How Digital Marketing Strategies Help Cleaning Businesses Generate Quality Leads Online Every Single Day

Introduction

About a decade ago, a lot of growth for a cleaning company was via flyers, van signage, and loyal referrals. These days, most customers start their search for a deep clean, office, or regular service or move-out job by picking up the phone and googling. If your name doesn’t appear during that search, you might as well not exist to that potential customer.

For a cleaning business, digital marketing has quickly risen to become one of the key elements of a growth strategy. Whether you have a small, local business or a larger, multi-location business like Sanitair, the same rule applies. The services that you provide are popular and people are searching for them. If your marketing shows up and communicates your services in a clear and trustworthy manner, you’ll get the job.

The advantage of digital marketing is that it’s systematic. When done correctly, the system will bring in leads at 9AM on Monday, 11PM on Thursday, and 2PM on Sunday without you having to make a single call. This guide contains those proven digital marketing strategies to get your phone ringing with qualified leads on a daily basis.

What Makes Quality Leads Better Than Lead Volume

To begin, let's define "quality." A quality lead is someone who could potentially benefit from your service, lives in your service area, has a realistic budget, and is ready to make a purchase in the near future. A low quality lead is someone who is just looking, has no intention to purchase, or is interested in a service that you do not provide.

Many businesses in the cleaning industry make the mistake of chasing clicks and calls, and do not filter for fit. These businesses spend money on pay-per-click ads, answer dozens of unqualified leads, and exhaust their employees by having them quote unproductive leads.

Successful digital marketing focuses on the right clientele, and allows that clientele to easily address their pain point.

As an example, think of the difference between a person searching “cleaning” and a person searching “end of tenancy cleaning near me” or “weekly office cleaning service.” The second person searching has a clear need and a clear time frame.

Strategy One: Develop a Website That Gets Results

Your website is often the first impression, and in many cases, the only opportunity you have to capture and retain a potential customer. For example, if a potential client visits the website of a cleaning company and has to wait 20 seconds for the website to load, they will leave. This is true if the website looks out of date or if the contact information is not clear.

To be successful, a lead generation website needs the following:

• Clear service pages. Each of your core services, such as residential and commercial cleaning, deep cleaning, carpet cleaning, and post-construction cleaning, should each have a dedicated service page. This is beneficial for the potential customers and the search engine.

• Fast, responsive design. Most people looking for cleaning services are done on a mobile device. Your website must load quickly and display correctly for the design to be effective on smaller screens.

• Prominent calls to action. A “Get a Free Quote” button must be visible on the service page without the need to scroll. Keep the click-to-call and contact forms simple, only requiring customers to provide their name and number to help ensure leads are captured.

• Trust signals. You must provide potential customers with before and after pictures, your company reviews, the certification and insurance, and your service area. Trust is important for people considering utilizing your cleaning services since you will be entering their home or workplace.

Hygiene and reliability are important trust factors for customers, and websites for companies such as Sanitair have a huge advantage since a clean and professional website creates a great first impression and builds the presumption of hygiene and reliability for customers prior to speaking with someone in the company.

Strategy Two: Capture Ready-to-Book Customers with Local SEO

Cleaning services are local services. Search engines recognize that. When someone searches “cleaning service in Portland”, Google displays results for Portland’s local cleaning services, lists the service’s address and phone number, and provides directions. The first few results are like having a billboard on a highway. If you clean yards in Portland, you need to show up for that search.

You start with your Google Business Profile (previously Google My Business). Make sure you fill in your business name, describe your business with relevant keywords, and identify the service areas and the hours you are available. Be sure to upload quality pictures of your business, provide a detailed description, and post frequent updates. Engage with customers by answering their questions. After that, focus on:

NAP consistency. Making sure your business name, address and phone number are the same across all citations (such as your website, social profiles and directories) is of utmost importance.

Location-based content. Write content focused on the areas you service. If you clean offices in Portland, for example, write a page titled “Office Cleaning Services in Portland”.

Reviews. The best way to boost your ranking and get customers is to have reviews. After each job, send a message to your happy customers and ask them to leave you a review. Respond to reviews, both good and bad.

