June 25, 2025 • 27 mins
Discover how Anthony and Jhanilka built a remote cleaning business that generated them over $2M while working less than 10 hours per week.
In this episode of Masters of Home Service, they reveal the exact systems and strategies that allow them to run their cleaning company from anywhere in the world.
🔥 What You'll Learn:
• How to build a cleaning business without doing any cleaning yourself
• The remote business model that generated $2+ million in revenue
• Step-by-step process for hiring and managing virtual assistants
• How to automate customer service, booking, and payments
This episode is 🎯 Perfect For:
- Home service business owners wanting to scale
- Cleaning business owners stuck in daily operations
- Entrepreneurs seeking location-independent income
- Anyone interested in remote business models
- Service-based business owners ready to systemize
🌟 Don't forget to drop us a review to support us!
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---Resources----
Learn how to start and scale a cleaning business without cleaning ANY Houses
Cleaning Business University Course
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https://tidytrack.io/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
If Masters of Home Service has been a game changer
for you and your business and wewant to hear from you go, leave
us a review and tell us whatyou think.
Help us build this communityand level up together.
If someone calls and says Iwant to book a cleaning with you
guys what do you?
Say Go to the website.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
No, or your.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
VA will then just do it for them on the website,
correct?
Speaker 2 (00:18):
I mean, you have someone on the phone.
You won't let them go, ofcourse, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
Welcome to Jobber's Masters of Home Service, a
podcast for home service pros byhome service pros.
We are in sunny Las Vegas Today.
We're talking about runningyour business from the beach a
guide to running your businessremotely.
I'm Adam Sylvester.
Today's guests are AnthonyHartzog and Janilka Hartzog.
They are the owners of KleeneBusiness University, maids to
(00:46):
Match and the hosts of more thana side hustle podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:48):
Welcome to the show, thank you for having us, thank
you.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
Janick, do you have this?
Tell our listeners briefly,like what you guys do, and all
that.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
So we own a cleaning business down in Dallas, texas,
and it's a remote cleaningbusiness because we do not do
any of the cleaning ourselves,but we manage the side of the
marketing the business, gettingthe clients, that type of stuff
okay, so our listeners are likerun your business from the beach
.
Speaker 1 (01:09):
I'm consumed by my business.
I work 80 hours a week.
Is it possible that's?
Speaker 3 (01:14):
what they're thinking .
Speaker 1 (01:15):
I mean a lot of listeners are in that place, and
so like, is it possible to runyour business from the beach or
wherever you want to run it.
Run it from.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Is that possible?
It's absolutely possible.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
Anything's possible.
Speaker 2 (01:26):
We've done it in Maldives and Dubai, and this is
before we really had a full teamin place to answer calls.
Now we have people in place to.
We have VAs in place that cananswer the phone, so we don't
need to be as involved.
But yes, because it's remote,because we do everything from
our phone and computer andlaptop.
You can do it from anywherethat can provide any cell
service or Wi-Fi.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
Okay.
So let me clarify, Becauseanyone our age remembers Tim
Ferriss' famous book 4-HourWorkweek Basically just don't
really work at all, basically.
So you guys aren't necessarilysaying go to Dubai and do
nothing, You're just saying runyour business from Dubai, do
some work.
Is that right?
Speaker 3 (02:04):
You're doing work, just from a different location,
definitely yeah, so when wefirst tested out our business
model, we actually went intothis business model where we're
saying we have a remote cleaningbusiness.
It was really just a cleaningbusiness where we don't actually
clean houses.
Now it's 2024, the world haschanged and the word remote has
been, has been, exasperated.
So now we just say remotecleaning business.
So essentially, we'll work with, we'll work with mom and pop
(02:25):
shops who are going on and doingthe cleaning and that's the
only part they're doing andwe're doing everything else in
the business.
So we're not saying that youjust don't run your business at
all.
We're saying you don't have tophysically go out and be the
face and brand and and label ofyour business yeah, we'll get to
the face thing in a second,because I am curious about that.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
Okay, so your workforce is primarily or only
exclusively subcontractors?
Speaker 3 (02:46):
outside of us.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
We're the only employees okay, you're the only
employees and your daughter andI don't, yeah, and so you guys
run your business, I mean withan internet connection, and so
you're you're hiring or notyou're hiring, recruiting new
subcontractors, and who handlescomplaints?
You know, someone doesn't cleanthe house, right right.
Who handles?
Speaker 2 (03:04):
So we're about to be seven years in a business.
So who handled it then versuswho handles it now?
Is completely different, so atthat time it was me.
My background is like a mentaltherapist, and so it just worked
out that I would handle theangry client.
He would handle the tech side ofthe business.
That's just how we separatedstrengths and weaknesses is how
it would work.
He was in IT, so it made sense.
(03:25):
Now we do have an operationmanager and two VAs in place, so
we don't, at this point, hearas much complaints as we once
would, unless it escalates thatwe need to hear it.
You know, at this point we meetwith our team once a week for
about an hour, but then it wasall coming to us on a Friday
night, on Valentine's Day Iremember this distinctively or
(03:46):
on a Sunday, or in Maldives,through my WhatsApp, and I'm
like oh okay, we'll get back toyou as soon as we can.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
So it varied then versus now, I think the
challenge of local servicebusiness owners is that you feel
like you have to be the one todo everything.
So for us we didn't feel likethere was anyone who could
handle a customer complaint aswell as us, because we know our
business, we know our customersand we realize we actually don't
really know them as much as wethought we did and we could just
give a script, giveunderstanding of who they are
and what they need help with,and we gave our teams parameters
(04:13):
on how much you could refund orwhat's the policies here, and
it was just more of us creatingour sops for our business where,
if this happens, you say and dothis and you can work outside
these parameters as you see fitit's also setting up the
client's expectations if you.
Speaker 1 (04:26):
If you answer the phone, you onboard them, you
send them the quote, you bookthe job, you tell them it's
gonna be great, and then you tryto hand it off to your they're
gonna be like whoa I want totalk to the owner.
Speaker 3 (04:35):
What happened?
Speaker 2 (04:36):
yeah, but if they never see you, yeah then they're
not gonna expect to see you nowexactly it was okay no I was
gonna say it was very specifictimes we would mention that
we're an owner, like if therewas a complaint, I would say,
okay, I got to take it back tomanagement, I am the management,
but I'll call you back in 10minutes, but they don't know
that, they just know that I'mtaking it to management.
So there were scenarios likethat Absolutely Very rarely.
(04:56):
I would say like I'm the owner,cause then that can be slippery
as well, cause then they try totell you about your business.
It just sometimes goes adifferent way.
So, yeah, we did face thatsometimes.
But I would just say like, ohwell, I have to take this up to
management and get back to youand let you know what they
decide.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
Yeah, I really like y'all's perspective because it
was a fresh perspective.
A lot of people who grow upcutting grass and then become a
lawn care company, they justhave.
They have such deep roots inthe industry, such deep roots in
the industry, yeah, and so theydo feel like they do everything
you just said, like they haveto address the complaints they
have to send the quotes, thequote has to be perfect and the
and everything has to be justright because they've been in
(05:31):
the industry so long.
You guys came in we're gonna Idon't care what business it's
gonna be cleaning houses,whatever it's gonna be.
And you guys just had adifferent perspective, because
you're like we're gonna bebusiness owners, we're not gonna
be house cleaners.
And so your perspective waslike we're going to run this
business our way.
We're not going to get in theweeds, so to speak.
And so along with that camerunning the business quote
(05:51):
faceless, you know, withoutbeing the face of the company.
Explain that a little bit.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
So, basically, like our name or pictures or anything
aren't anywhere on the website,it's not, you know, on our
profile for Yelp or Google oranything like that it just says
you know cleaning business indallas.
