Latest / Cleaning Business Life / CBL EP 186 Your Pricing Is Wrong (Cleaning Pricing That Actually Works)

Transcript

CBL EP 186 Your Pricing Is Wrong (Cleaning Pricing That Actually Works) · Cleaning Business Life

• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: Hello.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome, welcome, welcome back to the Cleaning Life podcast.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: I am your co-host, Jamie Ronko.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: I am with our host, Shannon Miller, and today we are going to talk about pinning your numbers and prices.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: I think we're doing kind of like a if you listen back to the past couple of podcasts, they should go kind of in order.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: Hammering at home.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, we are.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and and it's that time of year, you guys.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: Spring.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: I I don't know when this will be put out to you guys, but you'll still be in the busy season.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_00: And we want to make sure that, you know, especially if you're you're catching on board now for next year, you are super ready.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_01: Definitely.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_01: And when you say, I want to know your numbers, when when I first got into management in the restaurant industry, looking at a PL, I had no idea what I was looking at.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_01: I had never really, I'd had small businesses, but I didn't get to that piece of my business.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_01: I just knew how much cash flow I had in coming out and what my expenses were.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_01: I learned how to read a PL at TG and I Fridays, which is like sub-existent.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_01: I don't even I think there's only like 12 of them open anymore when at one point there was like 300 of them.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: Oh yeah.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_01: I want to say before I worked, before I worked with you, I didn't people talk about their numbers, it's intimidating because you don't know, you're grasping on the wall to try to figure out what numbers are important, what numbers are not important, what does this number over here mean?
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_01: And this and pricing comes down to knowing your numbers, and it's just one piece of that PL.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: So if you're not pricing, and I've mentioned this before, you could bankrupt yourself.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_01: If you're not pricing accordingly, if you're giving away too many free cleanings, if you're giving away too many discounts, if you're doing all these things, it can be detrimental to your PL.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_01: When I worked for TGI Fridays, the big thing was the Jack Daniels ribs.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: Well, they would put these mailers in, and I worked at the Long Beach location and the Cerritos location, and then I worked at a couple other locations.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_01: They would have those$5 mailers and every single table, hundreds, hundreds of people would come in to get the$5 discount off of it.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_01: And then you would see how much it would actually take out because we had the POP, which was the marketing.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_01: Then we had the discount itself, which actually, when it when you're discounting$5, you're not really discounting$5.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_01: It's usually two to three times that amount, if not more, you're discounting because there's cost to put the ad out.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_01: There's print, there is the mailer, there was all of these attributes that the person who created the ad way easier now to do than when I was in the restaurant industry.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_01: But there's a lot of dynamics of learning how to read your PL and being comfortable with it.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_01: So you don't want to get stuck.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_01: And this is something that you can learn.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_01: I still to this day, I point, I look at stuff, I'm like, what is that?
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_01: And 16 years in, and it's some random thing, it's some new random thing that's like, oh, well, this is this.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, well, I've never seen that before, right?
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_01: Some weird KPI that was like the new, it's like the new thing.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's, you know, so don't be intimidated when your math doesn't make sense.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_01: Just try to get one system down at a time.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_01: Your pricing, the three biggies are your pricing, your customer funnel, and your cleaning tech funnel.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_01: Those are the big the biggies.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_01: Everything else can kind of work itself through the kinks.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_01: And you don't have to be right all the time, but you'll start when you start to track your pricing, you'll start to notice where you're bleeding out money versus not bleeding out money.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_01: Or I made a grand off of this one.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_01: Woo-hoo, right?
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_01: But a grand isn't the same as getting a client that's bi-weekly where you're making 300 bucks a pop off of them for each visit.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_01: So there's that math, right?
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: Math.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_01: So what people think a lot of times is I'll just go with my gut, I'll fly by the sea of my pants.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_01: And what's actually happened is they're undercharging without realizing it.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_01: And it's not until you look at your PL, your profit and loss, that you start to go, oh yeah.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: I do know how to read it minimal, at least the minimum part you we were growing fast paced a rate.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: I needed to hire another coach specifically for the financial financial for Michel and start deep diving more than just learning my PLs, but learning habits and but I'm gonna be transparent.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: I I needed to hire somebody to help me understand that because it was just I I needed to say, hey, before we get any further, let's let's tweak this up, tighten the bolts a little, because I know it's coming, I know growth is coming, and it's painful.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: You guys know that it is a it can be painful because I've never been this to high on the ladder before.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: I'm going through this this and I don't know for everyone.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_00: I and I do that so that I can also come on here and talk about it with under so that we all right.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_01: And there's no crime in not knowing what a PL is or how to read it, but at least look at your reports.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_01: If you're not doing your books yourself and someone else is handing you a report, have them have them.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_01: Part of their service to you should be that they explain all of the nuances of the PL or the specific report, like the customer summary report or whatever report you fancy that you want, so that you kind of start to understand where the bulk of your money is going.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, a lot of us, the number one cost is the employee piece, and it should be these are the ones generating the income, the cleaning tax anyway.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_01: So that's just these are just things to think about, and there is no right or wrong.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_01: Just start to take steps to make yourself aware so that you're not shooting yourself in the foot going, how come I'm still not making any money?
