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Introduction
Hello everyone, welcome or welcome back to the Filthy Rich Cleaners podcast. I’m your host, Stephanie from Serene Clean, and in today’s episode, we are going to be discussing some more mistakes that I have made in my journey as a cleaning business owner.
I think that learning from others’ mistakes is something that has been very helpful to me in my cleaning business owner journey. And I would like to share with you guys some mistakes that I have made. I know I talk about my mistakes all the time, but these were three that kind of stood out and I thought would be interesting to share.
Table of contents
The Dangers of Gossip and Oversharing
The first one is actually something that I’m not particularly proud of, but I think will hopefully help you guys, and that is, as we all know, Stephanie has the gift of gab. I have no problem talking to anyone, really about anything. I just truly enjoy getting to know people, chatting, and you guys know I just can talk about anything, right?
However, the problem is when you talk about situations or things that the other person has no business knowing, and this has been an ongoing struggle with me. I’m definitely an oversharer, and I will absolutely say that over the years, especially when I was just starting out, I really struggled with not talking about my cleaners to my other cleaners.
And I don’t mean necessarily bad things, but perhaps just sharing things that Cleaner B should not know, or say if Cleaner A called in and then me maybe getting a little bit of a comment in there passive-aggressively because I’m frustrated.
I’ve touched on this before. We are supposed to shield our staff from the whirlwind of emotions and struggles and chaos that we are handling as the owner, and we don’t want to be putting that onto our cleaning staff, or really anybody else but us, because that is our cross to bear. That is what we’ve signed up for as a business owner is to be handling that chaos.
Taking that a step further, that means not talking about situations that your employee has no business knowing. And so this could be, like I said, mentioning little things about attendance, or if I’m feeling frustrated with an employee, it’s really hard for me sometimes not to let that come out.
Especially in the beginning, I was cleaning all the time. So I was cleaning with my employees side by side, and so that co-worker line where, yeah, that’s a normal thing. Anybody who’s been in the service industry knows it is very difficult sometimes when you’re working side by side with somebody not to have a little vent session. And I am definitely the queen of venting.
This was really inappropriate, because who was I venting about? It was going to be clients or other staff members. So I really want you guys to get this through your minds that is wildly inappropriate and it’s wrong.
Not only that, it showed my staff members that I would talk about them to other staff members. Because it’s that whole thing is, if somebody’s gossiping to you about somebody else, that means that they’re most likely turning around and doing it about you to other people.
And so even if it was not ill-intentioned, or I was even sharing anything necessarily negative, it’s just that oversharing that I have a problem with. I was just not being a boss. I was being a co-worker. I was being a fellow cleaner, and especially because I started so young. Remember, I started this at 22 guys. I had never owned a business before, and I was trying to connect with my employees, right?
I wanted them to like me, and so even if they would bring something up or be nosy or ask about a co-worker or client, gossiping about clients, you know, again, maybe we’re just driving to a job site and we’re gossiping a little bit – I really regret that. I regret the immaturity. I regret not having that boundary in place and saying, “Let’s not talk about that.”
I think I was trying to use talking about other people as an opportunity to connect and make that person like me potentially.
Client Confidentiality in Small Towns
This goes for clients as well. This is a big problem – we live in a small town, and a lot of our clients, they all know each other, right? You’re probably used to this.
They will ask about another client. And again, it could be in a well-meaning way, but the inference of, “I know you clean for them, I know you’re in their house, I know you know things about them,” whatever, and then even just making comments about things.
So I would say, just really start to think about right now how you’re going to shut those down in a tactful way that will make yourself feel comfortable. Say a client brings up another client. You can say things like, “Yeah, they have a super beautiful home” or “They’re so nice,” and just something like that – only ever say positive things about a client to anybody else.
This is another thing I will regret is not necessarily talking about a client in a negative way to employees, but even just saying little things like, “Yeah, it’s always so messy there.” I know that that may not seem like a big thing, but you never know where that comment is going to go.
For us, a huge core value of Serene Clean is not shaming people. Even something when I’m feeling frustrated because it is really messy when we go there or whatever it is, you have to keep that to yourself.
