As someone who offers a cleaning service, is it considered “pushy” to contact past customers via text inquiring if they’d like to schedule another “fall cleaning” type work? small business |
- As someone who offers a cleaning service, is it considered “pushy” to contact past customers via text inquiring if they’d like to schedule another “fall cleaning” type work?
- How to respond to this review?
- Six and a half years in, growth has been slower than I'd like, but has been steady...until recently. There's no money left. Being the owner, I recognize that in the end, it's all on me. (another take on: Your Employees Don't Care About Your Problems)
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| Posted: 28 Sep 2019 09:01 AM PDT I clean windows and pressure wash (soft wash/low pressure cleaning) homes, driveways, etc. i am 2nd year in business and id really like to focus on repeat customers. I do residential work, so selling my services to home owners. Im still trying to get past this mental hurdle (to be 100% honest) that people want to have their windows and driveways and house cleaned (especially windows) and that it's a serious service. The area i live in is extremely saturated and its almost like a beer money side gig to a lot of people unfortunately... Don't get me wrong. The potential to make good money especially if i establish myself and get into higher income clientele is there, i make on average $50/hr cleaning windows residential and average 1 job is around $250-300. Pressure washing $100/hr. And honestly the end results are really great. Very cool transformations. For anyone whos never had there windows cleaned here give it a try (from a reputable company of course) Ideally i would like for people to have their windows cleaned quarterly. This is usually when windows should be cleaned again to look pretty damn good year round in this climate. Problem is idk if my clientele right now is in that level of income to afford window cleaning every 3 months. This could easily equal out to $1000-1200 a year. Not a lot of money but probably for some window cleaning they dont see the worth. So then more realistically every 6 months. I had an idea on how to offer an incentive to get them cleaned more often. First cleaning 15% off if they schedule for quarterly cleanings (each subsequent cleaning would be quicker and easier to do. Not as much build up, dirt, etc on glass.) if not then regular first time cleaning price. I just dunno how to hold people accountable if they decide to opt out of the yearly quarterly cleanings now im out that 15% off that i gave them. "Hello Suzy. How's it going? Just wanted to check up with you and see if you needed any window cleaning. Let me know if you're interested in scheduling some time this fall for a cleaning. Thanks, have a good afternoon." Another thing is... i probably looked and presented myself pretty amateurish as i was very new at the time. Should i make mention that now my company is ranked #1 on google in our city with close to 60 5 star google reviews (approx 60k population) or just let the work that i did do the talking (i still did a good job for all work ive done i just looked new) [link] [comments]  |
| How to respond to this review? Posted: 28 Sep 2019 06:35 PM PDT I just got a google review, which was 4 stars. It says "Prices seem high, staff was nice and helpful." Our prices are right in line with (or less than) other area brick and mortar competitors, but less than online sellers who don't have the same overhead to pay. How would you respond? Would you even respond to the price remark? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 28 Sep 2019 10:07 AM PDT I own and manage a company of approximately five people, plus me (it varies from year to year). I started it with just myself but have hired additional help over the years as business levels dictate. There has been a little bit of turnover but I've been mostly fortunate in that aspect...and therein lies the problem. As the owner, boss, and overall HNIC, I'm far too forgiving. Before I get into it, it's important to say that I've not missed a payroll by even a single day since I hired a payroll company in January 2016. That milestone was me getting my act together, and my promise to the staff that I would never fail them. (before that we were kind of ragtag without much structure in any part of the business, anywhere) That being said, the two main technicians are, simply put, unreliable employees. One has been with the company on and off for 5 years, the other has been with the company for just over 3 years. By the end of this story you may jump to the conclusion, "Well get rid of them and hire new help already!" Heads up, we're a skilled trades industry -- a new tech, properly trained and certified, costs around $20,000 before he or she stops being a liability and becomes a profit-generating asset. Turnover is killer. Now, given, we've obviously been completing projects otherwise the company wouldn't still be in business, however the techs frequently slip up, make mistakes, or double and triple labor costs that eat into the profit. My business-owner-friends have told me that I put up with a lot more bullshit than they ever would...and you know what? Their businesses are thriving. The techs show up late to appointments with customers (think cable guys and time windows), without exaggeration, probably 40% of the time. Sometimes they don't show up at all. It either results in our projects starting late (and lasting later), or we lose business over it altogether. Other times they take 2x-3x as long to complete a task than I projected it for. Sometimes they break or lose company-owned equipment. The mindlessness of one of them is insanely frustrating: several trips to Home Depot to grab supplies when it could have been done in a single trip if he had just planned ahead. It boils my blood when these things happen but I've never actually taken any disciplinary action against them because
