How to use customer reviews to grow your maid service

How to Use Customer Reviews to Grow Your Maid Service

Last Updated on August 21, 2023 by The ZenMaid Team

You can have creative ads and big marketing campaigns, but when it comes to your reputation, your customers are in control. Their opinions about the quality of your service create your reputation. 

If youโ€™re not regularly getting and sharing positive customer reviews, you’re missing a huge marketing opportunity. Reviews can help build trust with potential customers long before they enter your sales funnel, making it easier for them to say yes to your service when they do.  

Another plus: Reviews and testimonials are user-generated content that will help boost your search engine ranking and drive more visitors to your website.  

Even if you have the best service, you canโ€™t expect glowing reviews to flow automatically. But many business owners donโ€™t know the methods for getting good reviews. Or the right way to share those reviews.

All of this falls under a growing field called reputation marketing. If done right, reputation marketing will help increase your sales and revenue, and build your brand. It will also help you hire โ€“ and retain โ€“  great employees by giving them the recognition they deserve. 

In this article, youโ€™ll learn what reputation marketing is and why it matters. And youโ€™ll get examples of how to use it to attract leads and grow your business. That includes an answer to the question most business owners ask: How many reviews do I need?

Have you ever found yourself staring at the phone, client on the line, sweating over what number to say? You’re not alone. One of the most common questions among residential cleaning business owners is how much should I charge for my services?

Charge too high, and you might scare clients away. Too low, and you’re undercutting your value. It’s enough to make anyone second-guess their math skills. In this article, weโ€™re breaking down industry standards and how to calculate the best price to charge for your maid service. 

Now, letโ€™s get to it. 

Hourly vs. flat rate pricing:

The debate between hourly vs. flat rate is as old as the industry itself. Many seasoned experts advocate for flat-rate pricing as the golden ticket to scaling your business. It offers predictability for your clients and ensures you’re compensated for the value you provide, not just the time you spend.

However, don’t toss the idea of knowing your hourly rate out the window just yet. Understanding your approximate hourly rate is crucial for accurately setting your flat rates. It serves as the foundation upon which you build your pricing structure, ensuring that you’re not only competitive but also profitable.

The trick is to calculate your hourly rate based on your operating costs, desired profit margins, and the market rates, and then transition to a flat-rate model that reflects the value and efficiency of your services. In this article, weโ€™re giving you step-by-step instructions on how to determine this rate. But first, letโ€™s cover some industry averages:

Industry average prices for cleaning services

The standard flat rate for cleaning services can vary widely depending on the location, the size and condition of the space, the type of cleaning required, and the cleaning company itself. Here’s a quick breakdown of standard cleaning rates based on averages from HomeAdvisor and Angi.

1. Hourly Rates:

  • Standard cleaning prices also range from $35 to $60 per hour for each cleaner. 
  • The national average cost of house cleaning is noted to be $40-$50 per hour, per cleaner.

2. Per Room Rates:

  • The rate is about $30 to $50 per room.

3. Square Footage Rates:

  • Cleaning a 2,000-square-foot home can cost about $0.06 to $0.16 per square foot, which would total $110 to $320.

4. Flat Fee Rates:

  • For a typical three-bedroom, 2,000-square-foot home, the cleaning cost usually ranges from $160 to $200. 
  • A one-bedroom apartment is priced at around $80 to $110.
Cleaning typeHourly rateFlat rateSq Ft Rate
Residential Cleaning
Standard Cleaning$25 – $50 per cleaner$100 – $200$0.05 – $0.16
Deep Cleaning$40 – $100 per cleaner$200 – $400$0.13 – $0.17
Move-In/Out Cleaning$40 – $100 per cleaner$300 – $400$0.13 – $0.20
Commercial Cleaning
Standard Cleaning$25 to $90 per cleanerVaries by size$0.10 to $0.25
Deep Cleaning$40 to $150 per cleaner$200 to $500N/A
Special ServicesVaries by serviceVaries by serviceVaries by service

Additional Services You Can Charge: For residential cleaning, add-on services such as changing bed sheets, laundry, interior and exterior window cleaning, fridge cleaning, oven cleaning, etc., come with additional costs ranging from $4 to $50 per serviceโ€‹. In ZenMaid, you can easily add these extra charges to your cleaning job. 