That's actually not true,because when we got awards of
recognition they had to put theit made better for seo, so your
optimization yeah, so that'swhen we started putting our
(06:15):
regular america and some stufffor cancer society and things
like that.
Speaker 3 (06:19):
So that's when you kind of see our name and face
and likeness.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
But in the backlink it's very backlinked where it's
not just, it's not in theonboarding process no, no, no no
, no, and it doesn't need to be,because if we don't feel like
we, like I don't know what goodthat does for us to be the face
of it right, and so we do getstudents or people that are
cleaners, like you said, andthey feel like you know, no, I,
I have to be the one cleaning orlike could never do that, or
(06:42):
like how do I make sure of thequality?
How do I do these things?
And I'm like there's alwayssomeone better than you one.
But doing something differentfrom you doesn't mean that it's
going to be bad either, and sothat's sometimes hard for people
that's been in the business for10 years or whatever doing it
themselves, to kind of grasparound as well.
Speaker 3 (07:03):
And we were talking about she wanted to learn more
about the way we ran ourbusiness.
And we got to a point in theconversation where I said I know
she actually came and saidAnthony, I understand what
you're doing, I love it.
But she said I just can't graspthe understanding of me not
doing those things.
I've been doing this for longerthan you've been alive and
she's like I was like alive andshe's like I'm.
I was like eventually there'sgoing to be a point where you're
(07:23):
I was like unfortunately,there's gonna be a point where
you can't do this anymore, andwhat happens to your business?
Then it dies, unfortunately.
I said, along with everythingelse.
But and she's like I understandthat I just been doing it for
so long and I said if you couldjust outsource some of the work
just to help you whether it'sthe customer service or whether
it's the emails, the marketing,just something where you're not
having to do everything.
And then, if you get to a pointwe decide to outsource your
(07:44):
cleaning, then you get to apoint where you can say I'm
going to take a day off, likebefore our work week, or things
like that.
So we've had thoseconversations where it's just we
know it's not going to work foryou, that's totally fine, but
there's another way to do it.
You guys are open to theconversation yeah, I would say
so.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
I say there's like a kind of middle ground with the
whole face thing, I think,because I would say I'm the face
to come because we have TVcommercials and I'm in those TV
commercials.
I wasn't at first.
I resisted the face thing toobecause I didn't want people to
be obsessed with.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
Adam Make a decision, yeah.
Speaker 1 (08:12):
And I've distanced myself a little bit from my
business, so that because whenpeople call, they don't expect
to find the owner answers.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
They're shocked, Right.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
And so I think there is, I think there's a middle
ground where you can balancesome marketing and being the
face on a really high level.
But if you call my company,you're going to get my staff
yeah, because it's a company andthat's what companies do and
you can play the owner cardwhenever you want.
Yeah, and they, yeah, exactly,you can play the owner but, but
(08:44):
I am actually yeah and they'relike oh my gosh.
The owner called me and it'skind of silly, but it's, you
know, it's fun, and so I thinkthere's a middle ground there.
If our listeners want to dolike a hybrid and I think you
guys we'll talk about this alittle bit if you guys ever
wanted to do radio tv like youguys have mentioned in the past,
then you might introduceyourselves in that as in that
way, but but your business won'tchange at all the operations.
You're never going to be partof the operations in that way.
(09:06):
What do your VAs do, yourvirtual assistants?
Speaker 3 (09:10):
I'm trying to call them remote employees Remote.
There's a stigma around VAsCustomer service reps.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
You try to do that externally to clients or just
internally, internally, both.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
We just say customer service reps.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
They are VAs.
Speaker 3 (09:25):
They're your virtual assistants, people who are
remote.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
But they answer our phones, of course, and they do
outbound calls, you know,following up with leads.
They do that and they answerthe leads that come in from
maybe Yelp or Google, any ofthose places they respond to
that.
They also assist ourcontractors if they need help
getting into a home or ifthere's an issue or address is
incorrect.
Those type of things they doPrimarily.
Speaker 3 (09:50):
Yeah, Marketing advertising.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
Hold on, okay, so you jump from answering their phone
to marketing.
Those are two very differentthings.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:57):
And so.
Speaker 3 (10:00):
How do they do the marketing?
Yeah, so if we're running adson Google, they're managing the
button.
Technically, our operationsmanager is a virtual employee.
She's remote so she's doing theadvertising on the Googles, the
Yelp.
If we're running any sort of ad, she's adjusting the marketing
spend, she's adjusting thelanguage, things like that.
So when you think about theword virtual assistant, it has
(10:20):
such a negative connotation.
It's kind of like they're justpeople who are just not in your
city or state helping you runyour business and manage it.
Our team who's been doing oursearch engine optimization, our
seo, for eight years, they're in, they're in russia.
I have such a closerelationship with those guys.
They're technically virtualemployees or virtual remote and
assistants and they've beendoing this for so many years for
us.
So that's just differencebetween the, the language.
Speaker 2 (10:43):
Because there's levels to what we have.
We have what we considercustomer service reps, and then
we have our operation manager,which she's still a virtual
assistant, so she would handlethe marketing, the very upset
client, those type of things,and then the VAs under would
handle the phone calls, the leadgeneration, that type of stuff.
Speaker 1 (10:58):
I think I know a question all of our listeners
are wondering.
They're asking themselves, soI'll ask it for them because I'm
here who prices, who gives theprice, who says it or who says
it?
Speaker 2 (11:10):
Who gives the bid.
So the way that we have it iseverything is booked online.
Okay, so all of our pricing isyou can see it online.
If you're a customer, you goonto the website.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
you can see the pricing right away, Okay so
there could be a whole episodeon that, because that's where
the rubber really meets the road, because a lot of our listeners
get hung up on like, but how doyou price?
Speaker 3 (11:28):
So we do flat rate pricing based off a bedroom and
bathroom?
Speaker 2 (11:31):
and square footage.
Speaker 3 (11:33):
Now, if the person goes out, the contractor who
goes out to the home.
We also have it in ourconditions and also in our
booking system.
That says if the home is morework than expected, we have the
ability to adjust the pricing aswe see fit.
We can do the exact same thing,so our contractors can say hey,
anthony or Janoko, it won't beus but we'll just use us.
They'll say, hey, anthony orJanoko, we got to this home.
It's going to be a little bitdirty and unexpected.
We'll say how many hours do youthink it's going to take?
(11:57):
They would tell us and thenthey would can say, hey, that's
totally fine, or we could do itat an hourly rate, up to however
much they want to clean thehome.
So still in that instance, wedon't have to be involved in
going out and doing the actuallabor or the bid.
So our contractors are our eyesand ears when it comes to the
ground floor things and theybring it back to our spaceship,
our hub, which is our team.
Speaker 2 (12:16):
Yeah, but the price is already set on the website.
Yeah, that's a huge.
Speaker 1 (12:20):
If someone calls and says I want to book a cleaning
with you guys what do you say?
Speaker 3 (12:23):
Go to the website.
Speaker 2 (12:24):
No, or your.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
VA will then just do it for them on the website,
correct?
Speaker 2 (12:27):
I mean, you have someone on the phone.
You won't let them go.
Of course you know that, ofcourse, yeah, yeah, you don't
let them go Fish on the line.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
You don't just cut the line.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
So, yeah, if that, if ever we're closed, our business
is open 24-7 because you canfind us online and book us.
Speaker 1 (12:48):
You don't have to speak it to us to book the clean
.
This is a great conversation.
I'm going to do a quick pausehere to talk about Jobber.
I think Jobber really helps meunlock the full potential of my
business with a couple of thingsOnline booking and all the
integrations that Jobber haswith other apps and all that it
allows me to automate a lot ofmy business.
It also allows my clients tobook jobs while my team is
asleep, and so you need Jobberbecause you need to grow your
(13:11):
business and unlock some of thethings that you just can't do on
pen and paper.
So new users can get anexclusive discount at jobbercom
slash podcast deal and go checkit out, get a free trial and get
started today.