This year has been particularly difficult because one of the techs tumbled down some stairs while at work and had a two-month medical leave. Yay for higher Worker's Comp premiums. (Truth be told, I have a feeling he was planning it because he was "complaining" about his wrists and shoulder hurting in the few months prior -- "I think I have arthritis, I can't carry ladders anymore." By the way, he's 22) During his lengthy absence I burned through all cash reserves by bringing in untrained, temporary help which resulted in the project running on and on and on... Then, upon his return, our last few jobs have also taken longer to complete than they should have ("getting back into the swing of things" according to him), and cost more than they should have. Keeping tabs on these guys and keeping them focused is like trying to keep two dogs in a bathtub. Fun fact: Both of them were a half hour late to our job just yesterday, leaving the customer waiting around. I wasn't aware of it until the customer called me and asked where we are. Any idea how embarrassing that is?? At this point, there is no money left. Zip. Zero. Zilch. Just this week I have started selling off my personal things on Facebook and Craigslist to put some money back in the account so I can make payroll while I wait for payments from the customers to arrive (jobs took longer to complete, so final payments take longer to receive). Here's a stark contrast between them and me: I have never given them an excuse for why their paycheck is late (because it has never been), but they constantly give me excuses for why they can't finish a job on time or why they have to leave early to, for example, take their pregnant fiancée to the doctor, or pet to the vet, or meet repair contractors at their own homes, etc... All of this screwing around has drained the company. I'm now two payments behind on my personal vehicle loan and have run up my wife's and my credit cards just to make sure I make payroll on time, every time. No excuses. They eat before I do, even if they probably, technically, don't deserve it. Here's the harsh truth I have to face: I need to man up and terminate them. I need more reliable help. The company needs dependable staff. I've never been closer to pulling that trigger than I am now, but also now, one of the techs is having a baby in less than two months. I've always felt like it is my responsibility to take care of my staff so they can take care of their families. Somehow I can't face the fact that I need to get rid of him while he has a baby on the way. Even though it shouldn't, it feels like a dick move. It's a true cop out to blame the employees because I, the owner, should have taken control and made those tough decisions long before I ended up this deep in the hole. Ugh. [link] [comments]  |
| Single employee/owner - Health Insurance Posted: 28 Sep 2019 05:56 PM PDT Anyone out here a single owner/single employee for their business? If so, what do you do for personal health insurance? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 28 Sep 2019 10:13 PM PDT I know this is a long shot but I'm seeing if there are other veterans on this sub who have opened a business. I am in the market to start a restaurant and would like some insight into the different programs that are available to us veterans as far as financing. TIA! [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 28 Sep 2019 09:01 AM PDT Does anyone have any experience setting up a website for sales. My wife started making her own jewlery and hygiene products and I would like to set a website up. We also need help figuring out how to lower shipping cost. Any advice is greatly appreciated. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 28 Sep 2019 08:16 PM PDT I was approached with a potential opportunity to sell out my business. The problem is... I'm having trouble placing a valuation on the business. The person buying it would get my client panel (I'm a service based business) plus equipment. Said person would also take over my lease... Where do i even start! Any advice would be helpful. I've never thought about selling, but i want to entertain the idea. Also, technically my business is not profitable because I've operated at a loss for tax purposes but I also have zero debt on the books. [link] [comments]  |
| My E-commerce Startup Shipping Method. Please help! Posted: 28 Sep 2019 01:35 PM PDT I've scoured Reddit and elsewhere to try and find a solid answer for this and most of what I found was over two years old, not enough to go off of, or contradictory input. My e-commerce startup will be selling standard clothing items in small quantities within the U.S. We are not yet certain if we'll be shipping via small boxes or poly mailers (for brand image reasons). We'll be shipping small quantities of orders per month at first but obviously hoping for more as the business grows. I need to know what are the cheapest and best options. My needs are that I need: standard 5-7 day shipping (no extended 10-12 day delivery times), expedited shipping options, tracking, and damage/return procedures/policies that aren't a total nightmare (I read that some of these companies were a lost cause in that regard). I am an LLC under Woocommerce and will have a Dymo 4XL thermal printer and my own shipping supplies bought in bulk. I'm open to doing more work myself to save some money (the convenience factors of the discount shippers is not a big draw for me). I've read that these are my options:
