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3 ways to create an optimal SHOPPING experience for your prospects (and a lesson on what not to do from Autotrader.com)

July 17, 2011 – 10:43 am

Before anyone ever decides to hire you, they shop first.

Most of the time, this means poking around your website.

Are you providing an optimal shopping experience for them? Here are three improvements you can make right away:

#1: Make your site very easy to navigate.

You might think that your website is awesome right now, and really easy to find stuff, but is that actually true? Ask your clients (the people who have hired you) if they found your website helpful. If that feels too weird, ask your Mom.

Sit beside your Mom and watch her as she checks out your website. If you see her struggling to find anything, ask her for some input on how to make it easier. Ask her to try and request an estimate, and see if she can find it within a moment or two. Ask her to look for information on gutter cleaning, and see if it’s really as easy and obvious as you thought it was.

#2: Don’t dance around price.

How does it feel when you’re shopping for something, and the price isn’t listed? Do you like it? Do you love being forced to pick up the phone, or fill out a form, or send an email, or do anything to find out how much something costs?

Then why in the world do you think it’s a smart move NOT to put pricing on your window cleaning or pressure washing company’s website?

If you aren’t providing easy access to pricing it’s very annoying to the people who are shopping for your stuff. Autotrader.com is a great example of this.

Let’s say you were in the market for a new pickup truck for your Chicago area window cleaning and pressure washing company. After asking around a bit, you decide that a 2009 Ford F-150* sounds like it might be a good fit. Not brand-new, not too expensive, and overall a solid truck.

(*I know that I’m going to receive a backlash from the Dodge, Toyota, and GM lovers because of this. Please, for now, just hear me out, I have a point that I’m trying to make to you.)

So you check out Autotrader.com and search for your vehicle. You find lots of trucks for sale, including the listings that include the price, as shown below:

And you find a lot of listings that do not include the price, like these, below:

Which vehicles are you going to follow up on?

All things being equal, do you really want to pick up the phone and call all those listings that intentionally hide price?

No, you don’t.

Why do you think that is?

Easy: because you don’t like playing games. And you don’t want to deal with some high pressure salesperson who is gonna suck you into a long-drawn out conversation.

You’ve learned that when people hide prices, it’s usually because their price is too high, not too low. So if this truck seller is chicken to show his price, then the price is probably way too high (also known as a rip-off), or even worse, there is something shady about this vehicle.

That’s the impression.

On the other hand, when a seller is open and straightforward with their price, it inspires trust. It doesn’t make you suspect that they are playing games (even if they are), and it gives you confidence in what they are selling (even though it may be junk).

The lesson: Be open about your pricing. And make it as easy as possible for them to find it. If it takes a shopper more than 10 seconds to get a price for your window cleaning or pressure washing services, then you need to change your online pricing system.

People are busy, and they have fifteen things on their to-do list today. Choosing a window cleaning company is only one of them. Respect their time. Make it fast and easy for them to find/get a price.

#3: Make it easy for them to contact you.

Some people like to text you.
Some people like to call you.
Some people like to fill out a quick, little form.
Some people like to email you.

Give potential buyers as many options as possible, so that they can contact you using the method that they prefer. And then stick with that method, unless they authorize you to do otherwise.

___________

You provide a great service, and everyone who hires your company ends up loving you.

I get it.

I like that you’re proud to deliver a premium service experience.

But what about your company’s shopping experience?

How many qualified buyers are you irritating because it’s hard to shop for your professional services?

Pay attention to these three things, and even more prospects will give you their business.

#1: Make your website very easy to navigate.
#2: Don’t dance around price.
#3. Make it easy for them to contact you.

What else do you think belongs on this window-shopping list?

Send your thoughts to kevindubrosky@gmail.com

 

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Would you like $10,000 in new window cleaning work?

July 12, 2011 – 10:33 pm

Is 2011 shaping up to be a fantastic year for your business?

Now that we’re into July, it’s a great time to stop and get a sense for how your business is doing so far.

Did you have an amazing Spring? Do you think you capitalized on all the business opportunities that you had? Did you earn as much as you thought you would?

I sincerely hope that you did. And if you did, then kudos. Good for you.

On the other hand, if you didn’t do as well as you would have liked, and now you’re kicking yourself because you could have done better (or even WAY better), then I’d like to help.

I’m going to help you land $2,000 $10,000 of brand-new, well-priced (very, very important) work just for you and your unique window cleaning or pressure washing business. Quickly.

