January 14, 2025 • 23 mins
With the right strategies, scaling a business to $1 million without a marketing budget is possible. This episode dives into practical tips, including leveraging Facebook groups, the power of email marketing, using Google My Business for visibility, and creating client loyalty through personal touches. Learn how to build momentum and keep it going with actionable advice designed for home service pros. Join host Adam Sylvester and Crystal Hamm of Go 2 Girls.
New to Jobber? Masters of Home Service listeners can claim an exclusive discount for Jobber at https://bit.ly/4d0KAEh
[00:00] Introduction to the episode and guest
[01:29] Growing revenue to $1 million without a marketing budget
[02:39] Using Facebook and free tools like Canva as a primary lead generation tool
[06:01] The importance of email marketing for client engagement and retention
[07:31] Utilizing Google My Business and collecting reviews to boost visibility
[08:50] Building credibility through a professional website and social presence
[09:26] How automation and systems like Jobber support scaling efforts
[10:37] Implementing a referral program for clients and team members
[12:13] The role of customer service in creating loyal, long-term clients
[13:39] Creating personal touches like welcome gifts and small gestures
[15:34] Handling mistakes to build trust and convert feedback into loyalty
[17:19] Recruiting and retaining quality employees as a foundation for growth
[19:36] Final advice for scaling, including free tools and local contests
[21:03] Encouragement to focus on momentum and the flywheel effect
[22:02] Adam’s Key Takeaways: Create a referral program, utilize Facebook groups, email marketing
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Once you get the Facebookalgorithm in your favor,
it keeps paying off and paying off,
and then you have others engagingyour clients. They just add to it.
So it's exactly as you described,but once you start that ball rolling,
it just picks up speed andcontinues downhill and it's free.
Welcome to Jobbers Masters of HomeService, a podcast for home service pros,
(00:21):
buy Home Service pros.
We're in Las Vegas and today we'retalking about scaling your business to $1
million in revenue with nomarketing budget. I'm your host,
Adam Sylvester. Today's guest is CrystalHam. She's the founder of Go-To Girls,
a house cleaning company in Raleigh,North Carolina. She has over 50 employees,
3 million in revenue, and I'mexcited to have her on. Crystal,
(00:41):
welcome to the show.
Thank you so much, Adam.It's a pleasure to be here.
Yeah, absolutely. So tell our listenerswho you are, what you do and everything,
and also how did you get here?
So I went to college for finance,finance, insurance, and real estate.
I was in the bankingworld for over 10 years,
and then I left the banking world.
I worked with my husbandfor about eight years.
(01:01):
He owns a manufacturing company and thenjust really decided that I needed to
get back to my core, which is toserve others. I love to help people.
I made a list of all the thingsI love to do. I love to clean.
When I originally started go to Girls,we were going to clean, do laundry,
do personal errands, dogwalking, you name it,
and then found that notall of that was scalable.
(01:23):
So I brought that to go-togirls and launched almost
nine years ago.
Great. Okay. And so yourmarketing budgets basically zero.
It's like less than 1%, way less than 1%.
And so you don't really spend money onmarketing except for maybe a little bit
here and there. We're not talking aboutthat. We're talking about lead costs.
You don't really have lead costs,
and so how did you build your businessto 1 million without spending any money
(01:47):
on marketing?
Yeah, so I grew go-to girls to a milliondollars in revenue in three years,
and so I have very specific strategiesthat we can provide for your users.
The first is have a Facebook account.You have to have a Facebook account,
even if you're young and youfeel that that's for old people,
that is where your audience and yourtarget market is going to be for most
(02:09):
service home-based businesses. Sodefinitely create a Facebook account.
As soon as you create that,
I would highly recommend to everyone togo to free design software. For example,
Canva. Canva provides amazing,
very professional ads that you cancreate and that you can post to your
Facebook. This is where we get very,
(02:30):
very specific with what weneed to do within Facebook.
This is how I personally grew my business.
So what you need to do is identifyyour target market. That is extremely
important for me.
I'm going to talk specifically for meso I can give very specific details.
My target market is moms.They clean the house.
And so once I got intoFacebook, I found groups,
(02:54):
community groups, mom groups,that's where my market is, the moms,
and there are searchfeatures within Facebook.
If you go to the top of the Facebook,you can actually search keywords. For me,
it would be clean housekeeper.Personally, we don't use the word made,
but you could search for the wordmade and you will find very specific
(03:16):
leads for your industry. Maybe it'scarpet cleaning or window washing,
whatever your target or yourservice industry is within those
community groups and those mom groups,
those are all free leads.
Here is the power of Facebook.Once you find that lead,
(03:37):
you create really a patternof words that will help
to boost your algorithm.So for example,
let's say that you're the onelooking, I would say hi at sign, Adam,
that's going to prompt that message toautomatically go in your notifications
because it has the at sign for youand then you do your specific company.
(04:00):
For me, it's go-to girlsat sign, go-to girls,
would love to assist youwith your cleaning needs,
and then if you're just startingout, you haven't won awards yet,
you haven't done things like that.
So highlight all the positivethings about your business.
What happens is it then starts tocreate algorithms within Facebook
that even now nine years later, when Ipull up my phone and I scroll through,
(04:24):
I get cleaning leads every single day.
So when you're first starting out,you're creating those algorithms.
Go into the moms group, search for theword clean, go into the community groups,
search for whatever your industry is,
and I would do that twicea day every single day.
