Wow Brian, I thought $159 for a 4000 sq. ft. house, that’s gotta’ be outside only (which I still thought was cheap). But I checked the dude’s website. That’s for IN & OUT!!! Ha ha, my price for large homes (which includes 4000 sq. ft. houses) starts at $199 exterior, $199 interior.
Climate is definitely changing for sure! Time and again at LEAST once a day I get that phone call asking if I can match so and so’s price. After a while when people are sometimes ANGRY with you over the curse word that you said “680 bucks, thats a BASIC service for your 5000 sq. ft home with cut ups and high interiors on top of your winding staircase and hardwood floors and no I’m sorry but your corroded aluminum tracks are NOT deep cleaned with a toothbrush, sure we will use that if you like however you need to add another 450, when would you like the work done?”
Price of fuel ain’t going DOWN is it? My milk still costs the same as it did 5 months ago, and up from a year ago. WHY am I supposed to bring my already close to bottom line prices down even further? Because craigslist Jack is doing it for less?
I made that mistake a couple weeks ago, lowering my prices just because I thought I had to…AGAIN. Sorry, but the people who want to pay that little are the WORST people to work for. Rude. Condescending. Unappreciative and disrespectful. I will NEVER work for someone no matter WHO it is for less than what needs to be made.
I spend too much time away from my family to slave for pennies. Bruce, your right…new thinking has GOT to be brainstormed. Whatever you got cookin’ I’m in, and there’s a few others who feel the same man.
I could care less when it’s a filthy 3000sft tract home that has been 5 years since someone has been out and will be again, with 5 dogs and dead grass and dog patties getting all over your shoes, the ladders and the wpole hose along with an oily driveway and nice new cars that haven’t been washed in ages (all clues that these folks just aren’t into ‘clean’ in general and [B]you’re[/B] gonna need a deep clean when done with the job)
it’s when it’s so entrenched in the [B]right customer’s[/B] mind and then you’re there at [B]the perfect home [/B]in your crisp uniform, outstanding presentation and materials and were [B]even referred[/B]etc etc etc
and they say,
“wow, I didn’t realize it would be so high”
(next time I’m ready to try Kevin D’s "oh? . . . " but may times they play along and say they’ll get back or something similar that you cant pin it down without pressuring them into ‘discomfort’, I could take a lesson from Live Clear who loves this part, lol)
that’s code for:
all i’ve seen and remember is the low ball ad’s pricing, you stand out, I want you, I would pick you in a second, but at the lowball price not your price
which is a round robin back to marketing and expensive ubiquity efforts
By the way “high” is just what all of us who are running a sustainable, vibrant and viable business are charging here on the forum over and over, not “$600 hour high”, just to be clear again.
I think in so cal, there’s a visual trick going on, the neighborhoods seem prime, the homes look great, there’s a bazillion of the 3-4,000 sft mc mansions less than 10 years old, but one problem is that these people just plain ol dont have the income to maintain these at respectable pricing levels.
If you use the online tools, some prime looking neighborhoods have avg incomes of just $60K!! talk about a mismatch
but I again, my frustration isn’t coming from joe blow tract home, that market segment has been shot for awhile, oh I think around the time ‘signature loans’ stopped being offered :rolleyes:
Here you go Brian!
and I’m not griping in my posts, i’m talking strategy
This guy did ‘win’ with low prices, he moved to the area 8 years ago and started this pricing and has only advertised in this same coupon mailer magazine for the same 8 years, but in many cities.
So while the rest of us locally were ‘dumb’ about marketing and still had too many jobs raining down on us constantly with great prices as we built employees and larger businesses, he came in with ACWC’s ubiquity and constancy strategy, and used the way low price thing as bait (even though that’s only a temporary very short term strategy from every pricing book out there, never as a long term strategy)
He almost went bye bye in '09 but then diversified into every business under the sun, I think he really wants the grout and carpet jobs
So it then newbies like the one Brian posted figure this guy is the one to undercut, ha ha ha
so it’ll take counter ubiquity and a clear market that could be attracted away or given an alternative to to make a difference
Sure wish I knew then what I know now about marketing (along with perhaps a few of you others?)
after all, if it wasn’t this guy, it’d just be another, the only antidote is more marketing knowledge and application
For those of you having a hard time getting the impact, just imagine if you were in ACWC’s service area and all those 75,000 postcards a month were advertising:
“20 windows for $99! Inside and Out!”
that’s exactly the same pricing as below
It’s a virus that spreads…
The problem is the consumer places no [I]value[/I] on the service.
they see no overall value in insurance, spiffy logo, truck, invoices. Do some? Yes but overall they have a picture of a sloppy so cal window cleaner in their mind, the eyes get big and and the excitement builds that the entire 4k sq foot home will be done for $159.
But here’s the catch it takes the guy 6 hours, he doesn’t actually clean the screens, he’s a dirt ball, smells, is creepy
I know I know all things to be different about. But with a certain segment it [B]doesn’t matter.[/B]
(no joke ran into a wc crew the other day in beat up van with their “professional” vinyl signage peeling off, they open the van and it looks like a bunch of carnies getting out! This in a neighborhood with the homes starting at 800k, supposedly the ideal area)
the catch the homeowner calls me next time complains about the guy. I tell her the price and she has the nerve to [B]compare me to the carnies![/B] This after all the problems so I encourage her to call him. “oh I “lost” his number”
“Sorry to hear that lady, so when do you want to schedule?”