There are two catches, though, and here they are:

Catch #1: I can only help thirty-five window cleaning or pressure washing professionals, and it will be on a first-come, first-serve basis. In fact, some of the thirty-five spots are already filled, even as I announce this zero-risk opportunity.

Catch #2: I will require you to attend and invest in two days of intense, highly-specialized education from me, Kevin Dubrosky, in New York City, in mid-October 2011.

Sound like something you may be interested in?

Great!

Now the question is “Do you qualify to be one of the thirty-five?”

To figure that out, here are 4 important questions that I wanted to run past you:

Question #1: You know that your window cleaning company has to fixate and obsess in order to be different, and then be saturated with this obsession. Are you doing that?

How do you figure out what you should obsess and fixate over? And how in the world do you saturate your brand? What does that involve? And most importantly, how can someone like you actually pull that off as affordably and effectively as possible?

Question #2: You know that you need to create a remarkable experience for your customers. How exactly are you supposed to do that?

You also know that “being remarkable” requires over-delivering in a way that is personal, relevant, and unexpected. What are some examples of how you could do that? And how do you figure out the areas where you should be over-delivering? Should you just copy what everyone else is doing? If not, then where do you need to look?

Question #3: You know that you need to have a referral marketing strategy. But which one actually works the best?

Unless you have a rich uncle, you’re the one that has to make a success of your business. A big part of that happening is having a robust, effective referral marketing plan in place. But what is the best referral marketing plan?

Should you be looking for new ways to bribe your valuable customers into coughing up more leads for your company? Even though 99% of other window cleaning and pressure washing companies are using this approach, is there a better way? If so, what is it? What actually works?

Question #4: You know that it’s craziness to waste time re-inventing the proverbial wheel. Is your window cleaning company trapped in this ironic cycle right now? Have you stopped to think about whether or not your marketing efforts could be significantly improved?

When’s the last time you read a marketing book? Or educated yourself on the psychology of selling? Studied some of the fascinating counterintuitive research on human purchase behavior? When’s the last time you got serious about figuring out pricing once and for all? When’s the last time you studied how other successful companies were doing these things, and learning from their systems and methods?

______________________

My brain hurts writing all this important stuff down.

But I needed to run it all past you. Because I need to ask you something:

Do you care about these parts of your business?

If so, then congratulations! That means you’re a prime candidate for this innovative, never-before-offered $10,000 new-work program. The truth is, not all business owners in the window cleaning and pressure washing industry are savvy enough to understand the importance of their marketing efforts.

But you’re different. Good for you. When you think of yourself as a marketer first, and a technician second, you make business success inevitable.

So, how will this work?

On Thursday, October 13th and Friday, October 14th, the “Squeegeenomics Experience” is finally coming to Manhattan. It will be held at a gorgeous venue (secret for now, full details coming July 18th) just a few steps from Central Park, and only a hop, skip, and a jump from some of the world’s most famous luxury retailers.

For two days, 35 of the most serious window cleaning and pressure washing business owners on the East Coast are going to meet behind closed doors to systematically discover and apply the lucrative answers to these vital questions listed above, as well as many more. More specifically, you’re going to learn what can be done to successfully charge the highest prices possible right now, while still delighting your customers. Part of this training module will include a field trip to Louis Vuitton’s flagship store (just a few minutes away from the event), as well as Tiffany’s famous 3-story Manhattan showroom (just a few steps away, too).

Naturally, an event like this has never before been available to professional window cleaning and pressure washing contractors on the East Coast.

And while I would have loved to have opened this event up to 200 professionals (instead of only 35), the rental cost of the space alone would be astronomical for an event that size. Especially right in the heart of Manhattan, only steps from some of the most famous, expensive consumer destinations in the world.

So in the interests of keeping the barriers to entry as low as possible, “The Manhattan Squeegeenomics Experience” is available to only 35 window cleaning and pressure washing professionals. First come, first serve.

If this sounds like something that may interest you, then I’d definitely recommend grabbing your ticket today. Once these 35 spots are filled up, the New York City fire code prevents us from accepting any more attendees, so do NOT miss out. This is the event you’ve been waiting for.

Don’t forget your zero-risk “$10,000 Guarantee”

The education that you’re going to receive during these two days of lively, practical, cutting-edge instruction at the “Manhattan Squeegeenomics Experience” is truly invaluable to you and your business.