So that's all free. It costsyou nothing. Your time is money,
(04:47):
but it's all free when you're startingout and you have no marketing budget.
And these are groups onFacebook of mom groups and that.
Kind of.
Stuff, correct? Yeah.
Yes, but it's also community groups.
So just because maybeyou're a mail cleaning
business owner, you can'tget into a mom group,
but you can get into thesecommunity groups and the leads are just as plentiful.
(05:09):
Going back to creating these freeads on Canva, once you post those,
be very strategic. Once you postthose to your Facebook page,
then you can share those to the communitygroup. So again, that is all free.
You have to share it from the ad thatwas created into those community groups.
Now there are certain guidelines, Ican't tell you specifically what that is.
For each group I would say read therules, follow the rules in each group,
(05:33):
but again, all of that isfree in order to do that.
So you would say that inthose first three years,
that is primarily whereyou got most of your leads,
was doing that with Facebook?
Yes.
I would get starting out over ahundred leads per month on Facebook
organically for free. I did notcreate ads and pay for the ads.
(05:53):
I would create something in Canva,
post it to community groups and replyto the leads specifically that were
looking for my services.
Wow. Would you say that all hundred ofthose were because you were going out and
getting them or were any of those wordof mouth people referring them to you and
then anything or sharing your postson Facebook, that kind of stuff?
Right, so Facebook would be one of thetools. I have many that I can share.
(06:17):
So the other is using email marketing.
So Jobber has an amazing way to doemail marketing to your clients.
For example, when you're starting out,
maybe you've hired a new cleaner andyou have openings on your schedule.
You can create a list and email out thoseclients and maybe you run a flash sale
and you can fill yourschedule. So as you are
(06:40):
getting the leads through Facebook,once you capture their email,
always capture their email, youcreate that list through email,
and then again, it's your nurturingthem. So it can be follow up,
which Jobber does. So that increasesyour probability of closing that job.
But then once you, let's saythe person didn't book with you,
(07:02):
but you run a flash sale, have a couplethree hour spots, run a flash sale,
get those clients in. Nowthey know how amazing you are,
then they can book with you. So wehad a very, very high conversion rate,
over 50%.
Using.
That strategy.
Okay, that's awesome. So Facebookis number one. Email is number two,
(07:23):
and if you're not emailing your clientson a regular basis, you're losing money.
That's what I've always saidfor years. It's true. So email,
any other things you were doing.
So you can create a Google MyBusiness account for free. Again,
that is another free tool.
And then every single clientthat you provide a service to,
you should have someone followingup. If you're just starting out,
(07:43):
then that would be you. If you're, asyou're growing customer service manager,
ask every single person that ishappy with your service or review.
We.
Still do that almost nine years laterpersonally ask them with a link.
So what that does is now you'reworking on the algorithm within Google.
GoTo Girls has, I don't know,almost 800 Google reviews.
(08:07):
Which is probably way more thananyone else. Even close. Yes.
Yes. So again, that is something.
So maybe they do see you onFacebook or they hear about you.
Where do most people go next?They go to check out your reviews.
Google My Business is free. You can go.And then as you build up those reviews,
then it can put you at the top of thepage without necessarily paying for
(08:31):
someone. For SEO.
When did you build yourwebsite? At what point?
I did have my website builtbefore I launched my business.
So I did have that from the verybeginning. When I started my company,
I did a coming soon, I gave myselfthree months to get prepared.
I'm a very type A individual, so Idid have my website from day one.
Okay. Which is very cheap.
(08:51):
Yes.
And I think that's prettyimportant because if you have a Facebook page and you
have all these different channels,but no website that it links back to,
it doesn't feel as professional.
Correct.
And the whole point is to be portraythis very professional image.
I will say if for some reason you do nothave the budget, create the Facebook,
create the Instagram.
(09:12):
For sure.
Use those leads to createthe money to generate to,
obviously you need a website.
Crystal,
I want to pause for a moment to talkabout jobber and why we like it so much.
In your opinion, what featuresmost important to scaling past a million dollars?
Well, first I think theprofessionalism of jobber,
the ease of creatingquotes, sending those out.
(09:33):
The follow-up process forus at a company my size,
it's the automationthat is absolutely key.
Ensuring that clients are gettingthe reminders by text, by email,
the follow-up process,
really everything in the entire job orsystem from the notes to the time cards,
it's just amazing.
Yeah, imagine for home cleaning,
(09:55):
the text that goes out to remind 'emthat we're coming is really important.
And if you're doing a hundred people aday, you can't send that out manually.
It's got to be automated.
Well,
and one of the things I love about thatis that you can actually customize that.
So you can send out, for example, youremail reminders five days in advance,
and then your text messageis three days in advance.
Whatever that looks like for you, couldnot imagine not having that feature,
(10:18):
especially with as manycleans as we do a day.
Right? Totally. Well, you need jobber two,
you need all the benefits forscaling to a million dollars,
automated follow-ups, all that kind ofstuff. So if you're not using Jobber,
you need to go tojobber.com/podcast, deal new users,
get an exclusive discount and start usingJobber to scale your business today.
I don't think there's any industry that'sbetter at word of mouth marketing than
(10:40):
house cleaning because moms busy.Moms are such a tight group,
they just talk about the best cleaners.
And so is there anything that youdo intentionally with word of mouth
marketing to facilitate it,
or do you just kind of hopeit happens and it does happen?
Or do you do anything specific?
