Featured Listing: Online Fully Automated House Cleaning Business

About the business

Tell us a little about yourself. What’s your background? How did you start the business?

I graduated from Cal State Northridge in 2017 with a bachelor’s in Business Admin & Insurance. My passion has always been in building businesses from the ground up! My father was and still is an entrepreneur so it’s in my DNA to do what I do and I love it!

As an eCommerce business, where are your products made?

This is a physical service – specifically a house cleaning service. Customers book over the phone and then we send a team out to clean their houses.

What can you tell us about your Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) and Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC)

CAC = $85
CLV = $4860 ($270 avg. order x 18 annual visits x 1 year retention)

It’s challenging coming up with this calculation as the business started 8 months ago. However, I can give the following information: so far we have 14 recurring customers, the recurring average order = is $270 per customer, and each customer has an average frequency of 1.5 visits per month.

How have you marketed the product and where are your customers originating from?

Customers are coming from Google Ads. I’ve created a marketing strategy that is extremely effective and I track all results with tracking numbers to see where the sales are exactly coming from.

Is the asset on your listing owner-operated, how much time does it take to run the business, who else is needed on the team, and what is automated?

2 hours per day at most, if that, and it can all be done by texting. I trained a FULL-TIME virtual assistant, from the Philippines at $4.50/hr. She’s AWESOME! She’s on from 9 am-6 pm PST Monday-Saturday.

She answers all the calls, takes the orders, does the scheduling, and follow-ups after the cleaning is complete!

What does someone need to do to continue operating the business in its current form?

“Managing” small issues that the cleaners are having such as:
Not being able to find parking, they got lost, they’re late, etc.

It’s more for moral support in my opinion and this can simply be outsourced/delegated to somebody else but I enjoy it so I keep doing it.

Growing the business

Can you list a few opportunities for a potential new owner to continue growing the business?

1. Incorporate carpet cleaning services as an upsell. This is HUGE! Many customers ask for this service. I used to do it myself with a portable machine but decided to discontinue it to focus more on growing the business. You can outsource it but it’s been challenging for me to find someone that will do it for less than $40 per area.

2. SEO – I have not really invested too much in SEO. I do have my Google Business listing optimized but I have not done much on the SEO side which could result in free business in the long run.

3. COLD CALLING – Commercial contracts are a huge opportunity and can be done simply by cold-calling businesses.

4. HIRING MORE – It’s a challenge finding the right people, however, when you do find them it’s really easy to scale because the cleaners are adding more repeat business.

What has been the evolution of this asset since its launch?

It was extremely challenging, in the beginning, to find the right people to work with, which is why it started off with net losses. However, I started implementing some systems that provided consistent results. I started qualifying contractors better to make sure they were suited for what I’m looking for. They have been tremendously reliable and have given me the confidence to book a lot of jobs without any issues.

The value is in the people that are working with me because they are the ones interacting face-to-face with customers and getting that repeat business.

How does this business make money? What are the current revenue streams?

By offering regular cleanings, deep cleanings & move-out/move-in cleanings. That first visit then leads to repeat business and money is made on the backend.

What marketing channels are most profitable for the business?

Google Ads

How does the business currently acquire customers and what is your breakdown for marketing costs?

All through Google Ads. The 90-day average cost is $5378 per month. I have tons of data so the new owner would have a blast looking at all the statistics that come with it. Demographics, ages, time of day, etc.

How big is your current team? How many people does it take to run this business?

My vision is to add more contractors and more states to be able to fulfil tons of jobs per day and increase repeat customers rapidly.

What’s the reason for selling your business on Flippa?

I love Flippa! My passion lies in building businesses from scratch, I’m ready to give this to a new owner and move on to the next project.