How to use Social Media for your Cleaning Business in 2023

Using social media for your cleaning business doesn’t need to be difficult.

But it is necessary.

In a market packed full of competition, your cleaning business needs to stand out from the crowd.

Social media is an accessible tool that is free to use. Use it in the right way and you gain an advantage over your competition.

You can develop your cleaning business into a trusted brand and an expert in your market.

You can build a following and grow an audience who turn into leads, and customers, for your cleaning business.

In short, you can use social media to grow your cleaning business.

How to use Social Media for your Cleaning Business in 2023

• Why you need to use Social Media for your Cleaning Business
• How to promote your Cleaning Business on Social Media
• 7 Simple Content Tips for your Cleaning Business
• The Best Platforms for Growing your Cleaning Business on Social Media
• 11 Effective Cleaning Business Social Media Post Ideas
• Key Takeaways

Why you need to use Social Media for your Cleaning Business

Before we look at how you can use social media for your cleaning business, let’s look at why you need to use it.

5 Levels of Market Sophistication

Market Sophistication is a term first coined by Eugene Schwartz in Breakthrough Advertising. It describes the level of marketplace awareness and whether your product or service has been sold to the market before.

There are 5 levels of Market Sophistication:

• Level 1: The Pioneer Level. This is the first mover territory. Your product or service is new and there is no competition.
• Level 2: Out-Doing The Competition. Competition has caught up. More people have entered the market for your product or service.
• Level 3: Showing Customers How It Works. It’s no longer about what your product or service does, but how it works. Is there a unique method, system, or process behind your product or service that produces the desired result?
• Level 4: The Cold War. The competition has caught up and there is a direct side-by-side comparison of two products or services. Yours has to be faster and cheaper. Think Mac vs PC or McDonalds vs Burger King.
• Level 5: The Rebirth. This is the most challenging level. Emphasis shifts from the promise of what the product or service delivers to customers buying from your brand. They identify with your product or service.

“What’s this got to do with social media using social media for my cleaning business?” I hear you ask.

The 5 Levels of Market Sophistication helps you adopt a social media marketing strategy. It allows you to create service offers at the level of sophistication of your market.

Understanding the cleaning market helps you to communicate and connect with customers. The best way to find this out is through market research.

I’m sure you’ve spent time and resources on marketing campaigns that have missed the mark.

I know I have. Here’s a prime example:

There are many reasons why this marketing campaign failed.

In hindsight, the biggest reason was that I hadn’t built my cleaning business into a brand.

The cleaning industry in general has been at Level 4 for a long time and is shifting to Level 5. The market is saturated with cleaning companies competing for business based on price.

To stand out in a saturated market you need to build your cleaning business into a brand.

People want to buy from brands.

And the best way to build your cleaning business into a brand is by using social media and creating content.

How to promote your Cleaning Business on Social Media

If you market your cleaning business to everyone, you’re marketing to no one.

Getting results on social media starts with understanding who your ideal customer is.

1. Know your target market

Targeting the right people, in the right market, with the right offer is the foundation of a successful cleaning business.

You need to carry out market research and learn about your ideal customer.

Where do they hang out?

What are their problems?

What questions do they have?

What kind of things do they wish they had in their life?

Find out your ideal customer’s pain points in relation to your cleaning service. Get feedback from existing customers, what they like, not like, and what needs improving.

Check your competition by reading their reviews and comments sections on social media.

The better you understand your ideal customer, the easier you can create compelling service offers for them.

You can create content that they will engage with. You also know what social media platforms to use to promote that content.

2. Choose the right platform(s)

One mistake cleaning companies make is having accounts on all social media platforms.

You should choose the platform(s) suited to the market and niche of your cleaning business.

If you specialize in commercial cleaning, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Twitter are the go-to platforms.

For residential cleaning, Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok should be your main focus.

3. Setting up your social media profiles

Potential customers want to see that you have a professional-looking social media profile.

Not having any social media profiles or business page is a red flag for potential customers. The same goes for not having a website for your cleaning business.

You don’t have to complicate your social media profiles when you get started.

Make sure that you have appropriate photos for your profile picture and banner image. Fill out you're about section. Include links to your website, free quote requests,s or a contact page.

Now you’re ready to start posting on a consistent basis.

Post Engaging Value First Content

Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook is the basic rule for social media marketing. That means giving before asking.

Most cleaning businesses post content that their ideal customers aren’t interested in. Posts about sales offers, hiring, or services make followers tune out.