The pricing strategy formula

Now that weโ€™ve covered some average industry rates, letโ€™s break down a bit more. Everyone likes a good roadmap, right? Here are the four steps for how to find your cleaning service rate: 

  • Step One: Find your target hourly rate
  • Step Two: Calculate how much square footage you can clean in an hour
  • Step Three: Develop a pricing strategy
  • Step Four: Use the pricing formula

How to find the hourly rate for your business

The first step to finding an hourly rate for your business starts with doing local market research. When conducting your market research, consider these targeted questions: 

  • What are other businesses charging? More specifically, what are businesses the same size as yours charging? 
  • How often do they offer services?

The easiest way to find out what your competitors are charging is when prices are listed on their website. Unfortunately, that’s not very common. So, pick up the phone and call up your competitors to ask. 

Once you know what your competition is charging, try to understand how much you can get for what you offer. 

  • Will the demographic in your area pay for a premium service? 
  • Do you want to charge the same as a franchise’s cleaning business?

Facebook groups, client surveys, and competitors are great places to find these answers. 

After you’ve done your market research, you’ll need to figure out how to position your company in the marketplace. Are you just another residential cleaning service? Or, do you offer a premium, specialized product? 

When you know the direction you’re headed, the road to your pricing strategy is easier to find. Some cleaning services like to specialize in large homes or luxury homes. Others just want the โ€˜meat and potatoes’ of a basic cleaning service. The good news is that there’s plenty of business for everybody. 

Employee pay

The next factor that influences your hourly rate is how much you pay your employees. If you want to pay the bare minimum needed to hire people, that’s going to put you on the lower end of the hourly rate. 

If you aim to offer a livable wage with benefits, you’re going to need to charge more. There are no correct answers here, but you need to understand these factors when developing your hourly rate.

The average employee pay range for cleaners is $15.30/hour. You can use this for calculating your hourly cleaning rate. 

Consider your marketing strategy

The final factor for your hourly rate is your marketing strategy. 

Are you trying to grow your business? 

Your rate will need to be competitive if you’re hoping to grow at a fast pace. 

If you need to grow rapidly but don’t want to lower prices, read this article three ways to get more cleaning customers without lowering your prices.ย 

If your business has grown to a place you’re comfortable with, or if you’re well-known in the area, you can probably charge a higher hourly rate. And you can definitely charge a higher rate if you have a waiting list of clients! 

How many square feet can you clean per hour?

After you’ve found your hourly rate, understand how many square feet you can clean per hour. Now, at first, this can seem hard to find, but you likely already have the information you need โ€“ it’s just a matter of finding it! 

It’s important to know your square footage per hour because you will use it as a baseline for all your prices.

Use data from past cleaning jobs to learn how fast you can clean 500 square feet. You’ll want to calculate an average from your recent jobs. 

  • How long did the last ten *typical jobs take you? 
  • How many employees were on the cleaning job? 
  • How many square feet were the homes?

Don’t have any recent data? 

No worries! Start recording this data for the next week and then use it to find your average.

*Several variables can affect your average cleaning rate, so use only typical homes when calculating your average cleaning pace. Your typical homes are the predictable ones that are simple to clean, requiring only your basic cleaning services. (We’ll touch on how to avoid pricing disasters in these kinds of homes at the end of this article!)

How to find your pricing strategy

The next step to nail down your pricing system is to identify your pricing strategy. 

In other words, how frequently do you hope to charge for services? We’re going to use your pricing strategy to calculate our prices based on frequency. 

Do you want your main revenue to come from weekly cleans, bi-weekly, or monthly with extra fees?

Many residential cleaning companies push for bi-weekly cleans. Offering a small discount of around 5% is a great option to incentivize clients to choose these more frequent cleans. 

On the other hand, charging more for monthly cleans is a good way to help clients choose more frequent cleans. It’s often reasonable to charge an additional 50% for a monthly clean. 

We see too many cleaning business owners charge the same rate for bi-weekly and monthly cleans. When this happens, your client has no reason to choose bi-weekly over monthly. 

Determining an effective pricing strategy is crucial and should align with your current business standing and long-term goals. Assessing your booking rates and understanding your clientele’s price sensitivity are pivotal steps.