Not every inside thought is an outside thought. It’s something I really have struggled with over the years, and often looking back, what I regret the most is I wish I hadn’t said that. Learn to shut your mouth. Learn to not say everything that comes into your mind and just blurting things out, because you can not only hurt other people’s feelings, you can hurt your reputation as a professional business.
People are trusting you, and having a sense of decorum and being very mindful of what we’re doing – this is a very sensitive thing that we’re doing by going into people’s homes, and that is part of our professionalism, not speaking about this.
This is part of our training – we talk about how we don’t talk about homes, etc., but it’s just something to keep in mind. I regret it a lot, and I know that for me, I want people to like me, and as I have gotten more mature, there’s just a lot of things I wish I hadn’t said, especially to my cleaning staff.
Now that I have my manager team, it is a little bit easier, because I can be more uncensored when I’m feeling frustrated. It’s something that’s a constant balancing act of how much is venting versus just complaining and not actually making progress on the thing.
I try to really keep in mind, if this stupid thing is happening, you can take 10 seconds and say something about it, but don’t let it drag out, because we need to move on to solution-oriented behavior.
At the end of the day, we’re dealing with people. I am super annoying. I’m probably just really obnoxious to people sometimes. Nobody’s perfect, and I know we all know that, but to expect every human being that you interact with in your business to behave perfectly – pot calling kettle black – it’s like you’re not perfect Stephanie, and you are probably really annoying and get on people’s nerves. So why not give people grace and just keep your mouth shut and keep those inner thoughts inner and really questioning yourself every time you’re annoyed: are they annoying, or are you just easily annoyed?
So that’s an area that hopefully you guys do not struggle with as much as I do. But please know that it’s never a good look, and if it gets back to somebody or even to that person that you’re talking to – you may be thinking that you’re connecting with them, but actually you’re showing one of your biggest weaknesses, which is gossiping, and that’s wrong.
Mistake #2: Trying Too Many New Services
Mistake number two is less on behavior. It’s kind of on behavior of me trying too many new things or taking on things that I have not thought through in depth, or thinking that something’s a good idea just because other people are doing it. This particularly is going to be on the topic of services.
Carpet cleaning – we started doing carpet cleaning a few years ago, and we just kept getting asked for it, and in hindsight, that was such a mistake. We never should have done that because, in my mind, or my reasoning of why we should do carpet cleaning, it was, “Well, we’re already servicing these people, and they’re asking for it, like, why don’t we just go in-depth and get more money out of these same clients, right?” Which is sound business advice.
However, for us, we were not in the place to do this in the correct manner, meaning, do the training involved that needed to be done, be prepared to take it on, and also the equipment and maintaining the equipment.
Because guess what we’re doing right now – we’re literally selling on Facebook Marketplace and eBay all of our carpet cleaning equipment at a fraction of what we paid just to get it out of our storage closet at the office so we can have some free space.
Honestly, every time we talk about it, I’m like, “Gosh, that was such a mistake,” and I regret starting that, because we were not in a place, and we still are not in a place where carpet cleaning makes sense for Serene Clean.
I wish I would just have taken that money and that time and all of the time I spent on carpet cleaning and just had gone harder on residential and commercial and just getting more clients, as opposed to trying to go deeper.
It’s not like it’s not in the realm of cleaning, right, but it’s more skilled, and there’s just a lot more moving parts when it comes to actually doing carpet cleaning in the correct way. And there are people out there who have done carpet cleaning for decades, and they are experts on it.
I realized once I started exposing myself to that content, I didn’t know much about it, and I had no business selling or making money off of this, and I was not prepared to actually go through what it would take to become an expert on this.
I’m not saying you need to be an expert on something to try it, but I was trying to make money off of something I had no business doing, and I really regret that, because we were not carpet cleaning in the way that was actually proper. I was not willing to spend the money on a proper carpet cleaning setup, like a van with hoses and things like that.