A better approach is to follow the 80/20 Rule to posting content. 80% of your content needs to be value-based and educational and the other 20% should be selling.

Educational content can include videos about hiring a commercial cleaning service. Or what to expect from a professional cleaning service.

Talk about things a prospective customer wants to know before hiring your cleaning service.

Producing content like this provides you with an opportunity to show your expertise. It performs well across all platforms, generates more engagement, and starts conversations.

It's also the sort of content that helps prospective customers choose your cleaning business.

If you’re stuck creating valuable content for your ideal customer, think about their questions and pain points. Refer to your market research, look at feedback, and review for content ideas.

Grow your following and build connections

To generate leads from your social media marketing, you need to have an audience.

Building connections, growing a following, and posting content that your ideal customer finds valuable produces results.

But this takes patience.

Posting alone won’t get you leads and sales. You need to invest time and effort into growing a following.

As your following grows and your connections build up, you can start individual conversations. Turn these conversations into customers. You can drive also more followers and connections to your website and turn them into leads.

7 Simple Content Tips for your Cleaning Business

1. Market the benefits, not the features, of using your cleaning business

One reason your content isn’t engaging is that you're focusing on the features of your cleaning service.

Features include things like the type of service you provide, how many years you’ve been in business, and your service area.

Even though this is important information, list it on your website. It doesn’t create engaging content.

You should be focusing on the benefits that your cleaning service provides.

To move from features to benefits-based content, instead of asking “how can I sell people my cleaning service?”, ask “how can I help people with my cleaning service?”. This small shift in creating content will make it much more engaging.

You’re still promoting your cleaning business, but doing by focusing on your ideal customer.

2. Talk about what your cleaning clients don’t know but should know

The best approach to take with social media is posting value-first content. Content that educates potential customers on the things they should know, but don’t.

As a cleaning business owner, you’ve gained valuable experience that's helpful to potential clients. Why not create content around your knowledge and experience? You’re likely to know things that your ideal clients don’t, which would be helpful to them.

Posts that educate your ideal customer increase the value and engagement of your content.

3. Use customer reviews as a form of content marketing for a cleaning business

Getting reviews for your cleaning business should be a priority. Social proof can be an effective form of content to promote your cleaning business.

What others say about your cleaning business is more important than what you say about your cleaning business.

Written and video reviews from happy customers are a powerful form of marketing.

You can scatter reviews throughout your content calendar to enhance the sales process. People are more likely to believe the words of happy customers compared to yours as a business owner.

Reviews on Google Business also enhance your local search ranking and improve your ranking on Google Maps.

4. Highlight the locations where you work

Highlighting your service area on your social media profiles is important.

Facebook and Instagram allow you to tag your location and use location hashtags. This is can be useful if a potential customer searches for a cleaning service in that location.

Customers looking for a cleaning business on social media will want someone close by. Including location details in your posts will help catch the eye of someone looking for a local cleaning company.

5. Post Both Photos and Videos

TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube are video-first platforms.

Video testimonials of clients or behind-the-scenes videos of your cleaning business are great content ideas.

Use images and post before and after pictures, written testimonials, offers, or promotions.

It’s also a good idea to add your logo or company branding to the photo and video content your produce. It helps to build brand recognition when your content appears on the internet.

Mix up your content and include videos and images to catch the attention of your potential customer and boost the credibility of your cleaning business.

6. Use Hashtags

Using hashtags has the biggest impact on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube Shorts.

You can target your ideal customers by using the most active hashtags for your target market and location. Incorporating local terms or events will drive engagement for your posts and help your ideal clients see them.

It’s important to diversify the hashtags you use. It allows you to reach new audiences more.

Be aware that using hashtags is a marathon, not a sprint. You need to give each hashtag a fair chance to perform.

If you want the best results from hashtags, always make sure they are relevant to the content you’re posting. Doing this allows you to maximize the organic reach of your posts.

7. Automate Your Posts

The best way to grow your social media presence is to post on a consistent basis.

Posting at least once a day is a good start.

As a busy cleaning business owner, posting on social media one or more times a day, every day, might not be possible.

That’s why automating your posts is invaluable for your cleaning business. Automation tools like Buffer or Hootsuite will help you post on a regular basis across your social media accounts.

You can batch your social media content scheduling on a weekly basis so you don’t have to remember to post every day.

These tools also help you track the performance of your posts. Analyzing data helps you understand which content that resonates most with your audience. Recreating your best-performing content will boost your following, engagement, and reach.