Has anyone had experience shipping their own products via the shipping services vs using one of these (or another) shipping discount service? Has anyone tried multiple shipping discount services and have an opinion on which is better? I read a lot of flak on Reddit about stamps.com suggesting that they try to scam you or make it a nightmare to leave them. Is this true? [link] [comments]  |
| How to turn an idea into a product? Posted: 28 Sep 2019 07:32 PM PDT If I had an idea for a company that sold an item (let's just say phones), who would I go to to get it designed, and then made into a working prototype. [link] [comments]  |
| Fabrication shop barcode tracking system Posted: 28 Sep 2019 07:10 PM PDT Looking for a way to track elements and assemblies that are being fabricated in my shop. The goal is to make sure that the elements are not getting lost and that all the elements of an assembly are being shipped out. Looking for a barcode labels/scanner solution. Any recommendations? [link] [comments]  |
| S-Corp bank account cross border payments Posted: 28 Sep 2019 11:18 AM PDT Ill be moving to the US and forming an S-Corp. Id like to open a business bank account for my S-Corp. Id like this bank account to be in CAD dollars and accept EFT payments from Amazon.ca US banks use: "ACH", Canadian banks use: "EFT" (not interchangeable). Does anyone know if this is possible? Note: I cant open a Canadian bank for my S-Corp. I would have to register for a Extra Provincial License and then have a Canadian (e.g. Ontario) registered head-office address. This would exposes me to Canadian income tax. (confirmed by CPA). My reasoning for moving to the US is to save on Income tax. Im a Dual US/CA citizen. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 28 Sep 2019 06:10 PM PDT Not sure if this is the correct term but what I'm wanting to do is learn the best way to conduct market research for events for a river boat cruise business. A customer survey along with last seasons reports show that people prefer cruises on the weekends but what else can be done before next season to figure out if we should add weekday cruises. Previous employee who was demoted, I now have her job, will not let up about week day cruises as another boat does them that is 2 hrs from here (although I've heard their boat is a tax write off for the company) if the boat isn't at 50% capacity I really don't like to see the boat going out because of the wear and tear. Previous managers only goal was to send the boat out as many times as possible whereas my goal is to be profitable to keep this amazing attraction in our area. [link] [comments]  |
| UK security guard company advice? Posted: 28 Sep 2019 05:54 PM PDT Hello to all Can anyone advise me on some basic bare minimum requirements to start a manned guarding security company in the UK? Insurances, Licenses and accreditation etc Perhaps any MVP ideas such as a website or where to seek contracts Kind Regards [link] [comments]  |
| Start up funding in Worcestershire, UK Posted: 28 Sep 2019 05:45 PM PDT Hi guys, I am working as a Project Support Officer at WINN Hub - https://winn-hub.com/ - the go to place for innovators across Worcestershire taking their idea and making it a success. Funded by Worcestershire County Council and the European Regional Development fund - we provide grant funding, technological development and networking opportunities across the county in order to develop the economy and promote Worcester as a whole. Our Proof of Concept programme where support is offered to applicants in order to advance, protect and commercialise early stage innovative business ideas; creating products and services that are both exciting and new to the market. The programme offers grants of up to £30,000, representing 40% of the total project cost. Please feel free to check out some of our case studies at the bottom of this page http://www.business-central.co.uk/proof-of-concept/. If interested, please register your details with Business Central on the same page and they will be in touch to discuss your eligibility. Best regards, Jonathan [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 28 Sep 2019 04:58 PM PDT I'm from around the Cleveland area and there's many extremely wealthy upper middle class suburbs around me. I see a lot of potential in advertising to these people and getting them to buy products because of their spending ability. I've been pondering many different business ideas recently and I'd like to create a local brand that has a spin off Cleveland name. I'm not sure what I would like to sell yet though. I was thinking of selling travel mugs and other accessories with my logo and message printed on them. I could possibly sell clothing but I also feel like the clothing market is extremely over saturated. Any tips and ideas on marketing and ideas on what to sell. How would I advertise to my local area? [link] [comments]  |
