Wanna know how to get reviews when you are new and you have no social proof? Here’s how to ask for reference reviews to boost your approval ratings while you earn testimonials from happy customers. This ultimate guide to starting social proof will help you build a reputation in house cleaning. Get more business reviews for your cleaning business today.
Listen: How to Get Reviews When You’re New
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Watch: How to Get Reviews When You’re New
Hey there, I’m Angela Brown, and this is Ask a House Cleaner. This is a show where you get to ask a house cleaning question, and I get to help you find an answer. You can find this and 400 other answered questions in this series on our YouTube channel.
How Do You Get Reviews When You Haven’t Worked Yet?
How do you get ratings and reviews when you haven’t done any work yet? Now, there’s a house cleaner who is going out on her own. She’s been working for a previous house cleaning company and she’s getting ready to go out on her own, and she doesn’t have any of her own ratings and reviews yet.
She wanted to know if she could borrow some ratings and reviews from the company she just came from. The answer to that is no. You were employed by that company, those ratings and reviews belong to that company. But she doesn’t have any ratings and reviews of her own and she wanted to know how to get my own if I don’t already have some.
Your Old Customers Can Write You a Reference Rating
Now, you have been inside the homes of the people that you cleaned for and so they can write you a reference rating. Okay? This is not like, “Hey, this company cleaned for me, but this person was in my house hired as part of another cleaning company. She’s now starting her own cleaning company, but while she was in my house, she was very thorough. She was on time, she never had a callback,” yada, yada.
They can leave you a reference, a character reference, based on, “I know this person, I’ve met them, I’ve watched them clean, although they worked for another company.”
I would also leave inside that rating and review a disclaimer. It says, “It would be unethical for me to hire her away from the company that she once was employed by, but as she goes out on her own, I recommend you give her a chance.” That is a rating and review someone can write for you that is not about the company that you used to work for, but about you as an individual.
You Can Also Write a Character Reference
Now, you can also write a character reference for somebody that you know. For example, I’m asked all the time, 40, 50 times a day, can you recommend somebody in San Antonio, Texas, in Lake Mary, Florida, all over the country. I do have a network of people that I will recommend, based on I know this person, they’re in my private Facebook group, I’ve watched them for the last couple of years and I’ve listened in on their conversations.
I know that they’re kind, I know that they’re fair, I know that their customers love them. I’ve seen them troubleshoot some of the issues inside their business and they’ve gone through my training program so I know the information that they know and I know that they’re good for the job that they do.
I’ve never personally hired them, and I let them know that right up front, but I do recommend you give them a chance. That’s a rating and review you can give someone that has not ever actually worked inside your home.
An Example of a Character Reference
Now, I was at a homeowner’s association meeting and there was a woman who stood up and said, “If you have a chance and you need painting, please hire my friend, Mac“. She said, “When Mac came to my house, I was a little bit hoping he would do a great job, but I hired him off of one note. It was in the rating and review section on Google.” Only one, he only had one. He didn’t even have a website yet.
Then she proceeded to read this letter. I don’t have the exact wording, but it went something like this. “My homie, Mac, is starting a painting company because he knocked up his girl and he doesn’t want to leave her hanging. He’s going to marry her and he needs the money so he can raise a little Mac.” He said, “I’ve known Mac for 20 years,” and he said, “This guy will never leave anybody hanging. I know he has the insurance and he has one of those fancy lifts that as a painter, you can go up two stories. If you have a big house and you have money, hire my friend, Mac.”
That was the character reference. She’s like, “Whoa, there’s this guy and he’s trying to do right by his girl. He’s going to be a new dad. I want to help this guy out,” and so she hired him on that one recommendation letter from his homie that he had known for 20 years.
Watch Your P’s and Q’s When You’re New
If you’re getting started in the business and you are moving out on your own. Or if you’re starting a cleaning business and you don’t have any ratings and reviews, don’t worry. You do need some because the rest of the world is going to come looking for your ratings and reviews.
What I recommend is this. I recommend that you watch your P’s and Q’s, as they say. That’s when you go into a private Facebook group, for example, and you are among your peers, watch the language that you use, watch how you treat other people. Are you getting blocked and deleted from people because you’ve got an attitude? Because guess what? House cleaners know house cleaners, and there are a lot of house cleaners in your area already.
Other House Cleaners Can Refer or Deter You For Jobs
If someone says, “Oh, my schedule is full and I can’t come,” they might say, “Hey, I heard of this other house cleaner,” you’re the house cleaner. They’re going to say, “You know what? That person is a hothead. I don’t trust that person. That person has been kicked out of five Facebook groups that I know of. I don’t recommend you have them in your house at all.” That happens as well.
You want to make sure that the message that you portray moving forward is one of fairness, one of being polite and treating other people with respect. Because as you go out into the marketplace, that persona that you carry with you and that reputation is going to follow you.
We live in an era where you can’t take any chances. The internet is so fast when somebody makes a post and it goes to Google. There are programs now that lots of people use for their business, that when you post a message, you can share it on a multiplicity of different platforms simultaneously.
Word Gets Around if You Do a Good Job
Words like that get around. They get around in homeowners’ associations, they get shared at the bus stop. When somebody likes your work, they have a tendency to either go online and they’ll do one of two things. And you see this in one-star and five-star reviews, they’ll say this was the worst experience I ever had or they’ll say this was the best experience I ever had.
If people get a two or a three and it’s average, people don’t usually spend the time and energy to write a rating and review, but you’ll get the best and the worst and people will find that online.
Be the Five-Star Review Type of Person
My recommendation is be the five-star review type person in all of your dealings online, because that’s going to go so far, so fast. I would ask the people that you know,r “Hey, you’ve known me for a very long time. Can you give me a character reference? Can you explain that I offer a 100% satisfaction guarantee and that I have your back?”
That like Mac, he’s not going to leave anybody hanging, and he didn’t. He did an amazing job for this woman and then she went around and she told her friends who had the money, who could hire him. Can you have ratings and reviews if you’ve never done any business? The answer is, yes.
Resources
Control the Narrative: The Executive’s Guide to Building, Pivoting and Repairing Your Reputation – https://amzn.to/2U4Yp1N
Referrals Made Easy – It’s NOT That Hard! – https://amzn.to/3dhdML4
Endless Stream of Referrals: 10 ways to bring in referrals Daily – https://amzn.to/3quvFLJ
Get More Referrals Now! – https://amzn.to/3A6aUdE
Endless Referrals – https://amzn.to/3y1rzx9
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