Sorry, I don’t mean to be defensive. I have spent the better part of two years researching on this forum and taking notes from you all here who are wiser, more experienced than I in this area.
I simply see nothing to lose and no potential drawbacks even proposed. As I said, if I was trying to build an operation on the scale of the Giants here, I would be more likely to agree. As of now I’d be content with a mere 1000-1500 per week in business, a goal I feel ten hours per week door knocking will provide, at least to start.
For brand visibility? Flyers are probably better than knocking, but there are alternatives better still. For getting business and giving estimates, especially in a area with such a limited population as mine? Door to door just seems a better match. I could be wrong though, in which case no big deal. Perhaps in that case a mix of flyers and knocking would be appropriate.
What is your range - how far do/will you travel for work? If close in has limited population then expanding your range will absolutely enhance your response numbers. Don’t forget that window cleaning is often referred to as a luxury service, so focus on those households which may mean a wider target area.
Very true. My service area is somewhat of a watermelon slice shape, with me at the tip. This is due to an active no-compete I have with the local FiSH franchise. Within that area is a population of roughly 160,000 scattered through numerous small towns and a handful of medium ones. It’s a rural area, as you could probably tell. I would have to drive pretty far (1 hour or more) to significantly increase that amount.
I was planning on focusing on window cleaning during the spring and summer, and gutters during the fall. I would like to add pressure washing and focus on it year round in the future.
professional flyers simply dont work. over the years iv read on here many times of this and i have first hand knowledge of a rival who put out 2.5k of top notch card flyers and not one bite. not a Single bite
i say draw your own design, make it personal.,this worked great for me. its then got the human touch …most everytime i doled out a 100 i got 1 or 2 bites . my first 200 flyers were on crepe paper and handdrawn boy that gave me wristache, but hey no pain no gain . youve got to think of an angle thats not the norm
last week i saw a burger van that looked to me as if it was made from old junk. it caught my eye and i made a mental note to go eat there sometime to check out is it really made from junk
Thanks. I think I read that article when I first considered doing this. My employer was reluctant at first. I had to sort of pressure them into taking another look at the non-compete, since they insisted it said I couldn’t open my own business anywhere.
Without knowing what is actually in the agreement then it is all guess work. He needs to sit down and do full read on it to know how restrictive it was written, or if it even pertains to what he wants to do.
Ohio. Although, I’m not really sure why this is relevant. As I said before, the agreement certainly stated that I could not do business within a 20 miles radius of the office until 1 year after I stopped working for them. No problem, since I have no desire to do so anyway.
@Fredled if you are really concerned you need proper legal advice. No one on this forum can give you a good answer regarding non-competes. The PDF link that @Garry posted is a good starting point.
If as you said you are not going to compete within a 20-mile radius, then you have nothing to worry about. From what you’ve written in this post it doesn’t seem like you will have much of an issue.
I had a former employee quit and steal a few of my customers from me by underbidding. He ignored the non-compete after several warnings. I wasn’t going to waste my time or money pursuing any legal action against him. One year later I got most of those customers back anyway because he went out of business.
To say a hand written message about a service works and a professional one doesnt is kind of a stupid statement.
Image is everything, first impressions, especially when is comes to residential customers who care more about who comes into their homes.
As far As what works or not really depends on luck.
Your flier, in most cases, won’t convince someone who isn’t in the market for your service but more less gets the person who possible has been thinking about it to call.