Social media part is all organic.We don't ask our clients to do that.
(11:01):
It's just something natural that occurs,
I think within momshelping each other out.
But we do have a paid referral program.
You do? Okay.
Yes. So as our currentclients refer to us,
then we do provide themdiscounts on future cleanings.
We also have our employeesthat get discounts.
So we have printed again, canvas. Amazing.
(11:23):
We have cards that areprinted for our cleaners.
It has very professionalon the front, on the back,
it has information about ourservices and it says referred by,
and then our cleanerscan write their name.
And so when the client contacts us, weask how you heard? And they're like, oh,
your cleaner was in myarea, gave me their card.
They get paid for that referral as well.
(11:45):
So not only are our clients gettingpaid, but also our cleaners.
I like that a lot. That's a goodtakeaway. Okay, so word of mouth.
You had your website.
Yes.
Google My business profilenextdoor. Is that big for you?
Nextdoor could be hit or miss. I'veheard success stories in the industry.
It wasn't, I mean, we have leads thatcome through Nextdoor, so yes, again,
(12:06):
it's free right now if you're startingout or you have very little marketing
budget, absolutely use Nextdoor.
What about customer service? Howdoes customer service factor in,
especially those early days?We're talking about starting out,
which means you're brand new,
which means there's someone out therewho's been doing this for way longer than
you have and they're established in thearea and you've got to find out ways to
(12:26):
slay the giant.
So how do you go about creating more leadsthrough really good customer service?
So customer service is key.It is at the top for us.
When I started out, I was customerservice. When you start out,
I was everything for almost the firstyear and a half before I hired my first
office staff.
(12:47):
So some of the takeaways for Go-ToGirls is we tried to make every single
service very personalfrom the very beginning,
from the very first client we had.
Every single client of Go-to Girlshas gotten a welcome gift. So for us,
that's a bath and body worksoap. It's super simple.
It doesn't matter if it's hot, cold,it's not going to freeze in the car.
(13:07):
They provide the little cellophane bag.
We slip our card in thatwhich asks them to review us.
It also asks them for referrals,and that goes into the bag.
We tie a neat little bow on it and weleave it on their kitchen counter after
every first clean. So that'sa great first impression.
And then we follow up after everyfirst time clean to ensure that the
(13:29):
client is happy. Again, we'reall about reviews and recurring.
That is our goal with every client.
Get a five star review andmake them a recurring client.
The bag that you're leaving behindin the quality control call.
Yes.
Somebody we call it to them,
but that's what we call it inside aftertheir first cleaning really builds
loyalty.
It.
Builds a really good experience,a good first impression.
(13:51):
Anything else you do to build that loyaltyfor clients where they just stay with
you forever?
Well, so we have a strategy withinour company called Above and Beyond.
Each one of our cleanersneeds to find something.
Every service that goes above andbeyond for the client. And maybe it's,
there's laundry that's thrown on thebed. You take the time, a couple minutes,
fold the laundry, fluff, the pillows.
(14:14):
One of the things that wedo, again, that builds,
we think loyalty is the littlethings like setting up stuffed
animals on a client's bed that'sreading books in the kid's room,
doing the same thing in thebathtub, leaving little notes.
Making the toilet paper folded just right.
Special paper, the toilet,special toilet paper. Paper, yes.
We just think that the little thingsare not so little. They make a huge.
(14:37):
Little things are what people remember.
Yes, yes.
They expect the house to beclean. If it's not clean,
then that's a different problem.
But if it's clean and thenyou do the little thing,
that's what they tell their friends about.The toilet paper was full just right.
It was so cool. My mom used doknows little, and it took me back.
That's the memories thatpeople will spread and share.
Yes. And then also we dohave a system or process.
(14:58):
I would love to think thatwe're perfect. We make mistakes.
If for some reason a client providesus feedback or in our follow-up,
we find out we could have donesomething different or better,
then we jobber again, systemsor processes are so important.
We use a system so our customerservice manager follows up,
ensures that they're happy. Sosometimes things can be going along,
(15:18):
but it's when you mess up or you don'tdo things just right that the clients are
like, wow, that was amazing.They took accountability.
And then that's whenthey tell their friends.
So you can take something that's not sopositive and turn that into a lifelong
client.
And I think most people, if you messup once, they're totally fine with it.
It's when you do it twice, theyexplode in anger and they should,
(15:41):
because here's what happens,a lot of home cleaners,
they send somebody different every time.And so the guy comes down and says,
Hey, please scrub it this way inthe future. Yeah, yeah, yeah, sure.
Well the next time it'ssomebody different.
They.
Don't know about thatconversation they had.
So they do it the same way theydid before. And the clients,
I told the guy and he didn't telleveryone else. And that's a big,
big friction point for alot of home service people.
(16:03):
Have you seen that to be true?
Yes. I think so. Thankfully in jobber,
both our office staff as well asour cleaners, the notes are amazing.
They save us. You can add the notes,add pictures, so that's wonderful.
Both for both our officestaff as well as our cleaning.
Staff.
Jobber Summit returns on March 5th, 2025.
(16:26):
Join our annual online learning eventto access proven strategies to build,
run, and grow a best inclass home service business.
Reserve your spot todayat jobber.com/summit.
Anything else to really lock thatclient in with long-term loyalty,
long-term satisfaction, how to makesure that people brag about you at the,
(16:48):
because here's the thing, you cango to a party that Saturday night,
a cocktail party,
and if you had your house cleantoday and it was fine, like, oh,
you have my house clean today. But itwas a lot of house cleaners out there.