Pricing is one of the biggestroadblocks for people getting
out of their business.
From my experience talking to alot of people, pricing is it
(13:34):
Because now there are someindustries that are better fit
for than others?
Window cleaning how many?
Speaker 3 (13:38):
windows.
Do you have, yeah, floors?
Speaker 1 (13:40):
All that kind of stuff.
It can be very linear and verypredictable.
There are some businesses thatdo it's.
It is a little more gray area,but I would say it's probably
not as gray as you think.
I think a lot of I was this waytoo.
I thought my pricing is soclever and it's so great and it
could never be a systematizedand.
Speaker 3 (13:59):
But it is now and I got over that, you know, and so
and also it doesn't have to beperfect.
Would you guys?
Speaker 1 (14:04):
agree with that.
Part of the magic is justletting go of perfection and
being okay with Good enough.
Speaker 2 (14:10):
Yeah, and so we say that to our students.
I'm like you can adjust yourpricing in two seconds Like if
this thing is too high or ifit's too low.
You've noticed, clients aresaying things, contractors are
saying things.
You can simply just adjust yourpricing.
You're not married to thisprice.
And then, even as inflationgoes on and things change,
you're going to change yourpricing.
So yeah, you can easily changeit.
You add on services, you takethem away.
(14:32):
You know things like that.
Speaker 3 (14:33):
It happens all the time.
Speaking of not being perfect,when we had our first daughter,
we had about a month to get anoperations manager in place
because we still had remoteemployees, remote team members,
but they were still coming to uson larger issues.
So we said, if we could justget an operations manager just a
fraction of what we think sheneeds to be at, she can handle
those things and we will bealongside her for any mistakes
that happen.
Speaker 1 (14:53):
How do you train them ?
Let's talk about that, becauseI don't want people to think oh,
they just hired all thesepeople from all over the world,
they just could do it day one.
It takes training.
How do?
Speaker 2 (15:01):
you train.
So I guess it depends on theperson.
A lot of people would have SOPsin place and then train the
person.
We were kind of backwardsbecause we had a month and we're
like the baby is coming, so wewere training and SOPing at the
same time.
So this person operationsmanager.
She was a manager for our VAbusiness and then we brought her
to our cleaning business.
(15:21):
So we trusted her and knew allthat and so in the process of
training we were SOPing as wewent along.
So we're, like you know, makean SOP of this as we train you.
Can you give me an example?
So let's give a scenario, uh,an upset client.
Okay, so we would talk throughscenarios and what to do, what
to say, how much you can refundwhen it's okay to refund the
(15:42):
whole thing.
If it is, though, likeliterally talking through
scenarios, we would.
We trained for about a monthtwo, three, two to four hours a
day of just going overeverything.
That it was a brain dump,really.
Yeah, everything because wewere doing it.
Let's see, our child was born2022.
We had started this business in2017, and we didn't have
anything really kind of we hadsome things in place, but not as
(16:04):
much as we should have, so itreally was a brain dump of
things flowing out of our mindoh yeah, this, oh yeah, this, oh
yeah exactly.
So it became like, okay, we knowwe need to have this in place.
This is someone that could helpus do putting in place.
So while we were training her,we were sop'ing her and giving
her the reins to do stuff.
So that's the other thing, likeyou have to let go and know
(16:24):
they're going to make mistakesand do things that maybe that's
not how I said to do it, and youretrain them and they learn and
refer back to the sop, and sothat's why we made it so
important at that time, becausewe're like we're probably going
to be off the grid for a bitwith a baby, with a new baby,
For the technical side of things.
Speaker 3 (16:41):
I would do things like a Loom video.
So we would do a screen shareon Zoom.
And then we got off to Zoom andit's like oh, I do a lot of
Loom videos and essentially it'sjust a screen share and it's
literally documenting everythingyou're doing.
So this is how you book aclient.
So I would go through, show myscreen on Loom and it literally
records it and it gives you atranscript of everything and
it's like this is how you wouldbook a client in a system.
So we started doing things likethat and we said we, I
(17:05):
literally.
I would rather Loom than havinga Zoom meeting any day, so I
would just Loom the entireconversation and send it over to
them.
They're like okay, into the SOPdocument.
Like Janoka said, that would bemy version of the brain dump,
because I don't want to be onthe phone with you explaining it
.
I'd rather just talk myselfthrough it.
Speaker 1 (17:18):
They can watch it a hundred times if they want to.
It's funny, I never used Loom.
It's funny.
And then I started using Loomand then I didn't know how I
could live my life without.
Speaker 3 (17:29):
Loom Like 24 hours later.
It's amazing.
It shows you how many times yousave your meetings when you
send looms off.
Speaker 1 (17:34):
Yeah, Okay, real quick.
I'm curious what other tech doyou guys use?
Do you use Slack, whatsapp?
How do you communicate All thatkind of stuff?
Speaker 2 (17:40):
I'm curious.
Yeah, we also use Slack tocommunicate with our team.
What?
Speaker 3 (17:44):
else do we use?
We use Basecamp.
Basecamp is one of our largerplatforms.
Speaker 1 (17:48):
Essentially, it's Project management, yeah,
project management A hub ofproject management.
Speaker 3 (17:53):
Zapier is one where we just kind of do automations.
New customer comes in, they gohere Slack.
We use Yelp, google.
Speaker 1 (18:01):
Google Ads.
Those are basics.
How do you guys ensure they doa good job?
Speaker 2 (18:05):
The number one answer Question sorry.
Speaker 1 (18:07):
The number one question how?
Speaker 2 (18:08):
do we ensure they do a good job?
I think one.
You're talking about thecontractors at the clean correct
I was, but I am now I was.
Let's talk about that first butI am curious how you make sure
your your office virtual staffdoes a good job too, but let's
talk about the infield staff too.
Okay, first, so one.
With that, we feel like thevetting process is before you go
into that, what?
Speaker 3 (18:25):
the question I would always ask back is if you're not
going to do the job, how do youensure it gets done?
So that's like, well, I wouldhave to go out and do it myself.
That's not always the case, sobut yeah.
Speaker 2 (18:36):
So our vetting process, I would say, is where
we start.
So we get an influx of peopleand the goal is really to not
have everyone make it through,because we know everyone won't
be good.
So starting from the vettingprocess is a big thing.
And then we do something calleda test clean, where you would
go to maybe a client, a friend'shome, maybe about an hour hour,
two hours.
We see how you did you show upon time, how did you come
(18:56):
dressed, what your supplies were.
They would get paid for this.
Like, how do we take feedback?
That's another step for usbefore we put you in the field
specifically and then, you beingin the field, we get feedback
from clients.
We call to this day our VAs doevery single client that we
service Okay, and to find outhow the cleaning was.
And so it's so funny.
We have students that are like,yeah, I'd rather just text or
(19:17):
email.
I'm like we said, to call for areason.
Call is just a different touchpoint.
Even to this day, we still haveautomations that go out to them
.
Like what, but like a text oremail.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (19:27):
But we find that calling them is one touch.
I can also catch you if youweren't happy before you get
this email that says to leave areview.
I can catch you right then andthere on the call and see how I
can rectify it.
So that's why calling is soimportant for us.
So when we call, we can hearfeedback from clients of what
they're saying about this personand that's a lot of how we
(19:48):
learn about how the person isand our communication with them.
When we provide feedback of theclient said this or this didn't
happen right, how do they takeit?
so that's how we do our qa, ourquality assurance, really yeah
through the clients and throughour vetting and our constant
communication with ourcontractors and our hiring
process is completely remotestill.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
So let's say we have 100 employees that apply on
indeedcom.
Then we have questions on theapplication that would say
things like if you're payingattention to this application,
let me know what your favoritecolor is, and its favorite color
has to be yellow.