I was doing our customers dirty, and I convinced myself that we were doing an okay job. We offered it for about a year before I was just like, “Let’s stop this. This is wrong. We don’t know what we’re doing. We’re not getting the carpets cleaned in the way that they deserve.”
It’s not like the customers were complaining necessarily. It just was a rock in my stomach of we’re not acting with integrity, which is one of our core values. It was going against what I believed was right, and that’s because it wasn’t right.
Focus on What’s Working
I saw a video recently from Alex Hormozi talking about how, instead of starting all of these new ventures, just going deeper on what is already working. Residential and commercial is working and has worked for us for years, why do I feel the need to open something else when I have not totally tapped out the market on this in our existing service areas?
I’ll say to you guys, too – a lot of you are opening locations before you have any business doing that. You’re opening a second location when you have no business doing that. You haven’t even figured out the first location, and all it’s going to do is monumentally grow and exasperate the problems that you’re already experiencing.
You aren’t systematized. You are not organized on how to handle things, so get that in place before you go and open another location. Additionally, why do you feel that you’ve tapped out that market completely? Have you tried everything? Have you tried all different types of marketing? What are your leads like? What is your close rate like? Is it truly tapped out? Or are you just bored and want to try something new?
That’s exactly what happened with the carpet cleaning for us. We had just got done with that big Fort McCoy job, which I’ve talked about all the time for you guys. I was feeling this giant sense of lack – this huge project is done, this million-dollar project that we had is now complete, and now I’m just going back to boring commercial and residential. I’m just craving excitement and something new, because I just had this giant thing ripped away from me, right? We found out within a day’s notice that we got cut as a subcontractor.
So I was like, “We gotta do something. We gotta do something.” And no, we did not. We absolutely did not need to do that. We did not need to spend the money on the equipment. I did not need to waste the time implementing this mediocrely.
I could have, with that same time, just improved our residential and commercial. Looking at all of the projects that we should have been doing in that time, meaning improving our current service, our current staffing situation, current training – all of the things that we now have done since that time. We could have just improved these things.
Overall, my lack of focus and just bouncing around like a jumping bean has been an issue. My focus now is focus. I know I talk about this all the time, but it’s such a huge problem for all of us – not being focused and just allowing our attention to be pulled around like a plastic bag in the wind, to quote Katy Perry in “Firework.”
I think that will forever be a challenge, and something that I’m really trying to work on is staying focused and not being distracted by the shiny object syndrome. Do you need to open a new thing or offer a new service, or do you just need to hammer down and do more of what is actually working already? Take a look at what is working. Do more of that.
Mistake #3: Not Getting Credit Cards on File
Number three mistake that I have made, and I just remembered this from a conversation the other day, is I was terrified to ask people to have a credit card on file when I opened up. For several years, we did not have credit cards on file.
I find that a lot of people are scared of this, but let me tell you that the pain that you are going to feel by not having a card on file – you’re gonna feel it, and it will implore you to do this, but not until after you lose some money and sleep at night because you lost money that you were owed.
The reason we started having credit cards on file was because I thought people would be like, “Oh no, I’m not going to do that,” not realizing, in today’s day and age, everything you do has a card on file. It’s not unusual. Getting my hair done, I have my card on file, so it’s not crazy. People are used to it, but I was thinking in our rural area, older folks wouldn’t be okay with that.
Now we both require a credit card on file and a 50% down payment on the first appointment in order to even confirm their first cleaning. I was petrified to do anything like that for years, because I thought people would think that was somehow intrusive, which is just crazy. It’s not crazy to ask for this. It’s actually totally standard.
I think a lot of us are afraid to implement something new in our business, not realizing that people are used to doing this nowadays, like giving a credit card to hold a spot or have a down payment. It’s just a protective mechanism. It’s not unusual at all, especially for services that you’re going to pay for after the service is done, like cleaning or getting my hair done.
When Clients Don’t Pay
I had a couple instances where people did not pay their bill and I had not asked for a credit card on file. Actually, I don’t know if you guys are familiar with Dog the Bounty Hunter, but I dressed up with my hair like Dog the Bounty Hunter, put the sunglasses on, and went to this customer’s house, because she wasn’t paying and answering anything, and her house was actually right down the street from us. I ended up talking to her and getting payment in that manner. That one was pretty easy.