Quality backlinks. The best way to boost your ranking and get customers is to have quality backlinks. Reach out to quality sites, local directories, suppliers and blogs for links to your site and boost your relevance. Over time, this will pay off.

Local SEO takes time and resources to set up, but delivers the best long-term return on investment of any digital marketing strategy for service-based businesses. Unlike other marketing channels, people clicking your local SEO-optimized listings are often ready to hire.

Strategy Three: Create Helpful Content that Builds Trust and Authority

Most people don’t hire a cleaner on the spot. First, they do research. They Google how much a deep clean costs. They look for signs of eco-friendliness. They contemplate how often their office should be professionally cleaned. They take stock of how best to prepare their home for the deep clean. They’re asking questions and looking for answers. Your business can provide those answers before a sales conversation even takes place by creating helpful content.

Each of the following topics lend themselves well to content that helps your audience with their research.

• "How to prepare your home for a deep clean"

• "Move in/out Cleaning Checklists"

• "What's the difference between regular, deep and sanitizing clean?"

• Seasonal tips and tricks

• Case Studies

Whenever someone in your service area types a question into Google, they're creating another doorway into your website and your helpful content has the potential to answer the question, build trust, and lower your Cost Per Lead (CPL).

It's true that in this industry, video is one of the most effective forms of advertising. Much like with the before and after photos, a short video showing the beginning stages of a project and the outcome is sometimes more convincing than paragraphs and paragraphs of promises. Show potential clients video examples of your work on your website, your social media, and your Google Business Profile.

Strategy Four: Use Paid Ads and Social Media to Generate Consistent Leads on a Daily Basis

SEO and content marketing build your business for the future, but to gain clients immediately, paid advertising is the way to go. Striking a balance between the two is ideal for most cleaning businesses.

Google Ads allows you to pay to have your business show up at the top of relevant search results. You can target high-intent keywords that are local and related to your cleaning business. Because you set a limit on how much you want to spend, you can determine how long your ad will run. Limit the ad to your service area and have the ad direct traffic to a dedicated landing page.

Social media advertising allows you to reach your audience based on location and interests. Have your ad focus on the people who recently moved into a new home or people who have recently purchased a home. Using video to showcase before and after pictures of your work is more effective than using text. Use customer testimonials and limited time offers to help increase your business as well.

Social media, especially Instagram and Facebook, allow you to post pictures and videos of your clean up crew at work. It also allows you to post pictures and videos of customers and test out quick tips and tricks to clean.

Email and retargeting close the loop. Not all leads convert on the first visit, and retargeting ads can help remind leads of your service. You can use emails to bring leads back for seasonal cleans or recurring service plans. Repeat customers are the best and easiest customers to gain, because they are cheap to acquire.

How to Track Results and Improve Every Month

Digital marketing has the upper hand compared to other marketing methods because everything can be measured. You can tell which channel brings leads and which channel is a waste of money.

Tracking call and form leads helps you determine which marketing channel is bringing the leads. Knowing a few key numbers can help you identify areas to improve. Look at how many leads you’ve gotten in a month, what was the average value of jobs booked, what was your cost per lead and what was your conversion rate from an inquiry to booked job.

During slow times of the year, find ways to keep cash flowing. Run Google Ads or adjust your local SEO. Lead behavior studies show that the first business to reply to a quote often wins the job. Be the first to reply to all your leads, whether it be quote requests, booking requests or an answer to your ad. Implement processes for quick lead reply, whether it be following up on quotes, or answering phones and booking requests during business hours.

Test new marketing ideas and offers. Changes to your headlines or landing pages can double or triple your leads. Continually focus on marketing system improvements and watch your leads grow.

Conclusion

Steady leads are no longer limited to large corporations. Any cleaning business can build a leading online presence to attract the customers they want, day after day. This includes building trustworthy, fast websites, using Local SEO to gain visibility before customers make bookings, writing quality content to establish authority, and trust. While working the lead-generating machines, tracking must also be done to assess return on investment and improve results over time.