With over one million commercial cleaning businesses in the country, it can feel like an impossible feat to claim your fair piece of market share. Most of your target leads already have cleaning providers, and getting them to entertain a provider switch can take countless hours that your employees don’t have. However, you can’t grow your business by waiting for leads to come to you—you need a structured lead generation program that incorporates the best sales strategies.
Creating a lead generation program is a long and arduous process. It typically takes around five months and 12 phone calls to get an outbound lead to set a sales appointment. Additionally, it takes a few months for a search engine optimized website to start pulling in inbound leads. But with the right combination of persistence and patience, you can transform your commercial cleaning business and turn your small operation into the leading provider in your area.
Here are four lead generation strategies you can use to capture qualified leads and turn them into new clients for your commercial cleaning business.
1. Be Strategic About B2B Appointment Setting
When most commercial cleaning companies decide to ramp up their lead generation efforts, they start with B2B appointment setting. Appointment setting typically provides a faster and more substantial return on investment than inbound marketing methods, making it a natural first step in growing your business. All you need is a team of sales development representatives (SDRs) and data cleansing experts who can compile a list of viable leads and use cold calls, emails, and marketing collateral to convince them to set an appointment.
If B2B appointment setting sounds complicated, it is. It takes weeks of research before you can even make your first call, and from there, you have to follow up with leads consistently to keep them in your pipeline. It’s tough to stay in touch with commercial cleaning leads because most don’t have an immediate need for a new provider, and they don’t want to deal with the hassle of ending their current contract.
It may not be easy to build a commercial cleaning sales pipeline and keep your leads engaged, but there are a few proven steps you can take to improve your chances of success: lead cleansing, qualification, and nurturing.
Lead Cleansing
If you want to get in touch with the right contacts and tailor your messaging to fit each one, you need to cleanse your commercial cleaning leads throughout your B2B appointment setting program. During the lead cleansing process, your sales team reaches out to potential leads and gathers information about their key decision-maker, facilities, and current cleaning provider. This step of the appointment setting process serves two purposes: it confirms that your information is accurate and up to date, and it helps you gather data you can’t find on a basic list.
Lead Qualification
You may market your commercial cleaning company as a jack of all trades, but you probably have an ideal demographic you prefer to work with. Some companies specialize in cleaning services for hospitals and private medical practices; others offer general janitorial services for schools and office buildings. If you’re picky about the companies you work with, you should only get in touch with leads that fit your target criteria. By asking qualifying questions about your leads’ industry, cleaning needs, and potential timeline for a new contract, you can decide if they’re worth your time.
Lead Nurturing
Without a strong lead nurturing program, you’ll be lucky if you close any major commercial cleaning deals. Unless a potential customer is looking for a simple carpet cleaning or a one-off deep clean of their office, you rarely set appointments within your first few phone calls. It takes months of regular communication to get most commercial cleaning leads to commit to a meeting. If you lose contact or write off a lead too early, you might miss out on your biggest cleaning contract yet. As a result, an organized lead nurturing strategy is a must-have for commercial cleaning companies.
2. Develop a Website That Converts
If you currently use your website like a digital brochure you show to outbound leads, you’re missing out on a major sales opportunity. While your website can act as an informational tool that supports your B2B appointment setting program, it can also be an alternate lead generation source for your business. When your potential leads search for commercial cleaning services in your area, your website could be the reason they choose you over a competitor.
Before your website can start converting visitors into customers, you have to fill it with clear, informational content and search engine optimization (SEO) features. These include:
- High-volume keywords: When you search for a keyword or phrase on Google, you typically end up with results that use the exact words you searched. This isn’t an accident—it’s SEO. You can research the words your leads frequently search and use them in your titles and body text to increase your search engine ranking.
- Optimized meta titles and meta descriptions: When your search engine results pop up after a search, you see a page title and a short description of its contents. Those are the meta title and meta descriptions. By including keywords and using content that entices searchers to click, you can drive more traffic to your site.
- Internal and external links: Keywords aren’t the only factor that influences your search engine ranking. Google judges your site’s flow and credibility based on the internal and external links you use. Linking to credible outside sources and relevant internal site pages can help you appear higher in search engine results.
- Easy-to-navigate site structure: If your website doesn’t have a clear flow that guides users to an end action, you won’t end up with many conversions. Well-organized sites rank better in search engines, and they prompt users to get in touch at the end of their visit.
Adding SEO to your website is an excellent way to drive traffic to your site. However, you can’t just stuff keywords and links into your site and expect it to rank well. SEO brings users to your site, but clean, compelling content is what convinces them to stay.
3. Use Content To Build Trust
Have you ever clicked into a website hoping it would answer your question but exited out immediately when you realized the content wasn’t helpful? Your leads will do the same thing if your website is all flash and no substance. You need content that conveys expertise, authority, and trustworthiness (otherwise known as E-A-T). When leads view you as an expert in the commercial cleaning space, they’re more likely to get in touch when they need a new provider.
There are many ways to incorporate content into your lead generation program. In addition to web page content, you can publish informative blogs, post short articles to social media platforms like LinkedIn, produce video content, and create various pieces of marketing collateral. All of these content types can add the extra support your sales team needs to make a deal.
For example, when a lead is deciding whether to choose you or a competing cleaning company, your closing sales reps can show them a testimonial video or an infographic showcasing your services. Your content could be the differentiating factor that leads your potential customer to choose you.
4. Capture Cleaning Leads on Social Media
In the commercial cleaning industry, you need to reach as many leads as possible if you want to sign more contracts. One of the best ways to expand your reach is by implementing a social media marketing strategy. Your social media posts can help you get your name in front of the leads that evade traditional sales methods like cold calls and emails.
To run a successful social media marketing program, you need to:
- Post regular content: The more you post on social media, the more chances you have to reach your leads. Post content that’s relevant to their needs, such as informative blog posts from your website or short articles written specifically for platforms like LinkedIn.
- Clean up your company profiles: If your company profiles look like they haven’t been updated in almost a decade, you lose credibility with your leads. By adding a high-resolution image, a short blurb about your business, a brief paragraph highlighting your accomplishments, and your contact information, you can boost your brand image and add a professional touch to your social media presence.
- Grow your network: As your network expands, your visibility expands with it. Grow your brand name and become a recognizable business by connecting with leads in your target audience.
By optimizing your company profiles, posting curated content regularly, and connecting with hundreds of B2B decision-makers in your area, you can turn social media into a lead generation source and a supporting tool for your sales reps.
Need Help Growing Your Commercial Cleaning Business?
If you want to grow your commercial cleaning business, you can’t sit around and wait for leads to appear. You need a mix of outbound and inbound marketing strategies, a team of dedicated sales and marketing representatives, and lots of patience. If B2B lead generation sounds like too much for your commercial cleaning company to handle, Abstrakt can help.
We’ve spent over a decade generating leads for commercial cleaning businesses, and we know how to get results. Our skilled sales development representatives will nurture your leads for as long as it takes to set an appointment and help you turn that appointment into a contract. No matter what your specialty is or what leads you want to target, we can build a sustainable sales pipeline and grow your business.
Get in touch to learn more about our commercial cleaning lead generation services and take the first step in growing your business.
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