I mean that. And to put my money where my mouth is, I have an airtight promise for you:

If what you learn during this revolutionary 2-day “Manhattan Squeegeenomics Experience” is not directly responsible for earning you at least $10,000 in extra revenue in the weeks and months following this event, I will refund every last penny of your registration fee, no questions asked.

In fact, if, at the end of the 2-days of exercises, training, and rewiring, you don’t feel completely empowered, energized, and equipped to achieve any level of business success you’re looking for with your window cleaning or pressure washing company, then simply return your course materials, complete the form provided, and hand it to me at the end of the second day, and I’ll refund your money on the spot.

No questions asked. No funny business. I guarantee it.

If you can find a way to be in Manhattan on October 13th and 14th, 2011, between 8am-5pm, then grab one of the very limited number of tickets available right now. Do not miss out! Grab your ticket when they go on sale Monday, July 18th.

Here’s the official ticket link: http://squeegeenomicsmanhattan.eventbrite.com/

Do you have a question? Concern?

Please feel free to email me at kevindubrosky@gmail.com

Kevin

P.S. Tickets go on sale Monday, July 18th, at 9am, so mark your calendar.

In the meantime, start to check out flights and hotels. There are lots of great deals available.

Hey, when do you get to write off a weekend trip to New York, right? The event is on the Thursday and Friday, so you can chill out in NYC for Saturday and Sunday before heading home.

It’s gonna be great. If you’re still reading this right now, then you need to come. Don’t miss it. It might never happen again. This train is leaving the station, and you need to get on.

On Monday, July 18th, at 9am, you can grab your ticket.

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Is this the world’s most expensive window cleaning company?

July 5, 2011 – 12:02 pm

It’s been quietly developed for the last 10 months as “Project Profit”. The “Ultimate Window Cleaning Company”, and “The First Of It’s Kind”.

Attendees of The Squeegeenomics Experience in Beverly Hills this past January got a (top secret) sneak peek.

And now, today, I’m very proud to announce that a new kind of company has officially opened it’s doors for business.

Unlike any other window cleaning company in the world, Swiss & Sennhauser is the very first professional window cleaning company to obsess and fixate on the thing that irritates residential consumers more than anything else: responsiveness.

Therefore, Swiss & Sennhauser has one simple promise:
Clean Windows Within 48 Hours, Guaranteed. Or Money Back.

When homeowners are looking for professional window cleaning services, they don’t want to hear that you can fit them in 3 weeks from today. They don’t even want to hear that you can do it next Tuesday. They want it done NOW.

Has that been your experience, too?

Let me ask you something, then:

Why has no professional window cleaning company ever decided to step up to the plate and fill that substantial, widespread need?

I have some theories.

The “Oblivious” Theory: Very few window cleaning companies think they have to differentiate themselves. They feel that being a good person and doing a good job is enough.

The “Scared Stiff” Theory: Very few window cleaning companies have the operational fortitude to come through for clients to make it happen. Or they’re already so busy they would be stressed out beyond belief.

The “We Know Best” Theory: Very few window cleaning companies think very much about what the customer might actually want. They instead simply default to “great workmanship” and “professional”, in the belief that a homeowner is looking for nothing more.

Which theory do you think is right?

I’m not sure myself, and honestly it doesn’t matter.

Not anymore.

As of July 2011, Swiss & Sennhauser is open for business in San Diego, Beverly Hills, and Toronto.

Want to be part of this revolutionary new brand?

Drop me a line to kevindubrosky@gmail.com

Kevin

P.S. In case you were curious, our minimum starting prices are around $600 for small homes, and go up from there. 48-hour service begins at $975 for small homes.

As you can imagine, that works out pretty well as an hourly rate.

It also makes us the world’s most expensive window cleaning company.

We’re proud of that.

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Are you a marketer or a technician? (and why you should not follow the pink bunny)

July 4, 2011 – 11:27 am

You’re standing in line at the grocery store, and you remember that you need a 4-pack of AA batteries.

Which battery brand do you choose?

Myself, I’m a sucker for the pink bunny Energizer brand, or it’s close rival, the ubiquitous Duracell.

Ask me why and I’ll tell you that they last longer. But do they?

Look closely at the packaging of any batteries the next time you’re at the store, and look for claims that they actually last longer than any other brand. Log onto the Energizer website and you’ll find very scientific-sounding claims. But the claims have an important “twist”.