The Best Platforms for growing your Cleaning Business on Social Media

Understanding your target market and ideal customer helps you find the right social media platform to target them. You’ll also have a better idea about the content you need to create, which they will engage with.

Using Facebook to grow your cleaning business on social media

Facebook is best used to grow a residential cleaning business.

Use your [ideal customer avatar] to search for suitable Facebook groups where your ideal customers hang out.

For example, your ideal customer avatar may be:

• Busy mothers with kids that play sports
• Who lives in the suburbs; and
• Own homes over 3000 square feet.

A Facebook group for stay-at-home mothers could be one where your ideal customer hangs out.

There are thousands of Facebook groups. You can find those most suitable for your business by searching for some of your ideal customer avatar characteristics.

You can also use your ideal customer avatar to target the right people using Facebook ads. One of the best ways to target people is with a combination of Facebook pixels and lookalike audiences.

Adding the Facebook pixel to your website allows you to track visitors to your website and engage with your content on Facebook.

Gathering pixel data means you can re-market to people who have already expressed interest in your cleaning business. You can also create lookalike audiences based on those who have engaged with your content.

Understanding what content your ideal customer engages with helps you create content that generates leads for your cleaning business.

Using LinkedIn to grow your cleaning business on social media

As a B2B platform, LinkedIn is an effective place to grow your commercial cleaning business.

Use the search function on LinkedIn to connect with commercial cleaning clients.

For example, your ideal customer avatar might be:

• Facilities managers;
• Working for businesses that manage many buildings; and
• With building sizes of at least 50,00 square feet in your local area.

LinkedIn’s basic search function will help you target facilities managers.

To do this:

1. In their search feature, you can type in “facilities manager”
2. Select people
3. Click on all filters
4. Type in the location as the area you want to service
5. Select 2nd connections

Research the companies where the contacts are currently working. If they meet the rest of your ideal customer avatar criteria click 'connect'. Make sure you add a personal note to your connection request.

After connecting, these facilities managers will start seeing your posts. They will engage with content that interests them. This creates prospecting opportunities for you to message them and start conversations.

If you want to supercharge your LinkedIn lead generation, sign up for LinkedIn Sales Navigator. You can carry out detailed searches and engage with the right prospects for your cleaning business.

Using Instagram to grow your cleaning company on social media

Instagram works better for growing residential cleaning businesses.

It’s a useful platform for driving traffic for your residential or commercial cleaning business.

Instagram is a visual platform. Post before and after pictures of your cleaning jobs or videos of your team in action.

Including calls to action in your posts. Drive traffic to your website where people can contact you for a quote or book a site visit.

Use hashtags for your cleaning niche when you post. There’s a chance that the people who follow those hashtags are your ideal customers. Every time you post content that includes the hashtag(s) they are following you show up in their feed. This increases the chances of engagement and them contacting you when they need a cleaning service.

Some of the most popular cleaning hashtags to use are:

#housecleaning

#cleaningservice,

#cleaningday,

#cleaningtips, and

#cleaningservices.

Using Twitter to grow your cleaning company on social media

Twitter is one of the most under-utilized platforms for cleaning businesses.

Engaging on Twitter is an essential part of winning on the platform. Conversations move fast. You’re able to communicate with people in real time. This is great for getting feedback, answering questions, and handling customer service issues.

Two of the most powerful tools that Twitter has are its search function and the ability to create lists.

Twitter search allows you to search keywords that your customer avatar uses. Contribute to ongoing conversations and provide value.

You can also build personalized lists of ideal customers on Twitter. After connecting with them on LinkedIn, you can find their Twitter profile. Add them to your list, learn more about their interests and engage with them online.

Leading with value first is key on Twitter. Taking this approach attracts people to your cleaning business profile. You can generate quality traffic and leads to your website.

Using YouTube to grow your cleaning business on social media

YouTube and video marketing is a powerful marketing strategy for your cleaning business.

YouTube content can work to grow your cleaning business 24/7. Create a long-form video with cleaning tips or a vlog about the day-to-day workings of your cleaning business.

A good example of this is JCD Cleaning.

Chris Guilfoyle at JCD Cleaning publishes weekly videos of things happening in his business.

Taking this approach generates exposure for your cleaning business.

The added bonus is that once your channel gets monetized, you’ll be getting paid to promote your cleaning business on YouTube. You can funnel that ad revenue back into your cleaning business to generate even more traffic, leads, and sales.