But if you had your house clean bysomebody who just blew your mind,
you're going to be like, listento what happened to me today.
I had the best house cleaning companyever. Let me give you their card.
(17:10):
And that's a totallydifferent experience. Right?
And so is there anything else ourlisteners can do in that first year,
first two years that reallyjust below people's minds?
Well, yes.
It starts from the very first applicantthat applies for your company and who
you hire.
The two most important aspects forGo-to Girls in the Growth are our
(17:31):
employees. Our employees are our numberone. They make you or they break you.
So there are two reasons why Go-toGirls had so much success in the
first three years. We had amazingemployees that love what they did.
They focused on the quality.They went above and beyond.
And then we never stopped marketing. Sothat's what I tell when people are like,
(17:54):
how did you do this? And whatare the keys to your success?
There's two things thatI never stop doing.
I never stop hiring amazing qualityemployees. You have to pay them well,
you have to treat them well. It's morethan just hiring. They're all these,
that's another conversation aboutemployee culture. Treat them well.
They have to love to show up to workfor you. Someone who loves what they do,
(18:17):
they go into that client's home.They're the face of your company.
I cannot stress that. We could not.
Have, especially going into your home, we.
Could not have grown this businessto where it was without the
amazing team going in to clean andthen never stop marketing and then
using those free tools. Andthen once you get in again,
(18:38):
if there is a service break,how do you handle that?
We have a lot of things now on theback end. When we first started,
we had to manually make thecalls, do the follow up.
Now we have processes in placewhere we do quarterly feedback from
clients, things like that.Their feedback matters.
And it's important to when you aregrowing your business and retaining
(19:01):
that, you listen to the feedback,
but then you actually take action thatit's important and the clients know that
it's important as well.
Yeah, absolutely.
Yes.
Crystal, it sounds like allthis is pretty simple. I mean,
your marketing spend iswhat still very, very low.
Yes.
Currently we spend less than 1%of our revenue based on marketing.
(19:23):
That's awesome. So anyone can dothis and you can do it for free,
you can do this kind of stuff.
Any other thoughts on someone's listingout here who just started a house
cleaning business, they'redoing 5,000 a month.
What would you tell them toget them to the next level?
So I would encourage you, if Ican do this, you can do this.
It is not hard.
I think I would start with looking atall the free things that are available.
(19:47):
The most important thing isconnecting with your audience.
What is your target market? Findout where they are and be there.
And if you can be there for freeor to little cost, be there.
And then once they reach out to you,ensure that you're professional.
That's the most importantthing. If they call you back,
if they answer your phoneresponse, it's not difficult.
(20:08):
I would just say focus on whoyour target market is. Go to them.
Use the free resources. Andalso I would encourage you,
even if you've only been in businessfor one year, most places have best of,
and so focus on those contests. Ensurethat your ads look professional.
Ensure that when clients are callingyou call them back when they email them
(20:30):
back and ensure that you areproviding the best quality.
That is the most important thing.
Once they come through your dooror you go through their door,
you have to provide amazing service.
Yeah, I love local contests. Mybusinesses have won gold and silver.
But here's the thing, eachyear I won gold or silver,
I said we were voted best either way.
(20:51):
Correct. It.
Doesn't matter if you get bronze, as longas you get one of those badges first,
second, and third, it still counts.
And so even if you're going up againsta juggernaut, if you get third place,
you can still say I was voted best.
And it makes a huge differencein terms of being trusted. And.
Yes, my average second yearin business, we went for it.
I thought there is no way that wewould have a chance. And we won.
And we have won every yearsince. So for eight years,
(21:13):
we've been best of in Raleigh.
Yeah. Yeah, that's awesome.Jim Collins is an author.
He wrote Good to Greatand one of his principles.
And there's the flywheel concept,which is where this big heavy flywheel,
imagine the wheel fortune wheel whereit's really hard to start turning,
but once you start turning,get it around once,
then twice and it starts going faster andfaster, eventually it's going so fast.
(21:35):
If you put your hand in there,
it'll hit it and it hurtbecause it's going so fast.
And that's when you have momentum.
And.
So building out your website with goodSEO is getting that flywheel turning.
It's going to spin forever.
Getting a contest is a flywheelwhere it's going to pay you off for
years after that. Everythingyou've talked about,
you said you still getmessages on Facebook for leads,
(21:56):
and that was from workyou did nine years ago.
So there's this thing of just momentumand just getting that thing in place,
spinning and it spins forever.
Once you get the Facebookalgorithm in your favor,
it keeps paying off and paying off.
And then you have others engagingyour clients, they just add to it.
So it's exactly as you described.Once you start that ball rolling,
it just picks up speed andcontinues downhill and it's free.
(22:20):
Crystal, this has been great.I really appreciate all this.
So I'm going to try to break it downinto three actionable items here.
Number one is create a referralprogram, not just for your clients,
but for your team too. So if yourteam refers your company to somebody,
the neighbor down the streetor their friend at church,
they get a little piece of the pie.
That's a huge way ofincentivizing your team.
Number two is utilize Facebook groups,join groups, check in them every day,
(22:43):
and then tag people and commentto them and get them engaged.
And that will begin the momentum ofFacebook. And three is email marketing,
flash sales, other kindof promotions. Use email.