| Founder Stories - ZenMaid's story on how they created a $40k/mo SaaS for Maid services Posted: 28 Sep 2019 04:31 PM PDT Hi Everyone! Julian here from Founder Stories (founderstories.io) - here's one of our latest interviews with ZenMaid's founder - Amar Ghose on how he and 2 Co-founders started a 40k+ / mo SaaS business. Interview: Hello! Who are you and what business did you start? Hi, my name is Amar Ghose. I'm the CEO/co-founder of ZenMaid. Our software makes it easy for growing maid services to manage their cleaners, clients, and schedules in one easy to use software. While we might have started off slow (both my co-founder and I worked full time for over 2 years after starting ZenMaid) we now make more than half a million dollars a year helping maid service owners to achieve the freedom in their lives and businesses that we have (I'm currently writing this from Canggu in Indonesia!) how-we-validated-and-grew-a-saas-for-maid-services-to-500k-year What's your backstory and how did you come up with the idea? I've always been quite entrepreneurial. I started as a kid selling candy to my middle school friends actually. Despite that I hadn't been able to create a real business that really stuck until ZenMaid. In 2012 I came across a post on Reddit. A guy was starting his own maid service and documenting the entire thing. By chance a friend of mine saw the same post and started working on the technical side of the business (building a website and etc). My friend quickly realized that he didn't want to deal with the people side of the business however. He tagged me in to help with operations and sales/marketing. From there I was quite quickly made an equal partner as he had yet to launch. Don't fall into the classic trap of spending months building or working on something, only to find out when you launch that no one is interested. At the time I was doing sales for a tech startup so closing business by phone was my jam. From there I quickly learned basic man management skills to work with our cleaners. Fast forward 1 year and I was no longer living locally. I'd moved closer to home (the SF Bay Area) for a much better day job. I was 400 miles away from our maid service and that caused tension with my partner. Ultimately I gave up my portion of the maid service (which shut down shortly thereafter). It was at this point that another friend approached me about what became ZenMaid. He felt he could build a better management platform than the one he'd seen me using. And he was confident that I could sell and market the software given my skill set and industry knowledge. Hence ZenMaid was born (initially named MaidDesk though I doubt that's ever been mentioned anywhere publicly before now :-) ) While working full time (myself at a startup, my co-founder on his PhD at Stanford University) we began simultaneously working on the product and getting in contact with as many maid service owners and offices as we could. Take us through the process of building the product. My co-founder Arun was familiar with the coding language Python but decided after reviewing some of the existing libraries that Ruby on Rails was the right way for us to proceed. … so he taught himself Ruby in ~8 days and got to work. I'm still baffled by this looking back on it. Due to my full time work schedule I made calls between 5 am and 8 am on weekdays before going into work and all day on Saturdays. It took almost 6 months to get a working prototype due to Arun's PhD program at Stanford (he worked from 11 pm to 3 am most nights on ZenMaid). I spent that entire time calling maid service owners and offices. Due to my work schedule (1.5 hour commute to SF each day) I made calls between 5 am and 8 am on weekdays before going into work and all day on Saturdays. We made the decision to focus our efforts on an easy to use calendar that specifically focused on truly recurring services (something that's unique to maid services and housekeeping companies) and on automated communications around the appointments. To this day that is still our bread and butter, though we've added many features and benefits since. A lot of people have asked about our startup costs but we didn't really have any due to our combined skill sets. The only expense we took on was once the product was live was ~$100-$200 per month for Google AdWords so we could get consistent traffic to our website and app. Describe the process of launching the business. We didn't do much of a launch for ZenMaid as we didn't have an audience to announce to. We paid for a press release service that didn't do much but I did reach out to everyone I had been talking to when the software was ready. Our first customer came onboard for $1000 for life, paid over 4 months (we have given a few other maid service owners lifetime access for a set price but we quickly moved to a more traditional SaaS model priced monthly which now starts at $49) We already had a landing page at this point as I was treating the business/product as if we were ready at least 3 months prior to the software being launched. I believe we initially used a tool called LaunchRock and then moved to WordPress with a theme quite quickly. Launch numbers (this was fun to look up in Stripe) : We brought on our first customer on September 9, 2013 and ended that year with 5 customers (though 13 had tried and paid us for at least a month) so clearly there wasn't much of a launch event Since launch, what has worked to attract and retain customers? ZenMaid has always relied heavily on paid advertising (Google, Capterra, LinkedIn, Facebook) for a constant flow of leads however we quickly branched out from there to do content marketing which helped with SEO and a variety of other things. We actually stumbled on this by accident when I took the keywords I had researched for my maid service and I shared them in a Google Spreadsheet which we hid behind an email gate. This was our very first lead magnet and to this day it still gets us more leads than anything else :-) From there we built an extensive email marketing funnel that's almost all