So they comment through ouryellow in the application, 50%
of the 100 people that appliedthey're not even seeing that, so
they're gone.
Then, after they actually apply, they meet the basic
qualifications.
Let's say they have two yearsof actual residential home
(20:29):
cleaning experience.
We do background check, we doinsurance.
They all have to have their ownbusiness liability insurances
as well.
They also have their own cars,they also have their own
supplies and then, after theymeet those basic qualifications,
they have to then scheduletheir own interview with us.
We're not going out andscheduling it with you.
So now we're like, out of the50, only 20 to 25 people
actually do that part of it.
You're talking about Calendly.
(20:50):
We do Calendly, okay, yeah, sothey'll go, sorry, they'll go
through Calendly, They'llschedule their own interviews
and then from there, at the dayof the interview, you have to
respond to say you're just sointerested in the job.
So out of the 100 people weonly get 10 to maybe 15 people
who actually make it to thephone call.
So out of the 10, 15 people thatmake it to the phone call to
actually have the conversationwith us, our operations manager,
then out of those 10 to 15people, they have to submit
(21:18):
their reference checks.
Yeah, they have to submit allthe insurance, all the
background things, I don't know10, 15 people, we get about five
to seven.
I was five to seven people.
Then we do the actual the firstjob or the test clean, and only
two to three people show up.
Hundred people.
We have the stats from ourwhat's a test?
Speaker 1 (21:26):
clean a client sometimes, sometimes the client.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
Sometimes it's a friend.
They used to be our apartmentwith a paid cleaning.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
Yeah, we're paying them.
We're pay them for that.
It's like our job, they getpaid for it.
But are you getting paid?
No, no, no.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
We're paying them to go do the job.
It's a free cleaning towhoever's getting the cleaning.
Yes, correct?
Speaker 2 (21:44):
It's our way of doing a initial I don't know,
in-person interview, if you will.
We're just making sure of thosethings that they said.
Are they showing up on time?
How are they dressed?
How can they communicate?
What supplies do they have?
What are they using, you know?
So that's what we look for inthe test clue.
Speaker 3 (22:00):
So, yeah, those 100 people, we're talking about two
to three people max thatactually show up for that first
job.
So by the time they actuallyget their real job, they already
showed up.
Speaker 2 (22:08):
Everybody else who didn't show that far more than
likely they're going to make itthrough.
Speaker 3 (22:12):
That's the part that takes the most work the hiring
process.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
How long is that cycle for people, is that a
month?
Usually about a month.
Speaker 3 (22:20):
When she'll go through the interview usually
about 25 a week we'll have aconversation, at least that part
of the process.
It'll be about $100 a month.
She'll give us the stats everysingle month.
Speaker 1 (22:29):
Normally most people don't even make that first part
Right even make that first part,okay, yeah, and right now, at
the current state of yourbusiness, are you guys doing
some of those still like, isthat what you guys are spending
most your time doing?
No, okay, you don't.
What do you guys spend mostyour time doing?
Right?
Speaker 2 (22:41):
now.
Uh, most of our time is done.
Like I said, we meet with ourteam hour a week, so most of the
time is really going over statsand numbers and marketing
budget and sometimes we'll talkabout customer complaints.
Speaker 3 (22:54):
Yeah, not customer complaints, but which cleaner
has been having the most issues?
So we're talking about turnover.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
Yeah, so is that a?
Speaker 2 (23:00):
group meeting or one-on-one A group.
It would be us two and then ouroperations manager and then our
VA lead, if you will.
Okay.
Speaker 3 (23:09):
Then we'll do a team meeting, maybe once a quarter,
with just the entire staff whichis really five, six people.
Okay, gotcha.
Speaker 1 (23:17):
We talked about hiring remote teams.
I am still a little curious onthat.
Do you guys use?
Well, you said you've beenusing a lot of Indeed lately.
Speaker 3 (23:24):
ZipRecruiter Indeed Housekeeper.
Those are the major ones, okaycool.
Speaker 1 (23:28):
What about automations?
Let's talk about that a littlebit.
How do you because you do haveremote staff that can do a lot
of this stuff, but you mentionedZapier earlier.
What else, I'm curious,anything else that helps you
guys reduce manpower?
Speaker 2 (23:42):
So we use something called TidyTrack, which also
helps with the automations ofthe emails and the text if we
want to send a blast, that typeof stuff.
It also kind of puts theclients into a funnel, if you
will.
So if they don't book, thenthey get like a 14-day sequence
of us sending messages to them.
So it's a lot of automation inthat regards, where we don't
have to have people constantlyreach out at this point.
(24:04):
And then our other system wherewe use for our CRM is Lawn 27,
where people kind of book onthere and that's how they find
us on the website, that type ofstuff.
Those are more automated ways.
I don't know what else youwould say that we use.
Speaker 3 (24:17):
Those are the major ones.
Zappy is just an automationconnector between the launch or
the tidy track or anything else.
Emails we do convert.
Well, now we do tidy track,which sends our emails out, but
we used you can use ml, champ,active campaign, convert kit,
any of those.
Okay, so those are the majorplatforms that we use for the
automations, correct, I'mcurious what you guys think
(24:38):
about, like the future.
Speaker 1 (24:39):
You know you.
There's the gig economy, whereyou just so many people now
their primary work income isfrom being a subcontractor for
you guys and being a sub overhere and doing side hustles, all
that kind of stuff which allowscompanies like you to thrive as
well, because you can utilizethem.
It's a good relationship.
Is that the way it's going?
I mean, do you see this trendcontinuing into the future?
Speaker 3 (25:00):
Yeah, I would say the I mean the pandemic changed a
lot of things for people.
We all want more time and weall want more flexibility, and I
think that's what the biggestchange out of the last couple of
years has been.
So you're seeing a lot ofcompanies now.
They're just like we're goingto work with people who just
want to do a few jobs here andthere and don't want to sit in
the office full of time or don'twant to work for anyone full of
time.
They want to kind of managetheir time, manage their money
(25:21):
and just manage their lifestylethe way they want.
Speaker 2 (25:22):
So I personally see it not changing anytime soon and
it's also I would say, likethings like Thumbtack and
TaskRabbit they are what we doon a bigger way, bigger scale.
Right, they just havecontractors on there that you
book for whatever service youwant.
Come do the job, they get apercentage, the contractor gets
a percentage and that's it, butjust on a way, bigger scale from
what we do.
Same thing like Uber and Airbnb.
(25:43):
Like we always say that wereference that all the time time
.
Like Airbnb doesn't own anyhome, uber doesn't own any cars,
we don't own any cleaningsupplies, it's the same exact
thing, except the ones under oursink.
Well, yes, Well, yes, but it'sthe same process, and so I just
see those companies continuingto grow.
I don't see Uber or Lyft oranything going anywhere anytime,
soon at least, and so the samething for us as long as there's
(26:07):
buildings and as long as there'shomes.
We continue to see this growingeven more and more.
Speaker 1 (26:12):
Janilka, anthony, this is great.
I'm going to summarize what wetalked about in three actual
steps here.
Number one is you need to haveclear standard operating
procedures and train your staffon how to use those SOPs to
respond to things, so you don'thave to jump in.
Number two is you need to haveclear pricing.
It needs to be on your website,it needs to be super clear and
so that your staff and yourclients can follow it and
(26:32):
respond to it.
And number three is hire remotestaff and this is really true
for any business, not justremote business but start to
take advantage of remote stafffrom anywhere in the world and
your business will be better forit.
Thanks for being here, guys.
That was great.
Speaker 3 (26:50):
Thank you for having us.
How do people find out moreabout you?
Yeah, so you can find us onYouTube, instagram, at
thehartrimony, that'sT-H-E-H-A-R-T-R-I-M-O-N-Y.
Or you can check out ourpodcast More Than a Side Hustle,
where we help non-fabulouscreate more impact, income and
influence outside their jobs.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
Cool, I really appreciate.