The other one that was really funny was this town probably about 15 minutes away, and we had done a cleaning for them, and they were not paying their bill. I was getting so mad, so I drove to their house, because I was like, “Screw this. We are getting paid today.”
I drove to their house, and their cars were in the driveway. They were clearly home. It’s middle of the day or whatever, and I start knocking on the door, and their dogs start barking like crazy. I know that they’re in there. I can see movement, right? They’re in there, but they’re not answering the door.
The dogs settle down, and then I knock again to set the dogs off, and they start barking because I was like, “You will not know peace until I get paid.” I just kept knocking on the door until the lady finally came to the door, all upset, but she had her checkbook and she paid her bill.
Lesson learned. I was like, “Okay, we need credit cards on file, because this is stupid. There is no reason I should be doing this. There is no reason that they’re not paying their bill.” Just total nonsense.
Obviously, we blacklisted that client and won’t clean for them again, because they were such a nightmare. That’s another thing – have a list of people that you won’t work with again, because as you add administrative staff, they don’t know the experience that you had. So make sure that you have a list of people that you will not clean for anymore. Otherwise, your admin will book it and you won’t realize, and then the history will repeat itself of the nightmare of working with certain people.
That really told me, “Oh my gosh, we need credit card on file,” because there’s no reason Stephanie should be dressing up like a bounty hunter and having to go knock on people’s door to get paid, and you shouldn’t have to either.
Especially when you’re small, that $500 move-out clean or whatever, that is huge money. And this is where the biggest problem is – with move-outs and one-time cleans, and they’re gone. You don’t have a credit card on file, you didn’t get a down payment, and you perform the cleaning, and they’re dust in the wind. They’re gone, and you’re not going to ever get that money.
Implementing Payment Policies
If you felt that pain right now, you’re doing credit cards on file. If you have a payment processor, if you have Stripe, Square, QuickBooks, however you do yours, you can have the card on file in there, and you can absolutely charge a down payment.
You may be like, “Stephanie, I charge hourly. How do I do a down payment?” We do a down payment of 50% of the estimated amount of time that first clean is going to take, and then whatever the balance is, is what we’re going to charge. It may be less or more than that first payment, but that’s okay. That’s how we handle it.
I know a lot of people want payment same day. For us, we have the card on file, we send them an invoice, or if they want to get automatically charged, we’ll do it that way as well. Other people might say, “No, you need to leave a check at the cleaning.” We charge hourly, so we can’t do that, which is why we do the invoicing. But either way, we know we have that protection and they’re going to pay.
We usually give people a grace period of about five days. For you, it doesn’t have to be like that. It can be same day – people have to pay same day.
If you’re scared about this, don’t be. It’s totally normal to have a card on file. It’s totally normal to charge a down payment to make sure you get paid, because at the end of the day, say they cancel their card or they gave you a bad card – you already have 50% so you can at least cover your labor costs.
If you do have cleaners, you can at least pay them for that time, and you may not have made any money or very little money, but at least you’re not eating the whole thing. That’s my thought process with the 50% down – at least I can cover the labor if something crazy happens in those very specific situations where they cancel their card or something in order to not pay you. People do crazy stuff, right?
So please stop not having this in place. Go ahead and start doing this right away, guys.
Closing Thoughts
So those are my three mistakes:
- Don’t gossip about people
- Don’t do services that don’t make sense, just because you’re bored and get a wild hair to start something new. Just keep doing what you’re doing. Keep doing what works.
- Get cards on file and charge down payments.
Those are my mistakes for you guys. Let me know what you think, hit that like, hit that subscribe, of course, drop any questions you have. I’m gonna keep doing the Q&As. Those seem to be doing very well, and you guys enjoy having your questions answered, and that’s what I’m here for – for you guys. So I will see you on the next episode of Filthy Rich Cleaners. Bye bye, guys.
Note: This transcript has been edited for clarity and readability.
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