Here it is:

Energizer does not shy away from making a big, bold claim.

“Energizer Advanced Alkaline lasts longer in over 65% of everyday devices*”.

Sounds impressive, right?

Until you check out the asterisk.

The asterisk explains that the 65% performance increase is compared to the Energizer MAX brand only. In other words, it’s not an absolute value, it’s simply an increase compared to something else the Energizer guys also sell.

In case you missed it, what this means is that Energizer doesn’t claim to outlast any other brand. Not even the cheap ones.

Good thing, too.

Consumer Reports decided to run a little experiment back in 2008, to figure out if the premier battery brands actually outperform their cheaper, less-known rivals in the real world. William Poundstone discusses this fascinating test on page 179 of his remarkable book Priceless – The Myth of Fair Value.

Consumer Reports measured 13 brands of single-use batteries in a head-to-head battery life competition.

The 13 brands were all used in the same digital camera, and the researchers simply started talking lots of photos, and zooming in and out a lot, since that wears out batteries more quickly. When the batteries died, they simply counted how many photos were captured, and then compared their findings.

The results were surprising, to say the least.

Price and performance had near-zero correlation.

The expensive, fancy, well-known brands did not significantly outperform the less expensive, less familiar ones. In fact, the cheapest brand (Kirkland Signature, the Costco in-house brand) was the clear, overall winner, outperforming batteries that are sold for six times to twelve times as much.

Six to twelve times as much.

Take a look at the results chart below. For fairness, exclude the results of the Lithium battery mentioned at the top, since Lithium’s are considerably more expensive, and in a different category than their Alkaline and Nickel Oxyhydroxide counterparts.

The lesson is clear: Price has no correlation with performance.

Batteries are simply another proof of that.

Do you believe that the same is true of pressure washing and window cleaning services?

Of course it is.

The next time you reach for a pack of batteries, remember that.

High prices communicate value. They make us believe that the stuff is better.

And that pink bunny messes with our heads. Carefully chosen names like “MAX” and “E2 Titanium” and “Supercell” play tricks on us, and cause us to assign a lot of value. Telling us that their Energizer Advanced Alkaline brand “lasts longer in over 65% of every-day devices” makes us trust them. Even though they fail to mention just how much longer they actually last. This is a trick called specificity. Extreme specificity never has to claim to be better. Our mind connects that dot all on it’s own.

In fact, even after reading this Consumer Reports “expose”, I still like the idea of paying $2.50 for two seemingly better batteries instead of $0.49 for two from a no-name cheapy brand. I am still a happy client of the pink bunny and his overpriced friends.

Even though they’re not as good.

Marketers – 1
Technicians – 0

Which one are you? A Marketer or a technician?

Learn from the pink bunny.

Or don’t.

It’s up to you.

Kevin

P.S. If you’re looking to bunny-fy your business, then you’re going to love reading “$600/hr – The Ultimate Window Cleaning Marketing Guide”.

Would you like to read $600/hr risk-free? Drop me a line to kevindubrosky@gmail.com

 

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Why does this work so well? (and a question about Picasso’s goat muffins)

June 28, 2011 – 1:54 pm

That’s the wrong question.

All that matters is that it does work.

The right question is: What might make it work better?

Make a crazy-looking flier.

Put a wacky headline on it, or make it look like an 8-yr-old drew it. Pass out a few hundred and see what happens.

If it makes you some decent money, then pass out 3,000. If those 3,000 also work like a charm, then pass out 30,000. If those 30,000 result in loads of new business, mail out 100,000.

Repeat.

Caution: don’t get too bogged down on trying to reverse-engineer why it worked.

Sometimes we can’t know.

Malcolm Gladwell, the legendary researcher, explains: “The allegiance that people have to certain brands is not always knowable or quantifiable, and it might be sometimes a mistake to try and ascertain what X is. We don’t really know why we have it, and we can’t figure it out. We simply have it.”

Bill Glazer, the acclaimed marketing expert, agrees: “Why do they work? Who cares! You don’t need to know why. You only need to know that it works.”

“Anchoring effects” fall under this category.

Anchoring occurs when you are exposed to an unrelated number right before making a decision regarding another number. Several studies have proven the power of random, unrelated numbers in affecting ‘guesstimates’.

Take for instance, goat muffins.