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_01: Because I've been there.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_01: I've been like, I'm working all these crazy hours, I got all these helpers.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_01: How come I'm not making any money?
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_01: It was because my pricing, I wasn't charging enough.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't understand the dynamics.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_01: I just copied the model that I came from and I was like, woohoo, here I am, right?
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_01: And it that wasn't the case when I really added in what it cost me.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, I'm giving away cleaning.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: So it happens, and it happened to me.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_00: So it yeah, it's happened to the best of us.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_00: I I am in between the two of them at least once or twice a week.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_00: Some people can go to there's you know, not that, but I I need to really keep track, and I got homework that I have to do for my coat to make sure that I am understanding completely all of this.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, yeah, and it's to make more profit, right?
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_01: Right, because that's that's the goal is to be an absentee owner, and uh that we can talk about that.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_01: We can have a whole segment one time.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: Do you want to make sure that you're not getting stuck in the trap and that you're not being fully booked and then you're still broke because it's happened to all of us.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_01: Just be aware that it could happen in the busy schedule full days and thinking everything was working, and then actually looking at the numbers and realizing you're off.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_01: So it wasn't until someone printed it out, said this is what it is.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, Are you sure?
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_00: I was this this all looks good to me.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_01: It's bananas and bananas, right?
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, shame.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, you wanna you don't want to work on long hours without enough profit and the realization moment.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_01: And I used to, and this was years ago, I used to have a 24-hour guarantee.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_01: And what that guarantee was is we would come back and reclean, and I still gave you a refund, not a good business decision ever.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_01: I and I I I shake my head.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: I don't, I guess I was just overcompensating and giving way too much customer service.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_01: And then people, certain people would learn that hey, Shannon would I could complain and Shannon would give me a four refund and I would get my house cleaned fantastic, right?
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_01: And then that stopped, and then it just became, and then now it is what it is.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_01: We all we don't offer refunds, we only come back and reclean.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_01: And if you argue with me, we're not even gonna come back and reclean.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_01: You're just gonna you're just gonna take it.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_01: And that's just I don't want to, I'm not debating, you know what I mean?
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_01: It's just it's there's too many other things going on for sure.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_01: Not that it's not important, customer service.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_01: We have we've groomed our society to expect something for free.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_01: I look at the Airbnb Facebook pages and how awful it is on both sides of it.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_01: It scares the crap out of me because there are people who will stay and then they get all freaked out over like, there's a fly in the house, I want a full refund.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_01: You're like, what?
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_01: We're in the jungle.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_01: There, of course there's gonna be flies, or they're in a beach house, they're sand in the house, I want a full refund, even though they stayed there for five years, five days, not five years.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_00: Five days, yeah.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_01: These these expectations become unrealistic.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_01: So we've we've coddled and burped and diapered all these customers to go, oh, you owe me.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: And they've never had a business, they don't understand how much all of that cost.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_01: So you should not give a refund.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_01: Every once in a while, I still have to do it because I'm just done.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_01: And when I lose my temper, I have to actually be by myself.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_01: It's me to go, and I have to reflect on how I got in the position I'm in and why I'm doing what I'm doing, and why I had to give a refund.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_01: And then, you know, sometimes I have to have a glass of scotch, sometimes I don't.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_01: It just depends.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_00: It is.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_00: I boy, I put my foot down so high whenever I there's just very rare instances, but I did give in, but there's that thing that's protecting all of us.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_00: Like we'll come back and do a reclaim, but I usually don't I don't refunds.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: It just says, like you said, you're just I I want you out.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: I want you out of my head space, right?
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_00: There's too many other people that I need to deal with.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_00: Take the refund, you're not on my schedule anymore.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_01: And you're 86 for life.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_01: 86!
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_00: I've learned from I landing to program that because there's right I have it 86 for life.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: I'll have it in Jobber 86 for life.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_00: They have a tag, I have a tag, a tag for that, right?
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_01: Because you you won't remember and they'll call three years later and you're like, this sounds familiar.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_01: And then after you take all the information, you take them back on, you're like, Oh my god! It was happening.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_00: You yeah, you get back in.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, but I don't see this a lot.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_00: It's like it's like don't be full of yourself because if it's not a flex, you guys, if you're completely booked.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_00: That's not a flex.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_00: That is that tells me and Shannon that you're not pricing high enough, and you're uh everybody's gonna course seek you out because you're just in they're gonna take advantage of that opportunity, and you're overworked, underpaid, uh and the math is not math anymore, right?