You guys are doing a reallygood job.
I think you're making a bigdifference in the marketplace,
so I appreciate what you guysare doing.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
Thank you, thank you.
Speaker 3 (27:11):
Appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (27:12):
Absolutely, and thank you for listening.
I hope you heard something thatwill make your business more
profitable and more efficientand more remote.
I'm your host, adam Sylvester.
You can find me atadamsylvestercom.
Your team and your clientsdeserve your very best.
If Masters of Home Service has been a game changer
for you and your business and wewant to hear from you go, leave
us a review and tell us whatyou think.
Help us build this communityand level up together.
If someone calls and says Iwant to book a cleaning with you
guys what do you?
Say Go to the website.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
No, or your.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
VA will then just do it for them on the website,
correct?
Speaker 2 (00:18):
I mean, you have someone on the phone.
You won't let them go, ofcourse, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
Welcome to Jobber's Masters of Home Service, a
podcast for home service pros byhome service pros.
We are in sunny Las Vegas Today.
We're talking about runningyour business from the beach a
guide to running your businessremotely.
I'm Adam Sylvester.
Today's guests are AnthonyHartzog and Janilka Hartzog.
They are the owners of KleeneBusiness University, maids to
(00:46):
Match and the hosts of more thana side hustle podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:48):
Welcome to the show, thank you for having us, thank
you.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
Janick, do you have this?
Tell our listeners briefly,like what you guys do, and all
that.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
So we own a cleaning business down in Dallas, texas,
and it's a remote cleaningbusiness because we do not do
any of the cleaning ourselves,but we manage the side of the
marketing the business, gettingthe clients, that type of stuff
okay, so our listeners are likerun your business from the beach
.
Speaker 1 (01:09):
I'm consumed by my business.
I work 80 hours a week.
Is it possible that's?
Speaker 3 (01:14):
what they're thinking .
Speaker 1 (01:15):
I mean a lot of listeners are in that place, and
so like, is it possible to runyour business from the beach or
wherever you want to run it.
Run it from.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Is that possible?
It's absolutely possible.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
Anything's possible.
Speaker 2 (01:26):
We've done it in Maldives and Dubai, and this is
before we really had a full teamin place to answer calls.
Now we have people in place to.
We have VAs in place that cananswer the phone, so we don't
need to be as involved.
But yes, because it's remote,because we do everything from
our phone and computer andlaptop.
You can do it from anywherethat can provide any cell
service or Wi-Fi.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
Okay.
So let me clarify, Becauseanyone our age remembers Tim
Ferriss' famous book 4-HourWorkweek Basically just don't
really work at all, basically.
So you guys aren't necessarilysaying go to Dubai and do
nothing, You're just saying runyour business from Dubai, do
some work.
Is that right?
Speaker 3 (02:04):
You're doing work, just from a different location,
definitely yeah, so when wefirst tested out our business
model, we actually went intothis business model where we're
saying we have a remote cleaningbusiness.
It was really just a cleaningbusiness where we don't actually
clean houses.
Now it's 2024, the world haschanged and the word remote has
been, has been, exasperated.
So now we just say remotecleaning business.
So essentially, we'll work with, we'll work with mom and pop
(02:25):
shops who are going on and doingthe cleaning and that's the
only part they're doing andwe're doing everything else in
the business.
So we're not saying that youjust don't run your business at
all.
We're saying you don't have tophysically go out and be the
face and brand and and label ofyour business yeah, we'll get to
the face thing in a second,because I am curious about that.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
Okay, so your workforce is primarily or only
exclusively subcontractors?
Speaker 3 (02:46):
outside of us.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
We're the only employees okay, you're the only
employees and your daughter andI don't, yeah, and so you guys
run your business, I mean withan internet connection, and so
you're you're hiring or notyou're hiring, recruiting new
subcontractors, and who handlescomplaints?
You know, someone doesn't cleanthe house, right right.
Who handles?
Speaker 2 (03:04):
So we're about to be seven years in a business.
So who handled it then versuswho handles it now?
Is completely different, so atthat time it was me.
My background is like a mentaltherapist, and so it just worked
out that I would handle theangry client.
He would handle the tech side ofthe business.
That's just how we separatedstrengths and weaknesses is how
it would work.
He was in IT, so it made sense.
(03:25):
Now we do have an operationmanager and two VAs in place, so
we don't, at this point, hearas much complaints as we once
would, unless it escalates thatwe need to hear it.
You know, at this point we meetwith our team once a week for
about an hour, but then it wasall coming to us on a Friday
night, on Valentine's Day Iremember this distinctively or
(03:46):
on a Sunday, or in Maldives,through my WhatsApp, and I'm
like oh okay, we'll get back toyou as soon as we can.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
So it varied then versus now, I think the
challenge of local servicebusiness owners is that you feel
like you have to be the one todo everything.
So for us we didn't feel likethere was anyone who could
handle a customer complaint aswell as us, because we know our
business, we know our customersand we realize we actually don't
really know them as much as wethought we did and we could just
give a script, giveunderstanding of who they are
and what they need help with,and we gave our teams parameters
(04:13):
on how much you could refund orwhat's the policies here, and
it was just more of us creatingour sops for our business where,
if this happens, you say and dothis and you can work outside
these parameters as you see fitit's also setting up the
client's expectations if you.
Speaker 1 (04:26):
If you answer the phone, you onboard them, you
send them the quote, you bookthe job, you tell them it's
gonna be great, and then you tryto hand it off to your they're
gonna be like whoa I want totalk to the owner.
Speaker 3 (04:35):
What happened?
Speaker 2 (04:36):
yeah, but if they never see you, yeah then they're
not gonna expect to see you nowexactly it was okay no I was
gonna say it was very specifictimes we would mention that
we're an owner, like if therewas a complaint, I would say,
okay, I got to take it back tomanagement, I am the management,
but I'll call you back in 10minutes, but they don't know
that, they just know that I'mtaking it to management.
So there were scenarios likethat Absolutely Very rarely.
(04:56):
I would say like I'm the owner,cause then that can be slippery
as well, cause then they try totell you about your business.
It just sometimes goes adifferent way.
So, yeah, we did face thatsometimes.
But I would just say like, ohwell, I have to take this up to
management and get back to youand let you know what they
decide.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
Yeah, I really like y'all's perspective because it
was a fresh perspective.
A lot of people who grow upcutting grass and then become a
lawn care company, they justhave.
They have such deep roots inthe industry, such deep roots in
the industry, yeah, and so theydo feel like they do everything
you just said, like they haveto address the complaints they
have to send the quotes, thequote has to be perfect and the
and everything has to be justright because they've been in
(05:31):
the industry so long.
You guys came in we're gonna Idon't care what business it's
gonna be cleaning houses,whatever it's gonna be.
And you guys just had adifferent perspective, because
you're like we're gonna bebusiness owners, we're not gonna
be house cleaners.
And so your perspective waslike we're going to run this
business our way.
We're not going to get in theweeds, so to speak.
And so along with that camerunning the business quote
(05:51):
faceless, you know, withoutbeing the face of the company.
Explain that a little bit.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
So, basically, like our name or pictures or anything
aren't anywhere on the website,it's not, you know, on our
profile for Yelp or Google oranything like that it just says
you know cleaning business indallas.
That's actually not true,because when we got awards of
recognition they had to put theit made better for seo, so your
optimization yeah, so that'swhen we started putting our
(06:15):
regular america and some stufffor cancer society and things
like that.
Speaker 3 (06:19):
So that's when you kind of see our name and face
and likeness.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
But in the backlink it's very backlinked where it's
not just, it's not in theonboarding process no, no, no no
, no, and it doesn't need to be,because if we don't feel like
we, like I don't know what goodthat does for us to be the face
of it right, and so we do getstudents or people that are
cleaners, like you said, andthey feel like you know, no, I,
I have to be the one cleaning orlike could never do that, or
(06:42):
like how do I make sure of thequality?
