Marketing Lesson Learned At Sea
By Hitman | August 8, 2009
I sat in the middle of the bay in pitch darkness. The waves calm as usual at night.
In the distance, lightning cracked the horizon. Our boat drifted further into the middle of Pensacola’s grand bay.
“Let’s try it one more time,” I said, knowing this time wouldn’t deliver a different outcome than last. What else is keeping this boat from starting?
Good grief. My boat is only exactly one year old and there shouldn’t be any problems with it already.
One year? Oh no! My anniversary date was last week. That means my boat no longer carries Sea Tow warranty. I meant to call them.
Why didn’t I remember?
The fact of the matter is, I would have called Sea Tow had I remembered. But they didn’t send me a reminder to prompt me to renew. Just a simple postcard would have done it. Or even an email.
But there I sat, in the middle of the bay in a boat that won’t crank.
Sea tow can be quite costly-easily hundreds of dollars. And the towing process is slow. To get towed, we’d be looking at getting the boat back to the dock in three hours if we were lucky (it was already 9pm). So the thought of having my boat towed was gut wrenching.
In the end, the service rep for the BoatUS towing service walked me through re-setting my power supply. It was as easy as hitting a button-I just had to know which button to hit.
My hero for today is the BoatUS technician who saved me. You better believe I’ll be getting a membership right away.
What does this mean for your cleaning business?
Send your clients reminder cards or even emails. Let them know a year has gone by since their last cleaning. Believe it or not, some clients REALLY care about constantly maintaining their flooring.
Create a continuity plan that requires them to clean regularly. Reward them for cleanings within a 6 or 12 month time period. Set up a frequent flyer type membership program (more on this later). You’d be surprised at how many would jump on the offer.
Educate and remind your clients. They’ll love you for it.
Topics: Carpet Cleaning Marketing | 6 Comments »
6 Responses to “Marketing Lesson Learned At Sea”
Questions and Comments
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August 8th, 2009 at 10:50 pm
This is a great analogy as to why clients should receive reminders. I forgot to send reminders, other than a newsletter, with my Portland carpet cleaning business.
The question I have is should the reminder cards be sent several times or just once?
August 9th, 2009 at 12:08 am
Good question. And it depends on whether or not you REALLY want their business.
How many reminder cards do you throw away? Hmm….
Seriously though, I’d send at least three reminders to my clients for yearly and/or six month cleaning.
August 10th, 2009 at 3:22 pm
I can testify also to the effectiveness of reminder cards. We have stepped up our reminder card send outs for our Macon carpet cleaning clients. That is what helped out the most during this summer’s slow season. 10 to 15% of the jobs we did in June and July had recently received a reminder card from us. Now, I have my assistant send 5 carpet cleaning reminder cards a day. It’s definitely worth doing.
Cory
August 13th, 2009 at 7:20 pm
We perform carpet cleaning in Northern NJ, and we believe strongly in showing our appreciation and professionalism to your new and existing clients.
This post is a great reminder to everyone in the business. Thank you for the insight.
August 14th, 2009 at 1:26 am
Wow, sorry to hear about your boating troubles. That would be nerve racking left out alone in the middle of the bay like that. But I am not a boater. You’ve probably been through all situations before.
August 22nd, 2009 at 10:31 pm
Reminder cards is good. But take the time to phone clients from the past. It work for us.