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it is a trap, it is a trap.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_00: So busy schedules, full days thinking everything was working, and then actually look at the numbers and realize that something is off, right?
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, if you weren't charging based on math, sometimes people are charging based on what people would pay.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_01: And there's a lot of mindset work here.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_01: There's a couple of people, I actually have a free course on my website.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_01: I I can't remember, manifest anything you want.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_01: That came out with a collaboration over competition.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_01: It was an extra bonus that I gave away for that talk on um Zen May, the Maid Summit.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_01: And there is some mindset working that you have to do.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_01: So if you're not comfortable charging those dollars, sit there and analyze.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_01: There's some exercises for you to do basic, it's basic 101 on what that mindset is and why you feel the way it is.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_01: Start to kind of work through why you're uncomfortable charging 150 bucks or 175 bucks.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_01: And I hear it all the time, and Jamie hears it too.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_01: I live in a small town, and no one will pay those prices.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, I live in a small town.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_01: Jamie lives in a smaller town than me, she gets more money than me.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_00: Well, it it's it's like there's I'm gotten done trying to explain it to some people, and you know, there's new coming in.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_00: I and sure, a lot of you see me around or Shannon in groups, and it's like why should you get those prices?
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_00: I I would have said that I said the same thing.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_00: I said the same thing.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, I I remember whenever I was charging$25 an hour and I hired Shannon as my coach, and she was like, What I I remember doing switching over from hourly pricing to flat rates.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I should have had a glass of wine that night or something because I was just and and the people leave you and like they they will pay your prices.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_00: We're in the most highest taxed state.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_00: I think New York is right above you.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_00: It just is they're not for businesses, so I I you have to charge accordingly.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_00: This is what we need in order to make this company fun.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_00: And I still have people that have switched over from the hourly rates now, and they stay, but they know the value of this.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_00: Like I I've said this a million times in other podcasts.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_00: This is the cheapest therapy that your client can get.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_00: And it's huge, it is, it's huge.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_00: It's them walking in to self-care it does something for it's it's and they value that and you do a good job, you got it.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_00: You got it.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: So that's not we're not I I know I went off on a tangent there, but it kind of does come back to so what are the different systems that we we do?
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_00: What which what are the there's hourly tie targets, there's time per job, there's core concept uh cost versus price.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_00: What are those, Shannon?
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_01: An hourly target, so and this gets way more involved than what this podcast is gonna be, and this is what we're talking in the pricing accelerator that's happening later this month, but it's the hourly target.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_01: What's the hourly, your not mine, not Jamie's, what's your hourly target?
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_01: To there's a break-even point and there's a profit point.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_01: So those will be the two numbers.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_01: There's actually a third number, I can't remember what it is because we're doing this on the fly.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_01: So you need to know what your time is worth.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_01: And some people don't feel comfortable and will only continually charge$90 an hour, and that's totally okay.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_01: We just don't want to see you in the group going, I can't make any money because I live in a small town.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_01: I don't want to hear it.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_01: And if you want$50 an hour, then that's gonna be your baseline.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: Right now, and I've mentioned this, I believe, I don't remember which podcast we were talking about, but that the national average right now is like$67.50 an hour per person.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_01: Can you go to a customer and say, I'm gonna be charging you$67.50 an hour per person?
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_01: No, they're gonna have a fit and they're gonna say all kinds of things to you.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_01: So you just eliminate it and learn how to bid at a flat rate price with a range so that you understand the math.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_01: And that's what your your hourly target.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_01: And then when you get more sophisticated and you've been doing this a couple of years, you can start to pull certain KPIs, or maybe you have a piece of software or a sheet that adds all of those calculations in.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_01: That's not me, by the way.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_01: I'd have to pay someone to do it.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_01: I can do it by hand.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_01: You just have a spreadsheet made for you if you don't know how to do it, and that's totally okay because I'm one of those people.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_01: And then that will tell you what your targets are.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_01: So if it's$50 an hour, you need to know you need it'll tell you how many clients you have and what the other price point is.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_01: It'll tell you because it's all calculated with math.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_01: The time per job, how long does the job actually take?
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_01: 600 square feet an hour.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_01: Professional cleaning person is going to be able to clean.
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_01: When they get good and they're more seasoned, guess what?
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_01: They can do 800 to 1000 square feet an hour.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_01: And you're like, no way.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, yes, yes, they can.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_01: They can.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_01: But that takes a while to get there.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_01: But the the goal should be pricing at 600 square feet an hour, right?
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_01: So if you have 1,500 square feet, right?
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_01: Hypothetically,$50 an hour.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_01: You know, if we did 500 square feet for easy math, that would be three hours.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_01: We all know that 1,500 square feet isn't gonna take three hours, especially once you learn the house or the cleaning tech learns the house.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_01: It's gonna go down to two and a half hours.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_01: You just gave yourself a price increase, a price raise, right?