How do I do these things?
And I'm like there's alwayssomeone better than you one.
But doing something differentfrom you doesn't mean that it's
going to be bad either, and sothat's sometimes hard for people
that's been in the business for10 years or whatever doing it
themselves, to kind of grasparound as well.
Speaker 3 (07:03):
And we were talking about she wanted to learn more
about the way we ran ourbusiness.
And we got to a point in theconversation where I said I know
she actually came and saidAnthony, I understand what
you're doing, I love it.
But she said I just can't graspthe understanding of me not
doing those things.
I've been doing this for longerthan you've been alive and
she's like I was like alive andshe's like I'm.
I was like eventually there'sgoing to be a point where you're
(07:23):
I was like unfortunately,there's gonna be a point where
you can't do this anymore, andwhat happens to your business?
Then it dies, unfortunately.
I said, along with everythingelse.
But and she's like I understandthat I just been doing it for
so long and I said if you couldjust outsource some of the work
just to help you whether it'sthe customer service or whether
it's the emails, the marketing,just something where you're not
having to do everything.
And then, if you get to a pointwe decide to outsource your
(07:44):
cleaning, then you get to apoint where you can say I'm
going to take a day off, likebefore our work week, or things
like that.
So we've had thoseconversations where it's just we
know it's not going to work foryou, that's totally fine, but
there's another way to do it.
You guys are open to theconversation yeah, I would say
so.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
I say there's like a kind of middle ground with the
whole face thing, I think,because I would say I'm the face
to come because we have TVcommercials and I'm in those TV
commercials.
I wasn't at first.
I resisted the face thing toobecause I didn't want people to
be obsessed with.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
Adam Make a decision, yeah.
Speaker 1 (08:12):
And I've distanced myself a little bit from my
business, so that because whenpeople call, they don't expect
to find the owner answers.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
They're shocked, Right.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
And so I think there is, I think there's a middle
ground where you can balancesome marketing and being the
face on a really high level.
But if you call my company,you're going to get my staff
yeah, because it's a company andthat's what companies do and
you can play the owner cardwhenever you want.
Yeah, and they, yeah, exactly,you can play the owner but, but
(08:44):
I am actually yeah and they'relike oh my gosh.
The owner called me and it'skind of silly, but it's, you
know, it's fun, and so I thinkthere's a middle ground there.
If our listeners want to dolike a hybrid and I think you
guys we'll talk about this alittle bit if you guys ever
wanted to do radio tv like youguys have mentioned in the past,
then you might introduceyourselves in that as in that
way, but but your business won'tchange at all the operations.
You're never going to be partof the operations in that way.
(09:06):
What do your VAs do, yourvirtual assistants?
Speaker 3 (09:10):
I'm trying to call them remote employees Remote.
There's a stigma around VAsCustomer service reps.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
You try to do that externally to clients or just
internally, internally, both.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
We just say customer service reps.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
They are VAs.
Speaker 3 (09:25):
They're your virtual assistants, people who are
remote.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
But they answer our phones, of course, and they do
outbound calls, you know,following up with leads.
They do that and they answerthe leads that come in from
maybe Yelp or Google, any ofthose places they respond to
that.
They also assist ourcontractors if they need help
getting into a home or ifthere's an issue or address is
incorrect.
Those type of things they doPrimarily.
Speaker 3 (09:50):
Yeah, Marketing advertising.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
Hold on, okay, so you jump from answering their phone
to marketing.
Those are two very differentthings.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:57):
And so.
Speaker 3 (10:00):
How do they do the marketing?
Yeah, so if we're running adson Google, they're managing the
button.
Technically, our operationsmanager is a virtual employee.
She's remote so she's doing theadvertising on the Googles, the
Yelp.
If we're running any sort of ad, she's adjusting the marketing
spend, she's adjusting thelanguage, things like that.
So when you think about theword virtual assistant, it has
(10:20):
such a negative connotation.
It's kind of like they're justpeople who are just not in your
city or state helping you runyour business and manage it.
Our team who's been doing oursearch engine optimization, our
seo, for eight years, they're in, they're in russia.
I have such a closerelationship with those guys.
They're technically virtualemployees or virtual remote and
assistants and they've beendoing this for so many years for
us.
So that's just differencebetween the, the language.
Speaker 2 (10:43):
Because there's levels to what we have.
We have what we considercustomer service reps, and then
we have our operation manager,which she's still a virtual
assistant, so she would handlethe marketing, the very upset
client, those type of things,and then the VAs under would
handle the phone calls, the leadgeneration, that type of stuff.
Speaker 1 (10:58):
I think I know a question all of our listeners
are wondering.
They're asking themselves, soI'll ask it for them because I'm
here who prices, who gives theprice, who says it or who says
it?
Speaker 2 (11:10):
Who gives the bid.
So the way that we have it iseverything is booked online.
Okay, so all of our pricing isyou can see it online.
If you're a customer, you goonto the website.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
you can see the pricing right away, Okay so
there could be a whole episodeon that, because that's where
the rubber really meets the road, because a lot of our listeners
get hung up on like, but how doyou price?
Speaker 3 (11:28):
So we do flat rate pricing based off a bedroom and
bathroom?
Speaker 2 (11:31):
and square footage.
Speaker 3 (11:33):
Now, if the person goes out, the contractor who
goes out to the home.
We also have it in ourconditions and also in our
booking system.
That says if the home is morework than expected, we have the
ability to adjust the pricing aswe see fit.
We can do the exact same thing,so our contractors can say hey,
anthony or Janoko, it won't beus but we'll just use us.
They'll say, hey, anthony orJanoko, we got to this home.
It's going to be a little bitdirty and unexpected.
We'll say how many hours do youthink it's going to take?
(11:57):
They would tell us and thenthey would can say, hey, that's
totally fine, or we could do itat an hourly rate, up to however
much they want to clean thehome.
So still in that instance, wedon't have to be involved in
going out and doing the actuallabor or the bid.
So our contractors are our eyesand ears when it comes to the
ground floor things and theybring it back to our spaceship,
our hub, which is our team.
Speaker 2 (12:16):
Yeah, but the price is already set on the website.
Yeah, that's a huge.
Speaker 1 (12:20):
If someone calls and says I want to book a cleaning
with you guys what do you say?
Speaker 3 (12:23):
Go to the website.
Speaker 2 (12:24):
No, or your.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
VA will then just do it for them on the website,
correct?
Speaker 2 (12:27):
I mean, you have someone on the phone.
You won't let them go.
Of course you know that, ofcourse, yeah, yeah, you don't
let them go Fish on the line.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
You don't just cut the line.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
So, yeah, if that, if ever we're closed, our business
is open 24-7 because you canfind us online and book us.
Speaker 1 (12:48):
You don't have to speak it to us to book the clean
.
This is a great conversation.
I'm going to do a quick pausehere to talk about Jobber.
I think Jobber really helps meunlock the full potential of my
business with a couple of thingsOnline booking and all the
integrations that Jobber haswith other apps and all that it
allows me to automate a lot ofmy business.
It also allows my clients tobook jobs while my team is
asleep, and so you need Jobberbecause you need to grow your
(13:11):
business and unlock some of thethings that you just can't do on
pen and paper.
So new users can get anexclusive discount at jobbercom
slash podcast deal and go checkit out, get a free trial and get
started today.
Pricing is one of the biggestroadblocks for people getting
out of their business.
From my experience talking to alot of people, pricing is it
(13:34):
Because now there are someindustries that are better fit
for than others?
Window cleaning how many?
Speaker 3 (13:38):
windows.
Do you have, yeah, floors?
Speaker 1 (13:40):
All that kind of stuff.
It can be very linear and verypredictable.
There are some businesses thatdo it's.