More factors to consider:

  • If you find that your services are in high demand, with a fully booked schedule being the norm, it might be an indication that your clientele values your services highly. In such a scenario, adopting a premium pricing strategy could be beneficial. This approach reflects the high quality and demand for your services and provides additional revenue that can be reinvested into growing and enhancing your business further.
  • On the flip side, a different approach is warranted if your booking rate is lower than desired and you’re struggling to cover your operational costs. Penetration pricing, where you initially set a lower price to gain market share and cover your fixed expenses, might be a viable strategy. This can help attract a customer base and establish a foothold in the market. Once a loyal clientele is built and market recognition is achieved, prices can be gradually adjusted to a higher point.
  • Alternatively, crafting custom packages could be a smart move. By offering tailored cleaning packages, you encourage customers to engage with your services over a longer term. This not only helps cover your fixed costs but also enhances each customer’s lifetime value, thereby boosting your overall profitability. Structuring packages that provide value while ensuring profitability will create a win-win scenario for your business and clientele.

To learn more about building a pricing strategy for your cleaning business, check out this article!

How to calculate your pricing

We’ve made it to the pricing formula. After you’ve gone through all the steps above, this next step is pretty simple.

First, take the square footage of your client’s home and divide it by your rate of square feet cleaned per hour. Then, multiply it by your hourly rate. The total number is how much you’ll charge for a single job in that client’s home. 

So let’s use an easy number as an example: If a client with a 2,000 square-foot home calls you looking for a quote, divide 2,000 by 500 (rate of square feet cleaned per hour) multiplied by $50 (an hourly rate.) The total one-time clean for that client is $200.

Bi-weekly rate

Offering a 5% discount for bi-weekly cleans is a great incentive for clients. Using the $200 example above, this would mean a client can have a 2,000-square-foot home cleaned twice a month for $380 (after the 5% is applied.) This is an example of a baseline bi-weekly rate. 

Monthly rate

Your monthly cleans can have an additional 50% charge to encourage more frequent cleans and account for the extra dust and dirt the home will accumulate between cleans. Using the $200 example, a monthly clean would cost a 2,000-square-foot client $300 (after an extra 50% is added.) This is an example of a baseline monthly rate. 

You can use this formula to calculate any specialty service in your business. Just play around with different percentages and values until you come to a reasonable and profitable baseline. 

Minimum rate

No matter what kind of service you’re offering, it’s important to set a minimum rate to avoid losing money on out-of-scope services. This will save you the headache of negotiating with a client who might only want a certain room in their home clean. Or perhaps, if they have a smaller home that would only require an hour of cleaning based on your square footage cleaning rate. Set this minimum rate using the pricing calculator and the base amount required to make a profit per clean. 

Factors affecting cleaning service pricing

Sometimes, you will find people reaching out to you for a quote, but once you get to the location, you find out there are a lot of factors at play that affect pricing.

Other than the factors mentioned earlier, here are some factors to be aware of:

  • Size of the Area to be Cleaned: The total square footage or the number of rooms and bathrooms can greatly affect the time, effort, and resources required to complete the cleaning task.
  • Level of Clutter: A cluttered space can take longer to clean as it might require decluttering before the actual cleaning can commence.
  • Type of Cleaning Required: Whether it’s a standard cleaning, deep cleaning, or a specialized service like carpet cleaning or window washing, different types of cleaning have different pricing structures.
  • Frequency of Cleaning: Regularly scheduled cleanings may be priced differently than one-time or less frequent cleanings.
  • Accessibility: If certain areas are hard to reach or the location is in a high-traffic urban area, it may add to the cleaning time and cost.
  • Special Requests or Preferences: Clients may have special requests such as using eco-friendly cleaning products or working outside standard hours, which can also affect costs.
  • Pet Situation: Homes with pets may require additional cleaning efforts like fur removal, which could influence the price.
  • Parking Facilities: In urban areas, the availability of parking near the location can be a factor as it may affect the ease with which cleaning crews can access the site.
  • Additional Services: Services like laundry, dishwashing, or organizing could be additional and would affect the overall pricing.
  • Supplies Provided: Whether the cleaning company needs to provide all cleaning supplies or some are provided by the client can also impact the cost.
  • Lifestyle Factors: Does the client smoke indoors? Does the client keep surfaces clean during the week? Do they host a lot of guests?
  • Urgency: Urgent or last-minute cleaning requests may carry premium pricing.

Protecting yourself from pricing disasters

With flat-rate pricing, you need to protect yourself from pricing disasters. We’ve all been there: after quoting a home, we walk into a cleaning job that takes way longer than estimated. There are mountains of clutter, piles of dust, and floors in need of a little too much love. So what do you do?

