[Smudger]

Mick, not sure why you need to walk the street twice. If your targeting dirty windows and note them why not tap them on the first walk past ?

Maybe the only ones I don't knock are those with a garden full of bin bags/scrap iron and a couple of burnt out cars,

Call me judgemental but I feel these people would have window cleaning as very low priority

Darran

[C o z y]

 

[Ian101]

Mick, not sure why you need to walk the street twice. If your targeting dirty windows and note them why not tap them on the first walk past ?

Maybe the only ones I don't knock are those with a garden full of bin bags/scrap iron and a couple of burnt out cars,

Call me judgemental but I feel these people would have window cleaning as very low priority

Darran

+1

[Mick Kent]

Its not that hard to work out is it! In the day next to no one is home so no point knocking!. In the evening especialy winter its too dark to tell whats clean or whats dirty. I have done it for long enough to know my best method on what works best.

[Mick Kent]

Anyway everyone has there own way of doing things! For me i have done all the legwork and graft building in rapid time that now i dont have too which is bliss.
As i said it totally worked for me! i did things different to all you lot and it worked.
I used to knock on every door and dismiss every for sale and sold board and only gained 1-2 new customers or 5 if i was lucky like i mentioned before. By changing it i was averaging 10 new customers a night.
If i was to build another round id do exactly the same thing.

[pdale]

I knock every door. I tend to find the dirtier the windows the less likely they are to want a window cleaner as that's the way they live.

I find the easier ones to book are those who have clean downstairs windows, but their upstairs are dirty ... it shows that they like to have clean windows but haven't got a window cleaner. Also if they have slightly dirty windows but perhaps look after their garden, or have nice clean cars on the drive, it shows they look after their property but haven't got a window cleaner, so a more likely to book.

With that said though I book jobs every day where the windows are clean, maybe they clean them themselves or could be unhappy with their window cleaner. It's impossible to judge, which is why I knock every door.

[Joe Bromley]

Mick - when you say "soon as the sold board goes down" do you mean once it's been taken down or..?

[Ian101]

I knock every door. I tend to find the dirtier the windows the less likely they are to want a window cleaner as that's the way they live.

I find the easier ones to book are those who have clean downstairs windows, but their upstairs are dirty ... it shows that they like to have clean windows but haven't got a window cleaner. Also if they have slightly dirty windows but perhaps look after their garden, or have nice clean cars on the drive, it shows they look after their property but haven't got a window cleaner, so a more likely to book.

With that said though I book jobs every day where the windows are clean, maybe they clean them themselves or could be unhappy with their window cleaner. It's impossible to judge, which is why I knock every door.

Hi Paul ... understand if you don't wont to answer this but do u manage to get the £500 week in week out and what time do you find best to knock 

[Mick Kent]

Soon as the new owners are in the house, bang the door i meant.

[Smudger]

How far do you walk each day mick ?

Are you in a city area ?

Darran

[Mick Kent]

I dont do any domestic roundbuilding anymore as am too overloaded but when i did i only targeted compact terraced roads/main roads etc, i work mainly south east london and east london and is saturated with nice terraced houses everywhere. All the houses are 250k plus and nobody ever questions the price of £10 for the front.
All i did walking wise was whilst i cleaned the 2 or 3 houses i did on the roads is walk the whole road and closes off noteing the dirty ones to return in the evening or weekend to knock which turned the 2 or 3 in a road to 5 or 6.
Sometimes i had someone with me to note all the dirty ones. That and sold boards built me the best round i could have wished for. For me it beat knocking on everydoor wasting time with people who do it themselfs or people who have a cleaner, for the few that may say they are not happy with there current cleaner for me didnt seem worth the time wasting.
Someone like pdale doing it for others have no choice but to knock the whole road/every house as no time to plan it out as he wants in and out and payed as quick as possible but where its my area i work i like to fully plan and target so i can get the best out of everything and for me the way to get the best was 1 thing which was to compact compact compact. Whats the point doing a £25 house then pack away to drive 5 mins away to do another £25 houses when you can do 6 £10 fronts all in same road from 1 spot taking less than 20 mins??.
Anyway as said it worked for me, and also my stepdad who i also built up and showed him the ropes how to get the best from his areas who also has a verey compact round full of mainly £10 fronts.

[Smudger]

As you can appreciate not all areas are saturated with Terrence housing we are quite rural, even if I travelled into Norwich I'd only find smallish areas where you could canvass like that, and the house prices are only a third of London ( which you might think would give them lots of spare cash, but many of those I come across are low rent bedsits ) so a tenner for a front only is a big deal.

Most roads are semis or detached with easy access to rear, they range from modern to 18th century in the same road, and the majority of the roads have no more than 70 houses in them.

So in short, we have to adapt to our area of operation to make our biz successfull

Darran

[Leeds]

As you can appreciate not all areas are saturated with Terrence housing we are quite rural, even if I travelled into Norwich I'd only find smallish areas where you could canvass like that, and the house prices are only a third of London ( which you might think would give them lots of spare cash, but many of those I come across are low rent bedsits ) so a tenner for a front only is a big deal.

Most roads are semis or detached with easy access to rear, they range from modern to 18th century in the same road, and the majority of the roads have no more than 70 houses in them.

So in short, we have to adapt to our area of operation to make our biz successfull

Darran

Well said Darran.

Here up North i always feel bad when i'm charging half of what some of these window cleaners down south are charging. £25 an hour in Leeds is nothing to be sniffed at, even if it isn't amazing in London.

Each to their own style i say.

meridion

[pdale]

Hi Paul ... understand if you don't wont to answer this but do u manage to get the £500 week in week out and what time do you find best to knock  Smiley

Hi Ian, yes i've never gone beyond a week to get £500, 3-4 days is an average.

The best time to knock is evenings after the school run, from 4pm onwards for obvious reasons, but that doesn't mean there isn't work to get during the daytime. Weekends can go one way or the other, if it's a sunny day there can be a lot out, but if it's rainy or overcast a weekend is good for catching people in.

[Clever Forum Name]

When P dale knocked for us, he went out for like 2-4 hours rung me up and said how much can i do in a day of first cleans?

Told him £150 of dirty first cleans. "ow best start booking for Tuesday or Wednesday"

I think P dale averaged nearly £200 a day when he was down here.

[Mick Kent]

Pdale, how come you dont build yourself up a decent round thats a regular income instead of building others up around the country?? Not knocking you as your doing realy well just it wont last forever and you do seem to have your head screwed on and get good reports from everyone so imagine how much of an empire you could build up for yourself. Defo worth thinking about.

[pdale]

Pdale, how come you dont build yourself up a decent round thats a regular income instead of building others up around the country?? Not knocking you as your doing realy well just it wont last forever and you do seem to have your head screwed on and get good reports from everyone so imagine how much of an empire you could build up for yourself. Defo worth thinking about.

I have considered it Mick. When I was window cleaning myself I now realise that I bent over backwards to accommodate the customer, now have learnt so much in the last 18 or so months from different people and would definitely do it different. The reality is though that there is other stuff I do outside of the window cleaning industry, so if canvassing does curtail at some point I'll be moving onto other things. That said I have given setting up on my own consideration from time to time.