quality content. Our goal is to never be forgotten by our leads because when they're ready for our software, they'll let us know. Essentially any maid service owner that signs up for our email list will receive high quality, implementable content for their businesses for almost two years, each email having a small, unobtrusive link at the bottom to learn more about the software. If they click this link they'll get a couple more targeted emails. I set this up following Ryan Deiss' The Machine course a few years ago. Two quick examples of awesome content we've done would be The Ultimate Hiring Panel, where we interview 3 industry experts on their hiring best practices, and "Steal This Cancellation Policy for Your Maid Service", which is exactly what it sounds like: 3 example cancellation policies that can be copy pasta'd into a maid service whether they use ZenMaid or not. More recently we've added in extensive Facebook retargeting campaigns, also focused on quality content, that we use to nurture the leads we get from other channels. And finally, what we're best known for in the industry, is our Facebook group, the ZenMaid Mastermind. We built the first widely joined community (some existed before us but were quite dead, and many have appeared since we did it) and at the 2015 industry event we were the talk of the town. More people knew us from that community than for our software though that's changed since. It's still where we get lots of leads, content ideas, and feedback on our software! Building the Facebook group The Facebook group actually happened by accident - I had a crazy idea that we could start a membership site and do it on Facebook so I launched a $19 per month subscription to our email list. Two months later and after signing up a whole 3 (THREE) members, I realized it wasn't the time or place (in hindsight this failure was 100% on me and had nothing to do with timing or anything other than my lack of experience) We refunded the money of the members who had joined but left the group up on Facebook. Over time I started inviting people to join if they added me as a friend and were part of the industry. Fast forward a year and we had 50 members who were starting to chat regularly when an awesomely epic thread appeared. I sent an email to our list letting them know they might be interested and 50 members turned into 200 overnight. We haven't looked back since. What was the thread? You know how they say Sex sells… One of the cleaning clients caught the team lead and a cleaner having sex in her bathroom while they were supposed to be cleaning. To make matters worse the 3rd cleaner on the team in question was the WIFE of the team lead (yes, you're reading that right) Epic, hilarious, and very beneficial to our business. Since that time we've built up the group with great content and discussion as well as making it a safe place for owners to let loose and rant (my approach was to make this a place online that maid service owners could get the help they need but also relax with a glass of wine at the end of a long day and chat with their friends) These days we do regular Facebook Lives and feature many of the industry's leading experts :-) And all of this has led to speaking engagements for myself and partnerships with almost every big name consultant in the industry. It helps a lot when we have a bigger audience than they do so at some point there was a snowball effect where most influencers chase us rather than the other way around. For example, we have a virtual summit coming up this year and, where most organizers have to chase speakers, we had 25 confirmed presenters within 24 hours of making contact with the first one. How are you doing today and what does the future look like? We recently passed the half million dollar yearly mark and will be breaking the million dollar a year barrier in late-2020. That will actually happen much sooner if we can accomplish the 3 primary goals I have in mind for ZenMaid going forward - two of which I consider to be "holy grails" 1 - To extend our lead as industry leaders. It sounds weird to me to answer that but after 6 years of hard work and focus the truth is ZenMaid is now the gold standard in the house cleaning industry for software. We have some very good competition but none are focused on our industry specifically which gives us a lot of advantages that we've piled up over the years (for example, we now employ 4 current or former maid service owners which puts our support heads and shoulders above other software who serve our audience) 2 - Negative net churn. We recently changed our pricing to grow every month with our customers as they are more successful. That change has lowered our churn significantly but we do still lose money each month from our current customers. By the end of 2019 I'd like us to actually make more from our existing customers even if we continue to lose ~5% of them each month. Software folk will recognize this as the SaaS holy grail, and we think it's possible for ZenMaid :-) 3 - Paid marketing that pays for itself (I'm not sure what the right term is for this - any readers want to let me know in the comments?) Inspired by Russel Brunson who actually makes money advertising ClickFunnels before people convert to paying software users … With our current lead costs my goal is to get a $97 or $197 info product that's part of our email automations so that we can advertise the software and immediately recoup our advertising spend. If we can achieve #1 and #2 simultaneously the sky's the limit for ZenMaid, particularly as a bootstrapped company. It's the holy grail of