It is a little more gray area,but I would say it's probably
not as gray as you think.
I think a lot of I was this waytoo.
I thought my pricing is soclever and it's so great and it
could never be a systematizedand.
Speaker 3 (13:59):
But it is now and I got over that, you know, and so
and also it doesn't have to beperfect.
Would you guys?
Speaker 1 (14:04):
agree with that.
Part of the magic is justletting go of perfection and
being okay with Good enough.
Speaker 2 (14:10):
Yeah, and so we say that to our students.
I'm like you can adjust yourpricing in two seconds Like if
this thing is too high or ifit's too low.
You've noticed, clients aresaying things, contractors are
saying things.
You can simply just adjust yourpricing.
You're not married to thisprice.
And then, even as inflationgoes on and things change,
you're going to change yourpricing.
So yeah, you can easily changeit.
You add on services, you takethem away.
(14:32):
You know things like that.
Speaker 3 (14:33):
It happens all the time.
Speaking of not being perfect,when we had our first daughter,
we had about a month to get anoperations manager in place
because we still had remoteemployees, remote team members,
but they were still coming to uson larger issues.
So we said, if we could justget an operations manager just a
fraction of what we think sheneeds to be at, she can handle
those things and we will bealongside her for any mistakes
that happen.
Speaker 1 (14:53):
How do you train them ?
Let's talk about that, becauseI don't want people to think oh,
they just hired all thesepeople from all over the world,
they just could do it day one.
It takes training.
How do?
Speaker 2 (15:01):
you train.
So I guess it depends on theperson.
A lot of people would have SOPsin place and then train the
person.
We were kind of backwardsbecause we had a month and we're
like the baby is coming, so wewere training and SOPing at the
same time.
So this person operationsmanager.
She was a manager for our VAbusiness and then we brought her
to our cleaning business.
(15:21):
So we trusted her and knew allthat and so in the process of
training we were SOPing as wewent along.
So we're, like you know, makean SOP of this as we train you.
Can you give me an example?
So let's give a scenario, uh,an upset client.
Okay, so we would talk throughscenarios and what to do, what
to say, how much you can refundwhen it's okay to refund the
(15:42):
whole thing.
If it is, though, likeliterally talking through
scenarios, we would.
We trained for about a monthtwo, three, two to four hours a
day of just going overeverything.
That it was a brain dump,really.
Yeah, everything because wewere doing it.
Let's see, our child was born2022.
We had started this business in2017, and we didn't have
anything really kind of we hadsome things in place, but not as
(16:04):
much as we should have, so itreally was a brain dump of
things flowing out of our mindoh yeah, this, oh yeah, this, oh
yeah exactly.
So it became like, okay, we knowwe need to have this in place.
This is someone that could helpus do putting in place.
So while we were training her,we were sop'ing her and giving
her the reins to do stuff.
So that's the other thing, likeyou have to let go and know
(16:24):
they're going to make mistakesand do things that maybe that's
not how I said to do it, and youretrain them and they learn and
refer back to the sop, and sothat's why we made it so
important at that time, becausewe're like we're probably going
to be off the grid for a bitwith a baby, with a new baby,
For the technical side of things.
Speaker 3 (16:41):
I would do things like a Loom video.
So we would do a screen shareon Zoom.
And then we got off to Zoom andit's like oh, I do a lot of
Loom videos and essentially it'sjust a screen share and it's
literally documenting everythingyou're doing.
So this is how you book aclient.
So I would go through, show myscreen on Loom and it literally
records it and it gives you atranscript of everything and
it's like this is how you wouldbook a client in a system.
So we started doing things likethat and we said we, I
(17:05):
literally.
I would rather Loom than havinga Zoom meeting any day, so I
would just Loom the entireconversation and send it over to
them.
They're like okay, into the SOPdocument.
Like Janoka said, that would bemy version of the brain dump,
because I don't want to be onthe phone with you explaining it
.
I'd rather just talk myselfthrough it.
Speaker 1 (17:18):
They can watch it a hundred times if they want to.
It's funny, I never used Loom.
It's funny.
And then I started using Loomand then I didn't know how I
could live my life without.
Speaker 3 (17:29):
Loom Like 24 hours later.
It's amazing.
It shows you how many times yousave your meetings when you
send looms off.
Speaker 1 (17:34):
Yeah, Okay, real quick.
I'm curious what other tech doyou guys use?
Do you use Slack, whatsapp?
How do you communicate All thatkind of stuff?
Speaker 2 (17:40):
I'm curious.
Yeah, we also use Slack tocommunicate with our team.
What?
Speaker 3 (17:44):
else do we use?
We use Basecamp.
Basecamp is one of our largerplatforms.
Speaker 1 (17:48):
Essentially, it's Project management, yeah,
project management A hub ofproject management.
Speaker 3 (17:53):
Zapier is one where we just kind of do automations.
New customer comes in, they gohere Slack.
We use Yelp, google.
Speaker 1 (18:01):
Google Ads.
Those are basics.
How do you guys ensure they doa good job?
Speaker 2 (18:05):
The number one answer Question sorry.
Speaker 1 (18:07):
The number one question how?
Speaker 2 (18:08):
do we ensure they do a good job?
I think one.
You're talking about thecontractors at the clean correct
I was, but I am now I was.
Let's talk about that first butI am curious how you make sure
your your office virtual staffdoes a good job too, but let's
talk about the infield staff too.
Okay, first, so one.
With that, we feel like thevetting process is before you go
into that, what?
Speaker 3 (18:25):
the question I would always ask back is if you're not
going to do the job, how do youensure it gets done?
So that's like, well, I wouldhave to go out and do it myself.
That's not always the case, sobut yeah.
Speaker 2 (18:36):
So our vetting process, I would say, is where
we start.
So we get an influx of peopleand the goal is really to not
have everyone make it through,because we know everyone won't
be good.
So starting from the vettingprocess is a big thing.
And then we do something calleda test clean, where you would
go to maybe a client, a friend'shome, maybe about an hour hour,
two hours.
We see how you did you show upon time, how did you come
(18:56):
dressed, what your supplies were.
They would get paid for this.
Like, how do we take feedback?
That's another step for usbefore we put you in the field
specifically and then, you beingin the field, we get feedback
from clients.
We call to this day our VAs doevery single client that we
service Okay, and to find outhow the cleaning was.
And so it's so funny.
We have students that are like,yeah, I'd rather just text or
(19:17):
email.
I'm like we said, to call for areason.
Call is just a different touchpoint.
Even to this day, we still haveautomations that go out to them
.
Like what, but like a text oremail.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (19:27):
But we find that calling them is one touch.
I can also catch you if youweren't happy before you get
this email that says to leave areview.
I can catch you right then andthere on the call and see how I
can rectify it.
So that's why calling is soimportant for us.
So when we call, we can hearfeedback from clients of what
they're saying about this personand that's a lot of how we
(19:48):
learn about how the person isand our communication with them.
When we provide feedback of theclient said this or this didn't
happen right, how do they takeit?
so that's how we do our qa, ourquality assurance, really yeah
through the clients and throughour vetting and our constant
communication with ourcontractors and our hiring
process is completely remotestill.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
So let's say we have 100 employees that apply on
indeedcom.
Then we have questions on theapplication that would say
things like if you're payingattention to this application,
let me know what your favoritecolor is, and its favorite color
has to be yellow.
So they comment through ouryellow in the application, 50%
of the 100 people that appliedthey're not even seeing that, so
they're gone.
Then, after they actually apply, they meet the basic
qualifications.
Let's say they have two yearsof actual residential home
(20:29):
cleaning experience.
We do background check, we doinsurance.
They all have to have their ownbusiness liability insurances
as well.
They also have their own cars,they also have their own
supplies and then, after theymeet those basic qualifications,
they have to then scheduletheir own interview with us.
We're not going out andscheduling it with you.