Did you know that Googling the phrase “goat muffins” produces over 7,240,000 search results? I sure didn’t. Here’s the screenshot below.

Quick question: How much did Pablo Picasso’s painting entitled “Jeune Fille Endormie” sell for this past week, at Christie’s Auction House, in London?

Pick a price and say it out loud.

What was your guess?

Seriously, say it out loud. Commit to a guess, and don’t scroll down to read the next sentence until you have said it out loud.

 

 

 

 

Twenty-one point six million. That’s what it sold for.

Here’s the bigger question: What do you think the odds are that the unrelated number of 7,240,000 that I just shared with you influenced your guess about the Picasso’s sale price?

What if I had instead told you that searching the term “goat weathervane” only produced 180,000 results? Would that have driven your guess lower, unbeknownst to your conscious mind?

(I know you just searched it to see if it did in fact, have 180,000 search results.)

Good question.

How could you know?

I wanted to find out for myself, so I tried a little experiment.

Back in March of 2011, around 50 window cleaning and pressure washing contractors gathered in New Orleans for Thad’s annual NOLA event. For the sake of simplicity, and to capture the scientific flavor of what happened next, I’ll refer to the 50 attendees as “subjects” for the duration of this explanation.

The subjects were invited to write down on a piece of paper the last four digits of their phone number. Naturally, some numbers were lower (1134, 2098, etc), and others were higher (7856, 9943, etc).

If you wish to play along, write down the last four numbers of your phone number on a piece of paper right now, before reading the next sentence.

The subjects were then invited to write down the answer to a simple number-based question:

“What is the correct number of Dentists in Manhattan?”

The beauty of this experiment is that it was private, since no one knew what numbers you were writing as your guesses. The subjects were sort of in a little personal vacuum, devoid of peer pressure to conform. Aside from the odd wandering set of eyes.

Can you guess what we discovered in the results?

When we openly surveyed the owners of “low” phone number suffixes, whose last four numbers started in 0,1 or 2, their answers were considerably and consistently lower than those whose phone numbers started with 7,8 or 9. In many cases, almost half.

Considerably and consistently lower.

Even though everyone knew quite well that there is no rational connection between their phone number and the actual number of Dentists in Manhattan.

Crazy.

That’s the “anchoring effect” at work.

(The correct answer is around 4100 Dentists.)

I explained the functionality of this bizarre psychological heuristic (mental shortcut), and reassured the attendees that they were not foolish or naive for responding as they did. They were simply human.

We were just getting warmed up, though. The next stage of the experiment was even more telling. The ‘guesstimating’ experiment was repeated one more time, with a slight variation.

The subjects were asked to take those same last four digits of their phone number, and place a decimal point between the second and third number, and a dollar sign to the left of the first number. This effectively changed the appearance of the number in front of them to a price. (i.e. 1134 became $11.34)

The subjects were then asked to write down the answer to a second number-based question:

“How much does a high-quality liquid eyeliner sell for at a fancy department store?”

What do you think happened with the answers?

You guessed it: the same thing. All over again.

Subjects with “high” phone numbers (that now looked like prices) guessed considerably and consistently higher prices than the subjects with “low” phone numbers.

And the craziest part is that all of the subjects knew about anchoring effects at that point. I had just explained it to them, they had seen it work in the first experiment with their own eyes (and pens), and they were still absolutely susceptible to it.

Why in the world does this work?

William Poundstone explains on page 90 of Priceless – The Myth of Fair Value: “Of all of psychology’s challenges to rationality, anchoring is the ‘easiest to demonstrate’…but ‘the hardest to explain’.”

No one knows why anchoring works.

It just does.

And that’s all that matters, isn’t it?

When people in your neighborhood buy cars, or leather jackets, or diamonds, or window cleaning, or pressure washing, they are susceptible to the anchoring effect. We all are.

“Why pay $3,400 to have your roof cleaned, when (your company) has complete roof cleaning packages from only $599?”

“2011 is halfway over! Clean all your windows for only $199″

“Did you know that last year, (your company) cleaned over 255,000 windows here in (your area)? Your home can feel like brand-new, too, for less than $400!”

Why does it work?

No one knows.

It just does.

Blame goat muffins.

Kevin

P.S. If you love this kind of stuff, then you’re going to love reading $600/hr.

Do you have a bizarre anchoring story to share? Drop me an email to kevindubrosky@gmail.com

Posted in GOOD Window Cleaning Business Advice | No Comments »