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Effective Communication to Grow Your Janitorial Business

Boost Your Janitorial Business Customer Retention Rates With Proper Client Communication

All businesses require good client communication in order to survive and thrive in the modern world. However, many fail to utilize the best communication techniques based on their company and clients.

If you are in the field of janitorial services, you might think that your work speaks for itself. However, you will lose out on potential clients and fail to retain current ones if you don't look at this aspect of business operations.

Janitorial services are vital to the business world, though many people don't give much thought to this important niche. As long as you are doing your job well, the people that you serve might not even realize how your thorough services help their employees to complete tasks efficiently. In that case, if a competitor comes along flashing lower rates in their faces along with some good sales pitches for good measure, you could end up losing the contract and never know why.

You should also remember that pro-active communication allows you to improve customer service. Any cleaning business owner knows there will always be customer complaints. If your customer communication channels are already established this will make it easier to determine if you need to improve your customer service experience.

At the other end of the communication spectrum are those who send out too much communication and end up getting tossed in the junk pile, whether it was delivered via hard copy or digital means. These people are busy, and if you inundate them with salesy communications all of the time, they will begin to resent seeing your logo. This is exactly the opposite of what you want.

When you have found the right communication paths with your customers, they will smile when your logo flashes in front of their faces. They will appreciate the services that you provide and desire to continue the relationship. This brief moment of positive connection occurring on a regular basis will help to shield you both from your competitors. Should the flashy salesman throw a pitch with lower rates their way, your satisfied clients will give little thought to seeing their ads.

If you serve a wide variety of clients, you will need to develop more than one communication strategy. While you don't have to create one for every client, you can use various programs to help you provide each one with a great experience interacting with you, your online presence and your staff. For instance, if you clean for religious organizations, you might want a slightly different set of communication protocol than a tech company. Large companies versus smaller ones is another way that you might adjust some of your choices.

The first step in customer communications is to establish a website. A few pages that talk about the business, your services and other important information is all you must have. It should be well-designed and implement good search engine optimization techniques to help people find it. Your business name, phone number and e-mail addresses should all be clearly visible. Additionally, a contact button so that visitors can fill out a form directly from your site is a good choice.

Your site should also offer an e-mail sign up opportunity. The various programs that help people to handle mass e-mail communications give you a lot of ways that you can work with. For instance, you can provide e-mail recipients to choose how often they would like updates. Some folks might enjoy a small newsletter each week while others would prefer a monthly update. Giving subscribers this type of control helps to gain their trust and respect.

When you are working with a prospective client, whether in person or via an online communication, you need to learn about their preferences and needs. There are some people who love to text and others that despise hearing their phone make their programmed text alert sound. By asking your clients directly which method is preferred, and the best backup if the first is not available for the message, you are showing respect for their wishes. People like that. Even if they don't remember the specifics later on, that positive feeling is there when they remember signing the deal.

For the most part, these men and women will want to keep communication to a minimum, so you have to find ways to keep your logo and brand in their minds without overwhelming them. Always make sure that you have something worth communicating when you are contacting your clients. Unless you are also good friends, don't call to talk about the football game on Sunday or the weather. Of course, if you are inquiring about whether any special cleaning needs are going to arise due to in-office parties, that is an entirely different matter.

The point is that you want to always make the customer feel important and in charge. By creating these positive moments repeatedly throughout the contract you have agreed to, the owners and managers of these companies are far more likely to simply renew it rather than shopping around. In fact, depending on how things have gone, you might even be able to increase rates without them batting an eye. One aspect of that is providing excellent service each and every day during the contract period. While one or two minor mishaps might not count against you, more than that will make them think that you don't deserve more money for the work.

These same concepts apply to virtually any type of business. The clients and prospective clients deserve an opportunity to tell you what they want as far as communication. Additionally, you can provide occasional opportunities for them to adjust their preferences in case other things have changed in their lives. By contacting them only with important or otherwise positive things, you can keep the relationship on the right path. If a customer wants weekly phone reports, by all means make that weekly contact. On the other hand, if they prefer quarterly reports unless something needs to be taken care of immediately, you should respect that as well.

Good customer communication is vital to customer retention. If you own and manage a professional cleaning services company, you can use in-person and online methods of gathering the information you need to ensure your clients are satisfied. This will help to grow your brand name and reputation.

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