So now we're like, out of the50, only 20 to 25 people
actually do that part of it.
You're talking about Calendly.
(20:50):
We do Calendly, okay, yeah, sothey'll go, sorry, they'll go
through Calendly, They'llschedule their own interviews
and then from there, at the dayof the interview, you have to
respond to say you're just sointerested in the job.
So out of the 100 people weonly get 10 to maybe 15 people
who actually make it to thephone call.
So out of the 10, 15 people thatmake it to the phone call to
actually have the conversationwith us, our operations manager,
then out of those 10 to 15people, they have to submit
(21:18):
their reference checks.
Yeah, they have to submit allthe insurance, all the
background things, I don't know10, 15 people, we get about five
to seven.
I was five to seven people.
Then we do the actual the firstjob or the test clean, and only
two to three people show up.
Hundred people.
We have the stats from ourwhat's a test?
Speaker 1 (21:26):
clean a client sometimes, sometimes the client.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
Sometimes it's a friend.
They used to be our apartmentwith a paid cleaning.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
Yeah, we're paying them.
We're pay them for that.
It's like our job, they getpaid for it.
But are you getting paid?
No, no, no.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
We're paying them to go do the job.
It's a free cleaning towhoever's getting the cleaning.
Yes, correct?
Speaker 2 (21:44):
It's our way of doing a initial I don't know,
in-person interview, if you will.
We're just making sure of thosethings that they said.
Are they showing up on time?
How are they dressed?
How can they communicate?
What supplies do they have?
What are they using, you know?
So that's what we look for inthe test clue.
Speaker 3 (22:00):
So, yeah, those 100 people, we're talking about two
to three people max thatactually show up for that first
job.
So by the time they actuallyget their real job, they already
showed up.
Speaker 2 (22:08):
Everybody else who didn't show that far more than
likely they're going to make itthrough.
Speaker 3 (22:12):
That's the part that takes the most work the hiring
process.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
How long is that cycle for people, is that a
month?
Usually about a month.
Speaker 3 (22:20):
When she'll go through the interview usually
about 25 a week we'll have aconversation, at least that part
of the process.
It'll be about $100 a month.
She'll give us the stats everysingle month.
Speaker 1 (22:29):
Normally most people don't even make that first part
Right even make that first part,okay, yeah, and right now, at
the current state of yourbusiness, are you guys doing
some of those still like, isthat what you guys are spending
most your time doing?
No, okay, you don't.
What do you guys spend mostyour time doing?
Right?
Speaker 2 (22:41):
now.
Uh, most of our time is done.
Like I said, we meet with ourteam hour a week, so most of the
time is really going over statsand numbers and marketing
budget and sometimes we'll talkabout customer complaints.
Speaker 3 (22:54):
Yeah, not customer complaints, but which cleaner
has been having the most issues?
So we're talking about turnover.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
Yeah, so is that a?
Speaker 2 (23:00):
group meeting or one-on-one A group.
It would be us two and then ouroperations manager and then our
VA lead, if you will.
Okay.
Speaker 3 (23:09):
Then we'll do a team meeting, maybe once a quarter,
with just the entire staff whichis really five, six people.
Okay, gotcha.
Speaker 1 (23:17):
We talked about hiring remote teams.
I am still a little curious onthat.
Do you guys use?
Well, you said you've beenusing a lot of Indeed lately.
Speaker 3 (23:24):
ZipRecruiter Indeed Housekeeper.
Those are the major ones, okaycool.
Speaker 1 (23:28):
What about automations?
Let's talk about that a littlebit.
How do you because you do haveremote staff that can do a lot
of this stuff, but you mentionedZapier earlier.
What else, I'm curious,anything else that helps you
guys reduce manpower?
Speaker 2 (23:42):
So we use something called TidyTrack, which also
helps with the automations ofthe emails and the text if we
want to send a blast, that typeof stuff.
It also kind of puts theclients into a funnel, if you
will.
So if they don't book, thenthey get like a 14-day sequence
of us sending messages to them.
So it's a lot of automation inthat regards, where we don't
have to have people constantlyreach out at this point.
(24:04):
And then our other system wherewe use for our CRM is Lawn 27,
where people kind of book onthere and that's how they find
us on the website, that type ofstuff.
Those are more automated ways.
I don't know what else youwould say that we use.
Speaker 3 (24:17):
Those are the major ones.
Zappy is just an automationconnector between the launch or
the tidy track or anything else.
Emails we do convert.
Well, now we do tidy track,which sends our emails out, but
we used you can use ml, champ,active campaign, convert kit,
any of those.
Okay, so those are the majorplatforms that we use for the
automations, correct, I'mcurious what you guys think
(24:38):
about, like the future.
Speaker 1 (24:39):
You know you.
There's the gig economy, whereyou just so many people now
their primary work income isfrom being a subcontractor for
you guys and being a sub overhere and doing side hustles, all
that kind of stuff which allowscompanies like you to thrive as
well, because you can utilizethem.
It's a good relationship.
Is that the way it's going?
I mean, do you see this trendcontinuing into the future?
Speaker 3 (25:00):
Yeah, I would say the I mean the pandemic changed a
lot of things for people.
We all want more time and weall want more flexibility, and I
think that's what the biggestchange out of the last couple of
years has been.
So you're seeing a lot ofcompanies now.
They're just like we're goingto work with people who just
want to do a few jobs here andthere and don't want to sit in
the office full of time or don'twant to work for anyone full of
time.
They want to kind of managetheir time, manage their money
(25:21):
and just manage their lifestylethe way they want.
Speaker 2 (25:22):
So I personally see it not changing anytime soon and
it's also I would say, likethings like Thumbtack and
TaskRabbit they are what we doon a bigger way, bigger scale.
Right, they just havecontractors on there that you
book for whatever service youwant.
Come do the job, they get apercentage, the contractor gets
a percentage and that's it, butjust on a way, bigger scale from
what we do.
Same thing like Uber and Airbnb.
(25:43):
Like we always say that wereference that all the time time
.
Like Airbnb doesn't own anyhome, uber doesn't own any cars,
we don't own any cleaningsupplies, it's the same exact
thing, except the ones under oursink.
Well, yes, Well, yes, but it'sthe same process, and so I just
see those companies continuingto grow.
I don't see Uber or Lyft oranything going anywhere anytime,
soon at least, and so the samething for us as long as there's
(26:07):
buildings and as long as there'shomes.
We continue to see this growingeven more and more.
Speaker 1 (26:12):
Janilka, anthony, this is great.
I'm going to summarize what wetalked about in three actual
steps here.
Number one is you need to haveclear standard operating
procedures and train your staffon how to use those SOPs to
respond to things, so you don'thave to jump in.
Number two is you need to haveclear pricing.
It needs to be on your website,it needs to be super clear and
so that your staff and yourclients can follow it and
(26:32):
respond to it.
And number three is hire remotestaff and this is really true
for any business, not justremote business but start to
take advantage of remote stafffrom anywhere in the world and
your business will be better forit.
Thanks for being here, guys.
That was great.
Speaker 3 (26:50):
Thank you for having us.
How do people find out moreabout you?
Yeah, so you can find us onYouTube, instagram, at
thehartrimony, that'sT-H-E-H-A-R-T-R-I-M-O-N-Y.
Or you can check out ourpodcast More Than a Side Hustle,
where we help non-fabulouscreate more impact, income and
influence outside their jobs.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
Cool, I really appreciate.
You guys are doing a reallygood job.
I think you're making a bigdifference in the marketplace,
so I appreciate what you guysare doing.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
Thank you, thank you.
Speaker 3 (27:11):
Appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (27:12):
Absolutely, and thank you for listening.
I hope you heard something thatwill make your business more
profitable and more efficientand more remote.
I'm your host, adam Sylvester.
You can find me atadamsylvestercom.
Your team and your clientsdeserve your very best.
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