marketing in my opinion. Through starting the business, have you learned anything particularly helpful or advantageous? Test test test would be lesson #1 as we essentially lit our business on fire overnight about 2 years back. We had the best intentions and it absolutely turned out for the best but we burnt a lot of bridges and lost almost 30% of our revenue because we didn't do enough testing prior to releasing a massive update on our software. Lesson #2 would be something I learned from Tim Ferriss which is "treat everyone like they can put you on the front page of the New York Times". A lot of our best partnerships and relationships have come because I simply cared more about the actual people than our competition a few months or even years before either we could help them or they could help us. We've had multiple customers sign up who currently pay us thousands of dollars a month who knew me 6 years ago when the company was starting but we weren't sophisticated enough for their businesses. On a similar note I've gone out of my way to help up and coming consultants, some of which became quite big years after and now refer us business left and right. And most consultants in the industry know they can approach me for tech or marketing advice if they want it. I'll even fix problems for them (usually paying money out of my own pocket to do so) if I know it's considerably easier for me or my team to do than for them. Lesson #3 would be to simply Not Quit. Everything in our business these days sounds like flowers and sunshine (and profits) but I can point to at least 20 situations where other entrepreneurs would have thrown in the towel. The reason we're in business and successful today was that we never gave up when things got challenging. It's easy to run a business when things go well, it's what happens when the sh*t hits the fan that actually defines you and your success. What platform/tools do you use for your business? We use a lot of software as a software company so here are our daily ones: Slack - for chatting when an email is unnecessary. Group discussions and etc. I've seen people mention this can be a big distraction but with a remote team it's absolutely vital to everything we do ActiveCampaign - Email marketing and automation, we're known in the industry for our email marketing and current email leads will receive messages for approximately 2 years after registering so this one's important fo' sho Intercom - I hate their pricing with a passion as it changes every month but they've done a great job of infiltrating every part of our customer process. We use them for support but also as a sort of customer dashboard (easier for us to find users with over X employees using intercom than anywhere else, for example) What have been the most influential books, podcasts, or other resources? I listen to a ton of books these days (Audible on 3x speed) so there's a lot to pick from but here are a couple that I think helped me a lot as I got started: The Four Hour Work Week - the lifestyle dream was always my why after reading this book Jobs by Walter Isaacson - this book completely shifted how I approached building the ZenMaid product and taking pride in many of the little details in our business I previously thought were unimportant The Fish That Ate The Whale - Best entrepreneur [true] story I've ever read - everything about this man's life is epic The Foundation - a online course to help folks like me start software businesses. We went through this after picking up our first 5 customers and came out the other side with over 30 Straight Line Persuasion - a sales course by Jordan Belfort, who everyone knows from the Wolf of Wall Street. I was already in sales and this course took my sales game to a new level. Shortly after listening to it we had our first +$200 MRR day which at the time was absolutely massive for us Advice for other entrepreneurs who want to get started or are just starting out? The main advice I would give to both starting entrepreneurs and even experienced one is to focus on FEEDBACK LOOPS, and increase the speed at which you go through them. A feedback loop is essentially asking yourself "How can I figure out if I'm on the right track as quickly as possible?" For ZenMaid we'll run article headlines and outlines by our audience before we create content. We'll do quick mockups of new features and share them first with our team, then with our champion user group on Facebook to find whether we're on the right track to solve the problems we intend to. This has been absolutely invaluable. For a new entrepreneur, don't fall into the classic trap of spending months building or working on something, only to find out when you launch that no one is interested. This is why I spent so much time calling maid service owners while we were developing the software and getting as much input from them as I possibly could. And this was despite the fact we "knew" what we were building. Are you looking to hire for certain positions right now? We try to keep our dev team lean and fast moving but on the non-tech side I'm always on the lookout for two types of people - entrepreneurial marketers and maid service owners. Most of the ZenMaid team members work part time for us and have their own businesses I'm happy to help them build. Anyone who can help me to get more leads, or convert more maid service owners into active users, is going to have my attention. For quite a few of our entrepreneurial team members their other business is an actual maid service in which they use ZenMaid. I can't dogfood my own software anymore since exiting my maid service. But the next best thing is hiring our customers or potential customers to help with customer service, marketing, account management, and more. Where can we go to learn more? Your website: theamaricandream.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/godblessamarica Instagram: https://instagram.com/TheAmaricanDream/ If you have any questions or comments, drop a comment below! Amar Ghose, Founder of ZenMaid [link] [comments]  |