When taking any new job, set the precedent that you may need to overcharge if any visit takes longer than planned. An example line you can add to your contracts is, โ€œquoted prices assume average-sized rooms in average condition. Extra hours needed to clean will be priced with an additional $50 per hour.โ€ When a client agrees to this ahead of time, you’ve protected yourself from being underpaid. 

Then, when you find yourself in a job taking longer than expected (which is bound to happen at some point), take a break from cleaning to notify the client that an extra fee will be added to keep cleaning. If they give you the go-ahead, you can proceed and charge extra as needed. 

If the client declines moving forward, then you can wrap up the job without any penalty. Don’t wait until you’re at the end of a job to notify the client of an extra charge. 

Wrapping up

Your cleaning business’ success starts with finding the right rates to charge. 

Luckily, finding the perfect pricing strategy for your cleaning business doesn’t have to feel like solving a complex puzzle. With ZenMaid, you can take the guesswork out of quoting and make the process as clean and simple as the services you offer. Our software comes equipped with an instant booking form feature, making it effortless for your clients to get accurate quotes online directly from your website.

Say goodbye to pricing woes and hello to a smoother, more professional booking experience with ZenMaid.

Reputation marketing makes your customer reviews work harder

Reputation marketing has elements of brand marketing and reputation management. Letโ€™s review the difference between them. 

Brand marketing is about publicizing your company’s identity and values. Your brand is how you tell the world what your company stands for. 

Reputation management involves decreasing negative reviews, responding to feedback and resolving customer complaints online. 

While dealing with negative reviews is important,  today it’s not enough to just react to negative reviews. You have to get ahead of the game. 

Reputation marketing is an active way to use your companyโ€™s reputation to attract new clients and customers. Specifically, itโ€™s getting and promoting customer reviews, testimonials, online ratings, community awards and social media mentions.

Reputation marketing influences what your customers think about you by highlighting the good, not just by avoiding the bad.

Set the stage for great reviews

To get a five-star review, you have to prepare your customers from the very beginning. Here are some ways to do that: 

Manage expectations. Most customers donโ€™t leave negative reviews because of a bad experience, but because a service didnโ€™t match their expectations. 

Make sure their expectations arenโ€™t unrealistic by explaining early in your process exactly what youโ€™re going to do and what youโ€™re going to charge. 

Show that their feedback will be part of the process. By highlighting reviews in your marketing, youโ€™re showing customers that youโ€™ll be asking for their feedback, too. 

Develop a five-star service. When youโ€™re developing your sales package or offer, ask yourself โ€œWhat does five-star service look like? What does a 10-star service look like?โ€ By doing that, you’ll now know what you need to do to meet the expectations for that level of satisfaction from your customers.

Remind your customers about the five-star service they received. At the end of the process, remind your customers about the things you did that youโ€™d like reflected in their review.  

This will increase your chances of getting a review that has detail and context, because a five-star review with no description wonโ€™t do much to help build your reputation.

Here are some things you can say and ask:

  • โ€œI hope you enjoyed how the whole process went for you today.โ€
  • โ€œWere you happy with the timeframe? I know we were 10 minutes early, but we try our best to be as early as possible.โ€
  • โ€œDid you like how we answered the phone? Did we answer all your questions?โ€

After this conversation โ€“ and hopefully theyโ€™ve stated they were happy with your service โ€“ ask them if theyโ€™d be willing to leave a customer review. And then tell him exactly how to do that.

Make it easy for your customers to give you a review

Make sure the process for giving reviews is simple. Difficulty is one of the biggest reasons consumers donโ€™t leave reviews. Think about all the positive experiences youโ€™ve had with businesses. How many times did you review them?

NiceJob finds that the two-week period after service is the best time to collect reviews.

You could use reputation marketing software like NiceJob to automatically collect your customer reviews, or you can use a manual system. You can also use QR codes, email review links or text link code. No matter which methods you choose, make it as easy as possible for your customers. 

And if a customer doesnโ€™t immediately leave a review, follow up. You could send a reminder text message and up to three emails, if necessary.  Once a review is left, make sure they don’t get any more messages. 

If you’re doing this without Nice job software, they recommend sending a reminder three days after the initial service. You can then choose to follow up seven or 10 days after initial service.

Whatโ€™s the magic number for reviews?

