get you the kind of customer retention and recommendations that you need to become successful.

Simon

[Craigp]

Ian if you follow JP why do you ignore his number one rule; increase your prices. ?

Your point on low priced carpet cleaners doing as good a job as the higher priced misses one important point. Motivation.

Higher priced C/Cers can afford to take time to do a better job and go the extra mile. This is basic logic.

[ian harper]

As i said my pricing model works just fine. You would not judge tescos on its lowest price item but on it yearly profits if you where an investor in  the city

My cost for a new client is worth every penny. My margins are very healthy. Profits are good why change

One point about USA market you have TMs that charge low price its a totally different market. You would need to have resonable prices to stay in business

[garry22]

when a prospect calls it should just be to book. your sales message should do the job. many just want to check they have what we offer right, its a real waste of your time having to sell on the phone

1/ This I agree with completely. It's when the copywriter earns their fee.

2/ Pricing - I have to disagree.

The salient point about pricing is the type of business. A friend of mine owns twenty garden centres and works on the "pile it high and sell it cheap" principle. He can do that because he just ships goods out and makes a smaller profit on each bit. If he shifts ten thousand units in a week, he will still have made a lot of money.

If he was physically carrying out a service (e.g. carpet cleaning), there is no way he could work at those margins as there are not enough hours in the day.

[ian harper]

You can build a business based on your charm and experance and is based on being a selfempoyed sucessfull cleaner or one thats has end game in mind thats sellable because its based on margins

Good wages or building a business

Let give the problem.

I know the price of a new client so I can buy them as money allows. as i buy them i keep in mind that i will run out of time in the week, so i can raise my prices and change the model that has taken me this far of buy them on a steady basis, building as i go so that when i reach my time limit i know the numbers to take some one to repeat what i have just done, so on, and so on.

Its like when you change one number on a spreadsheet they all change. completive advatage comes with doing things in a way thats not easy for other to copy. you can look at me and just see low prices but as I have said i could be making as much as someone with much higher prices. Thats why I was talking about benchmarks no one know what is good or bad if you dont have one

[Mike Halliday]

Ian you have a difficult turn of phrase, its as though you try and answer one question while trying to make a totally separate  point

Cheap is cheap whether you look at it at the end of the year or per job, if you are charging £25 a room then no matter how you juggle the numbers or use business waffle it still is £25, it does not jump to £75 because you are aiming for high demand low profit or because you have long tail keywords that create unique website searches or have a endgame exit strategy

If you are a sole carpet cleaner your earning are governed by how much you charge you can have zero marketing cost but £25 will never go higher than £25, but if you get £100 you might have £99 marketing cost but there always is the potential of earning the full £100

I keep saying this but it is a universal truth if you charge £25 then nothing will make it any more no matter how you gloss it up with fancy words and mathematical formulas

[ian harper]

sorry wrong, it does not work that way. you keep seeing the room price and not the overall earnings. if you want short days and having your assists sitting around then high price is fine but there is another road.

as an example why would someone pay £80 for one room when they can have many more? High price guy get some but the numbers of people how can i put this? are greedy and see my proposition as one that hard to resits

high price will never dominate any market they will have a share but not the largest slice, as long as that large slice make more money thats the winner

[Paul Clapham]

Ian ,

I have only been in the carpet cleaning business for a few years , ( I have run other businesses before )  I have looked at some carpet cleaning businesses that are for sale but I would not buy one because the  ones who work in the domestic market only don't really have a business to sell ( at the prices they want )  sure you can buy the equipment , website and client list , but that's all it is, a list of former users  of the business , with a few possible ones who may use you again in the future.......so I have decided to use the money I have to market my own new CCing business, and not risk giving £40K - £50K  to another carpet cleaner


My long term view is that I will make a good (ish) living out of CCing but in reality I will have nothing to sell when I retire , as all carpet cleaners are looking for new customers each week so where is the value in the  business? maybe a bit in the name , the branding ,  but the real value is in the person selling the business , and they are the business !

I would be really interested to hear from people who paid near to the original asking price for a CCing  business, that works in the domestic market,  and how it has worked out for them.........



NB: I am talking about a man with a van / TM style of business here.

[Mike Halliday]

Ian to be clear I'm using the figure £25 because l believe that is how much you charge, it is a figure I pulled out of the air to make my point.

I understand that if your aim is to go into a home and clean 4 rooms then the £25 room price jumps to £100 but why gamble on the customer buying bulk when you could get the £100 for the one room?