Cleaner Planner:
1. It's userable. After the initial learning curve it's fairly easy to use, even if you aren't good on computers the support offered is as good as everyone says it is and there is plenty of help on offer on the built in forum (now defunct). You can complicate it if you want to give you better reporting capabilities, or not. Whichever you prefer.
2. Integrations These are all optional but if you wanted you can make it - collect money from customers at the click of a mouse - email multiple customers at once offering additional services - set it to send reminders to customers at specific times via text or email - collect card payments over the phone - use your smartphone to mark off payments or add customers - chase debt while sat on your arse. (I'm sure there are/will be more but these are the one I use EVERY DAY
3. Development The software is moving along nicely and some of the ideas for the future are fantastic (some not so much but like everything else you can choose to use the features or not). If you have ideas of where you want the software headed, if it's any good and if it's feasible it'll no doubt be considered. Sure your PDA, spreadsheet or book may well be 'working just fine' but what if everybody else is moving forward and you aren't?
4. Planning There are some great features on there that let you plan out your day/week/month/year. I had fairly in depth software before but used correctly Cleaner Planner is so accurate and detailed it looks likely to make a real difference to me in the future.
5. Time saving Having run my old software and Cleaner Planner side by side (mainly to ensure that all the data moved across without error but also because I needed card payments which was released today), I reckon Cleaner Planner has knocked about 25% off admin time. There are some excellent time saving features in the pipeline so this will only improve.
6. Room to grow Whether you are a small one man operation, a franchiser or employ 50 people, Cleaner Planner will help you organise your work and analyse your performance. As window cleaning rounds get bigger they get more difficult to control and organise. With Cleaner Planner you can order, reorder and reorganise to your hearts content. The versatility of the software allows you set things out however you like without having to worry that you have muddled things up beyond repair.
7. Professionalism Window cleaning as an industry has come a long way in since I stated 16 years ago. With the popularisation of water fed pole systems has come much more investment (and dare I say it; productivity). There are now more and more professional window cleaning companies with staff and multiple vans on the road. Public perception of the industry however, has changed very little. Cleaner Planner can help any window cleaning company appear slick and professional to their customers. You can set it to contact your customers to let them know you are coming, either by email or by text, which comes through without a number, just your company name, which is so cool (and means they can't text back with a 'miss me this time') . There is also an excellent quotation/invoicing/statement feature which you can brand with your logo and is so simple to use, one click of the mouse and it's either printed or emailed direct to your customer.
8. Pricing Now, I'm well aware that there are other software options available and that you can get a round management system for less than you would pay for Cleaner Planner. However, you get what you pay for in this life and Cleaner Planner is well worth the price. My previous system was a bespoke bit of software that I had a local programmer build for me in 2007. I had a look around at what was available 'off the shelf' at that time and the pickings were slim, George or, well, George. I paid a fair amount for my bespoke software but I was happy, it did everything I wanted, how I wanted and it was better than anything else out there. Over the years development was done and upgrades were installed, always at a price but always exactly how I wanted.
I first saw Cleaner Planner, as I'm sure most of you did, on here, about a year ago. It was the GoCardless integration that first piqued my interest. I decided to have a look again at the software that was available 'off the shelf'. I trialled the lot and came to the decision pretty quickly that Cleaner Planner was, without doubt, streets ahead of the rest and well worth it's price tag. I imported some work onto it and gave it a go, that was around August last year. Since then there have been some fairly major developments, without me having to spend any extra. Developments and upgrades are not exactly how I wanted like on my old software but Cleaner Planner can do things that I'd never even considered, things that already, I couldn't do without.
9. Debt management With the integration of GoCardless (Direct Debits) and now Stripe (Card payments), Cleaner Planner is unrivalled in this department. The link between Cleaner Planner and GoCardless is brilliant. Click a button and it's done, literally that easy. If the payment fails or is cancelled Cleaner Planner automatically reverses the transaction for you. There is even a widget that you can put on your website to help you identify sign ups (a well known GoCardless issue). Stripe was integrated into Cleaner Planner this week and is something I've been pushing for since I first trialled it. Having the ability to take card payments over the phone is a must for me, having it integrate directly into my customer management software eliminates errors and makes the process simpler. If you have an overdue customer list (as I'm sure we all do), what better way to collect than from the comfort of your own home. Don't like the idea of phoning people up chasing money? You can set it to send an email (or text) to your overdue customers with a link to your GoCardless signup page. Without doubt, Cleaner Planner is ahead of the game on this one and with some really exciting developments in the pipeline signing up really is a no brainer.
10. Analytics 'Busy fool' is a term that is banded about on CIU quite a bit. There is no point in working your arse off if you aren't getting anywhere. Cleaner Planner can help you ensure you are not a busy fool. You can break everything down to day to day, week to week, month by month or even entire years. With the inclusion of expenses you can work out exactly where you are earning and where you can improve. You can analyse your accepted payment methods, it even has the ability for you to see exactly which methods of advertising are working for you and exactly how much they've earned you. Everything can be broken down and analysed. If you employ, Cleaner Planner is an excellent tool to asses how your employees are performing. The reports allow you to see performance per person per day/week/month/year.
I genuinely believe that Cleaner Planner has been a step forward for this industry.
Just get it.
(copy and pasted from a few years ago but still relevant)