If you're not emailing your clientsregularly, you are losing money. Crystal,
thanks for being here.
Thank you so much,Adam. It was a pleasure.
It was a pleasure. So how dopeople find out more about you?
So you can find me@gotogirls.com,
(23:05):
which is go dash the number two girls.com.
And I'm also on Facebookas well as Instagram.
Well, thanks for being here.
I think that the impact you'rehaving in Raleigh is huge.
All the women that you employ are justtotally blessed by you. So keep it up.
Thank you for all that you do.
Thank you so much.
And thank you for listening.
I hope that you heard something todaythat will help you improve your marketing
(23:27):
for free, free 99. My name isAdam Sylvester, I'm your host.
You can find me@adamsylvester.com.
Your team and your clients deserveyour very best. So go give it to 'em.
Once you get the Facebookalgorithm in your favor,
it keeps paying off and paying off,
and then you have others engagingyour clients. They just add to it.
So it's exactly as you described,but once you start that ball rolling,
it just picks up speed andcontinues downhill and it's free.
Welcome to Jobbers Masters of HomeService, a podcast for home service pros,
(00:21):
buy Home Service pros.
We're in Las Vegas and today we'retalking about scaling your business to $1
million in revenue with nomarketing budget. I'm your host,
Adam Sylvester. Today's guest is CrystalHam. She's the founder of Go-To Girls,
a house cleaning company in Raleigh,North Carolina. She has over 50 employees,
3 million in revenue, and I'mexcited to have her on. Crystal,
(00:41):
welcome to the show.
Thank you so much, Adam.It's a pleasure to be here.
Yeah, absolutely. So tell our listenerswho you are, what you do and everything,
and also how did you get here?
So I went to college for finance,finance, insurance, and real estate.
I was in the bankingworld for over 10 years,
and then I left the banking world.
I worked with my husbandfor about eight years.
(01:01):
He owns a manufacturing company and thenjust really decided that I needed to
get back to my core, which is toserve others. I love to help people.
I made a list of all the thingsI love to do. I love to clean.
When I originally started go to Girls,we were going to clean, do laundry,
do personal errands, dogwalking, you name it,
and then found that notall of that was scalable.
(01:23):
So I brought that to go-togirls and launched almost
nine years ago.
Great. Okay. And so yourmarketing budgets basically zero.
It's like less than 1%, way less than 1%.
And so you don't really spend money onmarketing except for maybe a little bit
here and there. We're not talking aboutthat. We're talking about lead costs.
You don't really have lead costs,
and so how did you build your businessto 1 million without spending any money
(01:47):
on marketing?
Yeah, so I grew go-to girls to a milliondollars in revenue in three years,
and so I have very specific strategiesthat we can provide for your users.
The first is have a Facebook account.You have to have a Facebook account,
even if you're young and youfeel that that's for old people,
that is where your audience and yourtarget market is going to be for most
(02:09):
service home-based businesses. Sodefinitely create a Facebook account.
As soon as you create that,
I would highly recommend to everyone togo to free design software. For example,
Canva. Canva provides amazing,
very professional ads that you cancreate and that you can post to your
Facebook. This is where we get very,
(02:30):
very specific with what weneed to do within Facebook.
This is how I personally grew my business.
So what you need to do is identifyyour target market. That is extremely
important for me.
I'm going to talk specifically for meso I can give very specific details.
My target market is moms.They clean the house.
And so once I got intoFacebook, I found groups,
(02:54):
community groups, mom groups,that's where my market is, the moms,
and there are searchfeatures within Facebook.
If you go to the top of the Facebook,you can actually search keywords. For me,
it would be clean housekeeper.Personally, we don't use the word made,
but you could search for the wordmade and you will find very specific
(03:16):
leads for your industry. Maybe it'scarpet cleaning or window washing,
whatever your target or yourservice industry is within those
community groups and those mom groups,
those are all free leads.
Here is the power of Facebook.Once you find that lead,
(03:37):
you create really a patternof words that will help
to boost your algorithm.So for example,
let's say that you're the onelooking, I would say hi at sign, Adam,
that's going to prompt that message toautomatically go in your notifications
because it has the at sign for youand then you do your specific company.
(04:00):
For me, it's go-to girlsat sign, go-to girls,
would love to assist youwith your cleaning needs,
and then if you're just startingout, you haven't won awards yet,
you haven't done things like that.
So highlight all the positivethings about your business.
What happens is it then starts tocreate algorithms within Facebook
that even now nine years later, when Ipull up my phone and I scroll through,
(04:24):
I get cleaning leads every single day.
So when you're first starting out,you're creating those algorithms.
Go into the moms group, search for theword clean, go into the community groups,
search for whatever your industry is,
and I would do that twicea day every single day.
So that's all free. It costsyou nothing. Your time is money,
(04:47):
but it's all free when you're startingout and you have no marketing budget.
And these are groups onFacebook of mom groups and that.
Kind of.
Stuff, correct? Yeah.
Yes, but it's also community groups.
So just because maybeyou're a mail cleaning
business owner, you can'tget into a mom group,
but you can get into thesecommunity groups and the leads are just as plentiful.
(05:09):
Going back to creating these freeads on Canva, once you post those,
be very strategic. Once you postthose to your Facebook page,
then you can share those to the communitygroup. So again, that is all free.
You have to share it from the ad thatwas created into those community groups.
Now there are certain guidelines, Ican't tell you specifically what that is.
