The difference customers' appreciation makes in their motivation & profits & every cleaning company owner dreams of having contract-cleaning customers who appreciate the work he does for them.

They all have some such customers but we all have too few of those appreciative, openly satisfied cleaning clients.

Customers readily give bad news, complaints & negative feedback to a cleaning company. But it seems that positive feedback just doesn't exist. Contract cleaning is one of those "invisible" services that people grow to take for granted from early childhood. Now it's just he who is the "Mom" whose task is to keep everything tidy & spotless as part of being unappreciated on full-time basis.

After all, when they complain, it's about a few square feet & yet they never pay any attention to those acres of well-cleaned surfaces that they leave behind them every week.

Contract cleaning blues

If one receives any feedback from a contract-cleaning customer then chances are that it is negative in one way or another.

In the face of constant, one-sided feedback, it is normal to become somewhat cynical about the subject of appreciation. They're human, after all, so they tend to start believing there's no way contract cleaning customers could be appreciative.

It's the old story: At first, most contract cleaning customers are satisfied with their new cleaning service but, as time passes, they become used to any improvements & the same old pattern of "searching for mistakes" begins to take hold.

After a while, improvements are taken for granted & the attention focuses solely on omissions & mistakes. It's as if every staff member of the client-company is out on a mission to find something — anything — to complain about in regards to cleaning!

The result of cleaning is nothingness. Cleaning is a funny task in that its goal is to leave nothing there.

Whereas many other services create something that can be seen, the successful cleaning job removes everything that could catch the eye, leaving a big "nothing" there to be seen.

A cleaning job done well means there's nothing there to be seen... so cleaning doesn't really exist for most people as they don't see it but only see the omissions in it!

The human eye (and mind) is not trained to see nothingness. They always look for something that's there.

Therefore, when an untrained eye (read: the customer) views a well-cleaned space, it doesn't see the total lack of dirt & dust.

It actually takes an expert to see that something's not there — in this case, dirt, dust & other particles that would show that the space has not been cleaned.

So, when a customer (or anyone in the personnel of the company) looks at his or her work space or the bathroom in order to check whether it's been cleaned, they don't see that it's clean but only whether or not there's something there that's been missed!

Nobody can do a 100% perfect job at all times, so there's bound to be some slight oversight here & there, now & again & each of those are certain to be noticed because almost everyone in the client-company's personnel is out looking for those omissions.

First they have to understand how people think about cleaning.

People view cleaning emotionally
Cleaning is a very emotional subject to most people.

In spite of trying to act indifferently (or negatively) toward cleaning, most people react to the subject of cleaning in a very strongly emotional way.

Everyone has been a child & had to clean when he or she didn't really want. Most adults have to clean their home or, if they don't, put up with unseemliness if they live alone. And if they live with a spouse then chances are that the person doing the cleaning is going to give the nonparticipating partner an earful about cleaning at regular intervals.

As a result, almost every human being will have unpleasant memories about cleaning. All of those bad memories also involve a lot of blame — being blamed and/or blaming another for cleaning — that isn't making the subject any more pleasant for the average person.

People think that cleaning is such a basic "no-brains" activity that anyone is an expert & everyone has his or her own theories on how it should be done "correctly."

So, with so much negative emotions & experience about cleaning, this is a volatile subject for most people. And who is the perfect target on which they can vent their spleen? Who's the ideal scrape goat for all that blame that's inside them?

They are the one whose service is under unbelievably microscopic scrutiny every day. Employees will try to find something wrong with their work.

So they get those ridiculously microscopic complaints too! That's why people complain about the smallest things and that's why their feedback can be so outrageously venomous, totally out of proportion with what they claim to be the cause of the complaint.

The actual cause of the complaint is not that there was a paper clip left in the corner or that someone's desk wasn't dusted. The actual reason for the complaint comes from the negative emotions most people have in the subject of cleaning.

Hence those complaints are so often petty-minded, sometimes borderline the ridiculous. To create appreciation for contract cleaning services when dealing with people who have so much negative charge in the subject of cleaning, he needs to be clever. The obvious solution — showing them how things really are — doesn't really work. It is a question of emotional things, not logical reasoning.

Customers must be trained to look for the well-cleaned areas. They will look for something always, whether he likes it or not. So, why not take the necessary steps to ensure they're looking for well-cleaned spaces instead of omissions and mistakes?

It's astonishingly simple to get laymen to see the "nothingness" of cleaning (the fact that there's nothing there in way of dust or dirt) Once one achieve this, the person will forever change his or her way of looking at the results of cleaning work & their appreciation will skyrocket.

Secondly, customers need to be handled with very special communication, using their opinions, ideas & views on cleaning as the starting point.

Essentially, their need to make anyone wrong stems from being themselves made wrong about cleaning. This may seem hard to believe but it is so nevertheless with the majority of people.

Thirdly, he needs to know what to ask his clients so they will focus their attention on the good that they receive from his services. This again is a simple set of questions — in fact, sometimes just one question — set in an interview or a letter.

Now, this all may seem like a lot of work, but the amazing thing is that all three of these techniques can be implemented & kept going with only minutes spent every month...

The results are nothing short of astonishing.

The increase in their perception of satisfaction toward their services will increase dramatically within a few days & that, in turn, will bring him many good things.

The difference appreciation makes to his motivation & profits. Even a slightly higher level of appreciation toward his services can make a huge difference to his work.

And a significantly heightened appreciation from customers can make a massive change to the positive.

Everyone needs to be appreciated. It's a human trait, something that's grooved into their basic nature of existence. Appreciation is simply the essence of life, the very elixir that keeps us going.

Educating their customers to see the good & activating their appreciation cannot but influence his own motivation in a very positive way. It will make work much more pleasant. It will also give him a lot more strength to keep on with the good work.

Customers' appreciation will affect his personnel too. Cleaning crews will actually do a better job simply because they want to return the favour — being appreciated makes a person willing to do more & to do it in a happier frame of mind.

Complaints will diminish significantly, saving a lot of his time (and headaches) that cannot but lead to more efficient use of time, leading to higher profits.

The positive feedback will actually also automatically increase his efforts in acquiring new clients. After all, the more pleasant it is to serve existing customers & the more these appreciate his services, the easier it is to offer those same services to new businesses.

Increasing the appreciation will also make a difference in how his customers pay those monthly invoices for their cleaning service.

Thus, there's a lot to be won by being able to bring into light the appreciation that customers could feel (and show) for his services, without changing anything in the technical nature of his cleaning.

It took us years to research, test & pilot these techniques but now they exist in form of ready-to-use tools, easy to take advantage of without any prior training. These tools & techniques also put in the appreciation for new customers from the onset, making his work much easier & much more profitable.

Even a slightly higher level of appreciation toward your services can make a huge difference to your work.

And a significantly heightened appreciation from customers can make a massive change to the positive.

Everyone needs to be appreciated. It's a human trait, something that's grooved into his basic nature of existence. Appreciation is simply the essence of life, the very elixir that keeps us going.