| Sass out-of-state buisness question Posted: 28 Sep 2019 12:33 PM PDT Hey all, I run a Sass Delaware based C-Corp. I filed to do buisness in NJ (where I'm located). However, I have school districts (our primary customers) in other states requesting to purchase a license to use our software. Do I have to file to do buisness in ALL states for schools that use our website? Thank you [link] [comments]  |
| Business Communication Survey! Posted: 28 Sep 2019 07:57 AM PDT Hi! I'm an undergrad student conducting research on how companies communicate with their current and potential customers. If you own a business or are a part of marketing/advertising in the company you work for, please take this survey! It's extremely quick and I would appreciate it a ton. https://forms.gle/ms59Hboshw8us1wS8 Thank you! [link] [comments]  |
| Need to let a part time employee go after two years, what do I need to know? Posted: 28 Sep 2019 03:15 PM PDT I have a part time employee who has been with us for over two years. We've been rejigging their job description repeatedly to try and make it work but they aren't excelling in any position and I think it's time to move on. Are there any legalities to take into consideration when letting them go? Do we give two weeks notice or can we do pay in lieu of notice? We're in British Columbia if that's relevant. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 28 Sep 2019 08:59 AM PDT I've closed my business down after two years and I'm trying to figure out all the loose ends I have to deal with and the best ways of dealing with everything? What are some tips and recommendations for making this as easy and as smart as possible? In my case, I was a retail bakery and I've already been shut for 2 months so I don't have employees to worry about now. I'm just trying to finish up getting out of my lease and dealing with past due bills like utilities and such. I don't have any loans out. What should I know about taking care of all this stuff especially since the business doesn't have any money and I personally don't have any money? (I mean like actually no money until I start my new job next week). Thanks for any advice. [link] [comments]  |
| Is this a good business idea ? Posted: 28 Sep 2019 05:28 PM PDT Have you guys noticed that : eating out is very difficult and expensive. In an area, typically, You find few outlets selling pizza or burger, you find a restaurant in which meals are quite expensive, and that's it. Here you have : only few foods, and they are expensive You can eat almost nothing, Eating out is nearly impossible Do you guys see ? This model is very inefficient Something important is missing It is : a restaurant where food keeps changing, chefs also rotate This restaurant is going to serve thousands of foods over the course of time A meal is going to be cheap You will be able to eat thousands of foods Eating out will finally become possible This model is way better [link] [comments]  |
| I want to buy and convert an old van into a mobile coffee mobile. Posted: 28 Sep 2019 01:38 PM PDT Hello, everyone. So, I dream of owning and running my own coffee shop. I have always had a huge passion for the caffeinated crack, and I believe I am getting ready to make the leap. Instead of renting out or buying a building, I was thinking about buying and old van and converting it into basically a mobile food van for coffee. Do you know approximately how much this would cost? [link] [comments]  |
| How to reduce contractor costs for a real estate investment group? Posted: 28 Sep 2019 07:28 AM PDT I have been offered a partnership working with a group of real estate investors. My duty would be to perform construction related jobs and manage other contractors. The problem these investors have is that they are tired of paying retail prices for labor and they desperately want to reduce costs. My question is, how can I negotiate with contractors on the behalf of the Group for them to accept working at a lower price, hopefully 20-30% lower. I've been looking into both parties getting resellers/wholesale permits so that contractors can save money by wholesaling their labor, on which the tax is .05% instead of the 6.4% in my state. But that still doesn't bring us low enough to what the investors would like to pay. I have considered the Group writing a contract with these subs that they will work for a set price and in exchange be provided work for the entire year with an average pay calculated based on expenses from previous years, and a promise that they will be called first anytime a job comes up, and be the only contractor recommended to other people and businesses. I have considered a bonus system for exceptional work or completing jobs ahead of schedule and right the first time. Also a penalty system for jobs completed late or wrong the first time. However, I think I need more. I need to offer them more incentives. Perhaps tax savings I am not aware of? My goal is to help the investors control their costs, yet make sure it is still beneficial for the contractors to work for them. What kind of ideas do you guys have? [link] [comments]  |
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