For each group I would say read therules, follow the rules in each group,
(05:33):
but again, all of that isfree in order to do that.
So you would say that inthose first three years,
that is primarily whereyou got most of your leads,
was doing that with Facebook?
Yes.
I would get starting out over ahundred leads per month on Facebook
organically for free. I did notcreate ads and pay for the ads.
(05:53):
I would create something in Canva,
post it to community groups and replyto the leads specifically that were
looking for my services.
Wow. Would you say that all hundred ofthose were because you were going out and
getting them or were any of those wordof mouth people referring them to you and
then anything or sharing your postson Facebook, that kind of stuff?
Right, so Facebook would be one of thetools. I have many that I can share.
(06:17):
So the other is using email marketing.
So Jobber has an amazing way to doemail marketing to your clients.
For example, when you're starting out,
maybe you've hired a new cleaner andyou have openings on your schedule.
You can create a list and email out thoseclients and maybe you run a flash sale
and you can fill yourschedule. So as you are
(06:40):
getting the leads through Facebook,once you capture their email,
always capture their email, youcreate that list through email,
and then again, it's your nurturingthem. So it can be follow up,
which Jobber does. So that increasesyour probability of closing that job.
But then once you, let's saythe person didn't book with you,
(07:02):
but you run a flash sale, have a couplethree hour spots, run a flash sale,
get those clients in. Nowthey know how amazing you are,
then they can book with you. So wehad a very, very high conversion rate,
over 50%.
Using.
That strategy.
Okay, that's awesome. So Facebookis number one. Email is number two,
(07:23):
and if you're not emailing your clientson a regular basis, you're losing money.
That's what I've always saidfor years. It's true. So email,
any other things you were doing.
So you can create a Google MyBusiness account for free. Again,
that is another free tool.
And then every single clientthat you provide a service to,
you should have someone followingup. If you're just starting out,
(07:43):
then that would be you. If you're, asyou're growing customer service manager,
ask every single person that ishappy with your service or review.
We.
Still do that almost nine years laterpersonally ask them with a link.
So what that does is now you'reworking on the algorithm within Google.
GoTo Girls has, I don't know,almost 800 Google reviews.
(08:07):
Which is probably way more thananyone else. Even close. Yes.
Yes. So again, that is something.
So maybe they do see you onFacebook or they hear about you.
Where do most people go next?They go to check out your reviews.
Google My Business is free. You can go.And then as you build up those reviews,
then it can put you at the top of thepage without necessarily paying for
(08:31):
someone. For SEO.
When did you build yourwebsite? At what point?
I did have my website builtbefore I launched my business.
So I did have that from the verybeginning. When I started my company,
I did a coming soon, I gave myselfthree months to get prepared.
I'm a very type A individual, so Idid have my website from day one.
Okay. Which is very cheap.
(08:51):
Yes.
And I think that's prettyimportant because if you have a Facebook page and you
have all these different channels,but no website that it links back to,
it doesn't feel as professional.
Correct.
And the whole point is to be portraythis very professional image.
I will say if for some reason you do nothave the budget, create the Facebook,
create the Instagram.
(09:12):
For sure.
Use those leads to createthe money to generate to,
obviously you need a website.
Crystal,
I want to pause for a moment to talkabout jobber and why we like it so much.
In your opinion, what featuresmost important to scaling past a million dollars?
Well, first I think theprofessionalism of jobber,
the ease of creatingquotes, sending those out.
(09:33):
The follow-up process forus at a company my size,
it's the automationthat is absolutely key.
Ensuring that clients are gettingthe reminders by text, by email,
the follow-up process,
really everything in the entire job orsystem from the notes to the time cards,
it's just amazing.
Yeah, imagine for home cleaning,
(09:55):
the text that goes out to remind 'emthat we're coming is really important.
And if you're doing a hundred people aday, you can't send that out manually.
It's got to be automated.
Well,
and one of the things I love about thatis that you can actually customize that.
So you can send out, for example, youremail reminders five days in advance,
and then your text messageis three days in advance.
Whatever that looks like for you, couldnot imagine not having that feature,
(10:18):
especially with as manycleans as we do a day.
Right? Totally. Well, you need jobber two,
you need all the benefits forscaling to a million dollars,
automated follow-ups, all that kind ofstuff. So if you're not using Jobber,
you need to go tojobber.com/podcast, deal new users,
get an exclusive discount and start usingJobber to scale your business today.
I don't think there's any industry that'sbetter at word of mouth marketing than
(10:40):
house cleaning because moms busy.Moms are such a tight group,
they just talk about the best cleaners.
And so is there anything that youdo intentionally with word of mouth
marketing to facilitate it,
or do you just kind of hopeit happens and it does happen?
Or do you do anything specific?
Social media part is all organic.We don't ask our clients to do that.
(11:01):
It's just something natural that occurs,
I think within momshelping each other out.
But we do have a paid referral program.
You do? Okay.
Yes. So as our currentclients refer to us,
then we do provide themdiscounts on future cleanings.
We also have our employeesthat get discounts.
So we have printed again, canvas. Amazing.
(11:23):
We have cards that areprinted for our cleaners.
It has very professionalon the front, on the back,
it has information about ourservices and it says referred by,
and then our cleanerscan write their name.
And so when the client contacts us, weask how you heard? And they're like, oh,
your cleaner was in myarea, gave me their card.
They get paid for that referral as well.
(11:45):
So not only are our clients gettingpaid, but also our cleaners.