11 Effective Cleaning Business Social Media Post Ideas

Now that you’ve decided to use social media to grow your cleaning business, what sort of content do you post?

To get social media to post ideas for your cleaning business, start by doing some keyword research.

Use Google or Answer the Public to find what people are searching for in your niche. Spend time on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook groups to find out common discussion points in your niche.

Look at your reviews and competitor reviews for things customers like and don’t like.

Then use your findings to create content. Focus on value-based content that solves problems for your ideal customer.

Here are X social media post ideas you can start using to grow your cleaning business:

1. How-To Videos

Why not create content that highlights your area of expertise? Explain the strategies and tools used by professional cleaning businesses for great results.

A video on ‘How to clean a kitchen’ or a ‘5 tips for finding the right cleaning business for your office’ are good examples.

2. Answer FAQs

Are there some questions that keep coming up about your cleaning service?

Sharing the answers on social media allows people to find the information they need.

It also saves you time answering the same questions. You can point customers to a page or a post that answers their questions.

3. Customer Reviews

Customer reviews are powerful. What people say about your cleaning business carries more weight than what you say about your cleaning business.

Getting online reviews should be the bread and butter for lead generation. Not only do they drive leads, but they also boost search rankings and confirm the reputation of your cleaning business.

4. Customer Case Studies

Try reaching out to long-term clients to see if they are willing to take part in a case study for social media.

Interview them and find out why they choose your cleaning service. Ask them to share their experience of working with your cleaning business. Show photos of the before and after transformations of their home or office.

More often than not clients will be happy to oblige.

5. Ask for Customer Feedback

Showing that you care about your customers enough and take note of what they have to say can be a huge win for your cleaning business. It helps to build customer loyalty.

Surveying your customers for feedback and sharing the result on social media can be a powerful marketing tool.

Find out what they like, what they don’t like, and what needs changing. Use the feedback to improve your cleaning service when the opportunity presents itself.

6. Job Listings

Looking to hire new cleaners? Why not post about it on your social media channels?

Posting in local Facebook groups and using Facebook Ads can put your listing in front of a bigger audience. Use LinkedIn Recruiter to find the right candidates faster.

7. Company Blog Posts

Blogging boosts your website's SEO. It also provides material to share with your community on social media.

Share blog posts across your social media platforms. Let people know when there’s new content and give them an opportunity to engage with your business.

The more they engage with your blog, the better the chances they will turn to you when they need a cleaning service.

8. Company News Announcements

Sharing company news with your audience makes them feel part of your business.

Whether you’re moving to a new office, hiring a new team member, or celebrating a work anniversary, tell your audience about it.

This keeps your cleaning business top of mind the next time your audience needs a cleaning service or a friend asks for a recommendation.

9. Curated Content

Sharing curated content is a chance to highlight what others in your niche are doing. It’s also an opportunity to provide more value to your audience by telling them about something they might otherwise have not known about.

Curated content is also an easy win for your editorial efforts. You’re sharing content that’s already available instead of having to come up with new content.

10. Contests & Giveaways

Running contests and giveaways is a great way to draw attention to your cleaning business. You can offer branded merchandise, gift vouchers or free/discounted cleaning.

Whatever prizes you offer, your audience is likely to share and like your posts if there’s a chance of winning something.

It increases engagement and you gain access to people that don’t know about your cleaning business.

11. Highlight the Holidays

There are many holidays available throughout the year. Celebrating these occasions is a great opportunity for social media content.

It can be as simple as wishing them a Merry Christmas or Happy Easter. Or, you can use the opportunity to run holiday contests and giveaways to create more engagement for your cleaning business.

Key Takeaways

In a crowded market, you need to provide an exceptional cleaning service. Your cleaning business also needs to stand out.

The best way to achieve this is by building your cleaning business into a brand.

Do this by creating engaging social media content for your cleaning business.

Once you’ve identified your target market, niche, and who your ideal customer you can:

1. Choose which platform(s) are best suited to reach your ideal customer;
2. Create the right sort of value-first content for your ideal customer; and
3. Grow your following, build connections and turn them into leads.

To grow your cleaning business online, optimize your social media profile(s), use the 80/20 rule (80% value, 20% sales), and post regular content.

Social media is free to use. It increases the exposure of your cleaning business. And it provides you with helpful data to better understand your ideal client.  It’s an effective tool for building the brand of your cleaning business.

Using the right social media strategies helps you generate more leads, and turn potential customers into paying clients.