The good clients are out there they do call but these knuckle dragging wc’s make our job a lot harder than it should be.
Marketing is the cure, my postcards have been getting people to call for a $199 job most are upselling themselves an average of $85
exactly, I know the crinkled face and crunched eyebrow look Tory!
And yes, a lot of that the last 4 years, they have a tone like you a gouging them “hurricane katrina selling plywood sheets for $100” style
Sales funnel to the rescue, there has to be pure crafting and strategy from start to finish, anyone that drops in from the sidelines and misses the start just wont work out as a prime customer
There’s a lot of straw that needs to be gathered, yet there’s not much time to gather it when the same daily allotment of bricks has to be made too (referring to Genesis and the overloading having a new and additional (previously virtually unnecessary) ‘full time job’ creates in this economy)
I had a lady call me the other day,
she comperd me with Justin lost my mind,
she liked my site, liked my postcard, wanted me but wanted his price.
"Why did you bother calling me?"
Interesting
You summed it up Brian, and it never was that way, this is a new attitude out here, probably because people are mad at their home since it’s ATM capabilities have worn out permanently and dont want to spend a dime maintaining it anymore (I think that has a lot to do with it seriously)
Carnies! good one Brian
Yes, no matter how professional start to finish, compared to the carnies, ridiculous, probably stemming from Kevin D’s thread of any startup can have an appearance of professional instantly, so people are jaded about that anymore and it doesn’t have the value it once did
Yep, marketing is the cure hands down
examining the lowest pricers and their strategy helps formulate counter strategies and new marketing efforts, it’s good, this is new strategy from frustration
in the new 600 hr book Kevin has that postcard that says “why are we the most hated as the highest priced window cleaner?” or something similar (I am probably combining 2 postcards actually)
primes the pump from the start, I like it
Spidey Sense as Paul said, ha ha ha
but spidey wants someone better at that lowest price
people act like it’s a open middle east bazzaar or something
or TJ selling blankets at the border, eh Tory? you see that every day
So whadda we got so far?
People don’t value WC in general
People lost their ATM
People have been conditioned by ubiquitous low prices
People think in this economy they can get a “better choice” at the lowest price they’ve ever seen by using assumed desperation for anything
People are not impressed by “professional” anything anymore
where’s the gaps?
where’s the angles?
Where’s the sales funnel to pre condition and have prime customer say YES!! to our pricing?
there’s the strategy road right there.
ha ha ha
he’s 60 miles out now, wow, welcome to my world Brian, I used to lose my mind too, lol Now it’ll be R* Brothers instead that will be your thorn in the side!
oh well, the best things come out of adversity and some of the best serious strategy analysis is going on for sure.
Quite honestly it’s what shoulda been done many moons ago, for me at least, so I’m late to the game.
oh, add another one to the list
People are treating services like pre manufactured products
they are doing the same pricing that they might do shopping for a tv, standing in the best buy aisle on their smart phone checking amazon and the store across town’s price
this may have a lot to do with it too, they are bringing a habit that works with products, but pricematching or lowest price guaranteeing with a labor based serviced business is just mismatching shopping strategies, no 2 service companies are exactly alike
Bruce, that is crazy nuts! I really had no idea you guys had that type of craziness happening. I get the picture now.
bet those fools don’t score $70 tips
Advertise your higher prices…make the lowball er’s look redicilously low…like something is wrong with this picture low…put doubt into the consumer… You could get creative making a postcard with the image of the carnie window cleaner…" you want toothless Bob in your home?" put him next to the cute little girl with mom in the background asgast as Toothless Bob gives Jr a lollipop. They will get the point…stop selling window cleaning and sell trust.
Low-ball Hall of Fame, this entire building $700. I didn’t believe it myself, but from 3 different sources that say its absolutely true
sto -pid
keep in mind, many don’t look like carnies - nice trucks, wraps, website, in business 20 years, live in community etc etc.
I think the issue can be “first”
who is first to be ubiquitous
funny thing, it’s the lowest pricers that seem many times, out here anyway, to be the ubiquitous ones, and with the largest service areas
that says a lot right there to me
I have a friend who cleans windows over the hill from where I am. He mentioned a business for sale in my area and asked if I was interested. I asked him to get the particulars and he did. The business did with three guys what I do/did by myself last year. His prices were so low that he could not afford to stay in business and could not sell to us because we don’t work for the peanuts he charged for his services.
Seldom do the low ballers last. They either burn out or fade away.
Yep, now tell me ANY business that does not have these issues… yet here we all are.
Is ACWC being dismantelled by craigslist ‘bucket bobs’, or do they keep raising prices?
Did Yugo put Ford, GM and Chrysler out of business?.. did it really even
impact their business?
Budget issues are budget issues. There is a large segment of people out there
who simply can’t afford to pay $50 more. That is reality.
Our job is to price fairly (fair to us and them) AND build as much value as we can
into the service. We focus on those who shop at Target and less to those going
to Walmart.
I don’t worry about respect and most people do not think of us as a ‘$10 per hour
maid’. That is the insecurity of a struggling WC business owner who thinks that
(I do not mean you, I mean the ones you mentioned).
Find me ANY successful window cleaner who thinks that way. Just one