Now letโ€™s get to the question most business owners have. Exactly how many reviews do you need? Itโ€™s a complex answer, but letโ€™s start here: If you donโ€™t have at least 20 reviews, you canโ€™t consider yourself a competitor in your market.

In the eyes of your potential customers, 20 reviews shows enough experience to be trustworthy. 

To start, aim to get one review for every 10 jobs. With that as your minimum, you will start to collect enough social proof to begin sharing them and see results. You might say, it could take you 20 months to get to that number. Thatโ€™s why itโ€™s the bare minimum. As your reputation starts to grow, youโ€™re going to get more than 10 jobs a month.

To recap: You need one review for every 10 jobs, 20 reviews to gain competitor status, but ultimately, you want to have as many reviews as possible. 

Why some negative reviews are good for business

If you think you should aim to have only five-star reviews. Think again.

Consider this example from the world of computer generated graphics. When something thatโ€™s computer generated looks too real (referred to as โ€œuncanny valleyโ€), audiences have a hard time connecting and trusting.

The same concept applies to your reviews. If you show only five stars, itโ€™s hard for people to believe those reviews as real. A few not so positive ones will contribute to a realistic presence online so donโ€™t remove them. 

Also, if you start seeing more negative reviews roll in, you’re able to determine what part of your system is contributing to those negative reviews so you can quickly resolve those issues. 

Where and how to share your reviews with potential customers

Once you have 20 customer reviews, it’s time to start marketing the reputation that youโ€™re starting to earn. Here are four places where you can start:

Add the customer reviews to your website. According to Shawn Hill at NiceJob, customers read about 10 reviews before buying. And they think reviews are 12 times more believable than sales copy. 

If you don’t display reviews on your website, you’re probably missing out on a good percentage of business. In fact, having at least 10 customer reviews can increase your search traffic by 15% to 20%, says Shawn.

Consider having a dedicated review page that highlights your reviews from other platforms, like Google and Facebook. You can embed their widget onto your site so they can update information automatically.

Itโ€™s a good strategy to highlight the three best and three worst reviews. Remember, some negative reviews actually help. You can also add a widget that shows virtual thumbs-ups in real time. 

Save your top review for the homepage. A recent study showed that adding a review underneath a hero section improves the conversion rate by 56.2%, says Shawn. 

Use your reviews in your advertisements. Whether it’s an ad on Google, Facebook or Instagram, sharing reviews and social proof of your great service helps improve your paid marketing performance. 

With paid ads, there’s no way to outbid competitors for clicks. That means your reviews and your average star rating are going to be the two most important criteria for ad placements.

Draw them in with the social proof and pair it with a convenient call to action, also known as a CTA. Examples of CTAs are โ€œBook a free consultation,โ€ or โ€œSign up now.โ€

Share your reviews on your free social media accounts. By sharing there, youโ€™ll market your reputation to people doing a natural scroll through their feed. You can craft posts through software such as NiceJob that will help you automatically share those reviews. Or you can use tools like Canva to easily create graphics. Add photos to the reviews to create more impact.

You can also share things like awards for community service, or your involvement with charities or local events. This kind of marking material is just as useful as a customer review, because it showโ€™s your company is reliable and trustworthy.

Maximize your Google My Business profile. If you’re not claiming it, controlling it, and connecting your reviews to it, you’re leaving a huge opportunity on the table. 

Results are found in consistency

Using reputation marketing to dominate your market can take work, skill and time. But investing in the effort can lead to big rewards for your business. 

About the presenter

Shawn Hill is the Community Marketing Manager for NiceJob, a reputation management software company and Maid Summit sponsor.ย  Shawn specializes in building engagement and customer interaction.

This talk first aired at the 2021 Maid Service Success Summit.

The Maid Summit is an annual online event that brings together the most successful leaders in the cleaning industry, like Debbie Sardone, Angela Brown, Courtney Wisely, Amy Caris, Chris Schwab and more. Get free access to masterclasses and workshops that will help you to grow, scale and automate your cleaning business so you can get more leads and create more profit. Make sure youโ€™re on our email list to find out how to get free tickets to the next event.

Learn more:

If you found this article helpful for your maid service, you may also like:

ZenMaid

Amar is the founder and CEO of ZenMaid Software, Inc. He started and ran Fast Friendly Spotless, a maid service in Orange County, CA. With the help of customized software to automate work he successfully operated the service in under 30 minutes per day. He created ZenMaid scheduling software to help other maid service owners do the same.

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