I like that a lot. That's a goodtakeaway. Okay, so word of mouth.
You had your website.
Yes.
Google My business profilenextdoor. Is that big for you?
Nextdoor could be hit or miss. I'veheard success stories in the industry.
It wasn't, I mean, we have leads thatcome through Nextdoor, so yes, again,
(12:06):
it's free right now if you're startingout or you have very little marketing
budget, absolutely use Nextdoor.
What about customer service? Howdoes customer service factor in,
especially those early days?We're talking about starting out,
which means you're brand new,
which means there's someone out therewho's been doing this for way longer than
you have and they're established in thearea and you've got to find out ways to
(12:26):
slay the giant.
So how do you go about creating more leadsthrough really good customer service?
So customer service is key.It is at the top for us.
When I started out, I was customerservice. When you start out,
I was everything for almost the firstyear and a half before I hired my first
office staff.
(12:47):
So some of the takeaways for Go-ToGirls is we tried to make every single
service very personalfrom the very beginning,
from the very first client we had.
Every single client of Go-to Girlshas gotten a welcome gift. So for us,
that's a bath and body worksoap. It's super simple.
It doesn't matter if it's hot, cold,it's not going to freeze in the car.
(13:07):
They provide the little cellophane bag.
We slip our card in thatwhich asks them to review us.
It also asks them for referrals,and that goes into the bag.
We tie a neat little bow on it and weleave it on their kitchen counter after
every first clean. So that'sa great first impression.
And then we follow up after everyfirst time clean to ensure that the
(13:29):
client is happy. Again, we'reall about reviews and recurring.
That is our goal with every client.
Get a five star review andmake them a recurring client.
The bag that you're leaving behindin the quality control call.
Yes.
Somebody we call it to them,
but that's what we call it inside aftertheir first cleaning really builds
loyalty.
It.
Builds a really good experience,a good first impression.
(13:51):
Anything else you do to build that loyaltyfor clients where they just stay with
you forever?
Well, so we have a strategy withinour company called Above and Beyond.
Each one of our cleanersneeds to find something.
Every service that goes above andbeyond for the client. And maybe it's,
there's laundry that's thrown on thebed. You take the time, a couple minutes,
fold the laundry, fluff, the pillows.
(14:14):
One of the things that wedo, again, that builds,
we think loyalty is the littlethings like setting up stuffed
animals on a client's bed that'sreading books in the kid's room,
doing the same thing in thebathtub, leaving little notes.
Making the toilet paper folded just right.
Special paper, the toilet,special toilet paper. Paper, yes.
We just think that the little thingsare not so little. They make a huge.
(14:37):
Little things are what people remember.
Yes, yes.
They expect the house to beclean. If it's not clean,
then that's a different problem.
But if it's clean and thenyou do the little thing,
that's what they tell their friends about.The toilet paper was full just right.
It was so cool. My mom used doknows little, and it took me back.
That's the memories thatpeople will spread and share.
Yes. And then also we dohave a system or process.
(14:58):
I would love to think thatwe're perfect. We make mistakes.
If for some reason a client providesus feedback or in our follow-up,
we find out we could have donesomething different or better,
then we jobber again, systemsor processes are so important.
We use a system so our customerservice manager follows up,
ensures that they're happy. Sosometimes things can be going along,
(15:18):
but it's when you mess up or you don'tdo things just right that the clients are
like, wow, that was amazing.They took accountability.
And then that's whenthey tell their friends.
So you can take something that's not sopositive and turn that into a lifelong
client.
And I think most people, if you messup once, they're totally fine with it.
It's when you do it twice, theyexplode in anger and they should,
(15:41):
because here's what happens,a lot of home cleaners,
they send somebody different every time.And so the guy comes down and says,
Hey, please scrub it this way inthe future. Yeah, yeah, yeah, sure.
Well the next time it'ssomebody different.
They.
Don't know about thatconversation they had.
So they do it the same way theydid before. And the clients,
I told the guy and he didn't telleveryone else. And that's a big,
big friction point for alot of home service people.
(16:03):
Have you seen that to be true?
Yes. I think so. Thankfully in jobber,
both our office staff as well asour cleaners, the notes are amazing.
They save us. You can add the notes,add pictures, so that's wonderful.
Both for both our officestaff as well as our cleaning.
Staff.
Jobber Summit returns on March 5th, 2025.
(16:26):
Join our annual online learning eventto access proven strategies to build,
run, and grow a best inclass home service business.
Reserve your spot todayat jobber.com/summit.
Anything else to really lock thatclient in with long-term loyalty,
long-term satisfaction, how to makesure that people brag about you at the,
(16:48):
because here's the thing, you cango to a party that Saturday night,
a cocktail party,
and if you had your house cleantoday and it was fine, like, oh,
you have my house clean today. But itwas a lot of house cleaners out there.
But if you had your house clean bysomebody who just blew your mind,
you're going to be like, listento what happened to me today.
I had the best house cleaning companyever. Let me give you their card.
(17:10):
And that's a totallydifferent experience. Right?
And so is there anything else ourlisteners can do in that first year,
first two years that reallyjust below people's minds?
Well, yes.
It starts from the very first applicantthat applies for your company and who
you hire.
The two most important aspects forGo-to Girls in the Growth are our
(17:31):
employees. Our employees are our numberone. They make you or they break you.
So there are two reasons why Go-toGirls had so much success in the
first three years. We had amazingemployees that love what they did.
They focused on the quality.They went above and beyond.
And then we never stopped marketing. Sothat's what I tell when people are like,
(17:54):
how did you do this? And whatare the keys to your success?
There's two things thatI never stop doing.
I never stop hiring amazing qualityemployees. You have to pay them well,
you have to treat them well. It's morethan just hiring. They're all these,
that's another conversation aboutemployee culture. Treat them well.
They have to love to show up to workfor you. Someone who loves what they do,
(18:17):
they go into that client's home.They're the face of your company.
I cannot stress that. We could not.
Have, especially going into your home, we.
Could not have grown this businessto where it was without the
amazing team going in to clean andthen never stop marketing and then
using those free tools. Andthen once you get in again,
(18:38):
if there is a service break,how do you handle that?
We have a lot of things now on theback end. When we first started,
we had to manually make thecalls, do the follow up.
Now we have processes in placewhere we do quarterly feedback from
clients, things like that.Their feedback matters.
And it's important to when you aregrowing your business and retaining
(19:01):
that, you listen to the feedback,
but then you actually take action thatit's important and the clients know that
it's important as well.
Yeah, absolutely.
Yes.
Crystal, it sounds like allthis is pretty simple. I mean,
your marketing spend iswhat still very, very low.
Yes.
Currently we spend less than 1%of our revenue based on marketing.
(19:23):
That's awesome. So anyone can dothis and you can do it for free,
you can do this kind of stuff.
Any other thoughts on someone's listingout here who just started a house
cleaning business, they'redoing 5,000 a month.
What would you tell them toget them to the next level?
So I would encourage you, if Ican do this, you can do this.
It is not hard.
I think I would start with looking atall the free things that are available.
(19:47):
The most important thing isconnecting with your audience.
What is your target market? Findout where they are and be there.
And if you can be there for freeor to little cost, be there.
And then once they reach out to you,ensure that you're professional.
That's the most importantthing. If they call you back,
if they answer your phoneresponse, it's not difficult.
(20:08):
I would just say focus on whoyour target market is. Go to them.
Use the free resources. Andalso I would encourage you,
even if you've only been in businessfor one year, most places have best of,
and so focus on those contests. Ensurethat your ads look professional.
Ensure that when clients are callingyou call them back when they email them
(20:30):
back and ensure that you areproviding the best quality.
That is the most important thing.
Once they come through your dooror you go through their door,
you have to provide amazing service.
Yeah, I love local contests. Mybusinesses have won gold and silver.
But here's the thing, eachyear I won gold or silver,
I said we were voted best either way.
(20:51):
Correct. It.
Doesn't matter if you get bronze, as longas you get one of those badges first,
second, and third, it still counts.
And so even if you're going up againsta juggernaut, if you get third place,
you can still say I was voted best.
And it makes a huge differencein terms of being trusted. And.
Yes, my average second yearin business, we went for it.
I thought there is no way that wewould have a chance. And we won.
And we have won every yearsince. So for eight years,
(21:13):
we've been best of in Raleigh.
Yeah. Yeah, that's awesome.Jim Collins is an author.
He wrote Good to Greatand one of his principles.
And there's the flywheel concept,which is where this big heavy flywheel,
imagine the wheel fortune wheel whereit's really hard to start turning,
but once you start turning,get it around once,
then twice and it starts going faster andfaster, eventually it's going so fast.
(21:35):
If you put your hand in there,
it'll hit it and it hurtbecause it's going so fast.
And that's when you have momentum.
And.
So building out your website with goodSEO is getting that flywheel turning.
It's going to spin forever.
Getting a contest is a flywheelwhere it's going to pay you off for
years after that. Everythingyou've talked about,
you said you still getmessages on Facebook for leads,
(21:56):
and that was from workyou did nine years ago.
So there's this thing of just momentumand just getting that thing in place,
spinning and it spins forever.
Once you get the Facebookalgorithm in your favor,
it keeps paying off and paying off.
And then you have others engagingyour clients, they just add to it.
So it's exactly as you described.Once you start that ball rolling,
it just picks up speed andcontinues downhill and it's free.
(22:20):
Crystal, this has been great.I really appreciate all this.
So I'm going to try to break it downinto three actionable items here.
Number one is create a referralprogram, not just for your clients,
but for your team too. So if yourteam refers your company to somebody,
the neighbor down the streetor their friend at church,
they get a little piece of the pie.
That's a huge way ofincentivizing your team.
Number two is utilize Facebook groups,join groups, check in them every day,
(22:43):
and then tag people and commentto them and get them engaged.
And that will begin the momentum ofFacebook. And three is email marketing,
flash sales, other kindof promotions. Use email.
If you're not emailing your clientsregularly, you are losing money. Crystal,
thanks for being here.
Thank you so much,Adam. It was a pleasure.
It was a pleasure. So how dopeople find out more about you?
So you can find me@gotogirls.com,
(23:05):
which is go dash the number two girls.com.
And I'm also on Facebookas well as Instagram.
Well, thanks for being here.
I think that the impact you'rehaving in Raleigh is huge.
All the women that you employ are justtotally blessed by you. So keep it up.
Thank you for all that you do.
Thank you so much.
And thank you for listening.
I hope that you heard something todaythat will help you improve your marketing
(23:27):
for free, free 99. My name isAdam Sylvester, I'm your host.
You can find me@adamsylvester.com.
Your team and your clients deserveyour very best. So go give it to 'em.
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