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_01: So time per job, you decide what the time per job is going to be, not the client.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_01: When you're charging hourly, guess what?
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_01: It benefits the customer, not you.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_01: And then the cost versus the price, that's what it costs.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_01: You so you have your labor, right?
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_01: You have the payroll taxes, workmen's comp, general liability.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_01: All of those add into the combo of what that costs, right?
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_01: That's what you're we call it often wholesale pricing, right?
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_01: When you're doing secret shoppers, you're they're paying wholesale pricing and they have to sign an agreement.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_01: They won't tell anybody that they're getting wholesale pricing.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_01: And they have to be nice and they have to give you reviews, and there's all that stuff that goes along with it.
• 19:29
  unknown: Yeah.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_01: So your labor supply and your overhead, and then if you're lucky and nothing gets screwed up, you have the profit.
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_01: So if you don't know your numbers, you're guessing your pricing.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_00: And so this isn't complicated, it's all void.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_01: Because they don't teach it.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_01: I wish when we became housewives or domestic engineers and we started to do this.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_01: I wish that they would treat households because that technically is as a business.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_01: You get a PL every month, you look at we used to do it, they called it balancing your checkbook back in the day.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_01: But now I think that your home and your expenses should be put in a PL so you can see this is my mortgage payment.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_01: This is what I paid in interest on my mortgage payment.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_01: Oh.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_01: This is what my property taxes are.
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_01: And then you're you because technically we're already business owners, we're running our homes, right?
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_01: This is a concept to think that you're transitioning from being an hourly employee somewhere.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_01: However, you're already a business owner because you're a domestic engineer.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_01: That's what I used to tell people I was.
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_01: What are you doing?
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_01: I'm a domestic engineer.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, how long did you do that?
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_01: About 15 years.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I love it.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_01: Very much money.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah, I made tons of money, right?
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_01: I think that your house.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_01: On a PL so you can see where your expenses are.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_01: Oh my gosh, that that REI credit card, we shouldn't have gone on that hike.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_01: I shouldn't have bought those new hiking boots, right?
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna chuck that down.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_01: Oh my god, it's 29% interest.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_01: It will tell you because it'll break it down for you.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_01: We don't do that because it's not taught in school.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_01: I wish it was.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_00: Again, like I said at the beginning of this show, I hired somebody that does make me those spreadsheets because I want I needed that.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_00: I needed to separate, I was having trouble separating the personal and understanding what was for personal and what I co-mingled.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_00: So it's like trying to do brain surgery for me.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_00: So, but I I I wanna get it's also like almost paid.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like I'm almost paying for college or that's my life.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_00: This isn't just for this, but it's my my yeah, uh avoiding it what's cost yeah, you don't have a pricing problem.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_00: And that is totally me.
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_00: That what it can be was me.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_00: Like I said, I I needed some help, and whenever I I need help, I know now the value of hiring a coach and a mentor, and it don't just have to be for just cleaning, or you know, obviously, or because whenever it's to me, whenever it all comes, I I I know how to get the clients because I guess what I hired a coach to help me teach.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, I know the value of coaches, and because I did in the beginning have a math problem.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_01: Always an opportunity to have a coach.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_01: And in the there we're notorious, our industry notorious for DIYing it.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_01: I get it, but you get to a point where you want to fast track things.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_01: If you don't want to DIY it, I recommend picking someone who resonates with you, someone who's honest and has integrity.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_01: It and Go with that person and don't make it like for uh for everything, right?
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_01: You don't want to have it's like having the same counselor, right?
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_01: You can't have the same counselor for 10 years, you need to have a different person because they have a different perspective on whatever's going on, different eyes on it, yeah.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_01: But we we both budget every year for it's a line item in my budget for coaching, whatever that is that we decide for that year.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_01: I'm on a different coaching plan than Jamie is because I have coaches myself, and and that's helped fast track me to do a lot of things that I would have still been trying to figure out if I didn't get the help.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, because you need someone who has experience.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_01: People are like, well, can't you know there's a and this is off topic.
• 23:37
  SPEAKER_01: The people are like, well, you can go to there's the SBA and you can get a mentor and blah, blah, blah.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_01: There is a mentor program through there, which is great, but mentors typically aren't charging.
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_01: You're not gonna get the juicy bits.
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_01: You want the juicy bits of what they have learned with the real life experience.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_01: And the most frustrating thing I found when you went to the SBA is they had never really been in business for themselves, and they they didn't have any skin.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, right, right.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_00: No, I I I agree.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_00: I do, I agree, I do agree that they do offer a lot of different classes to help you, but I do agree whenever it comes to mentoring, it's like, well, what do you what business did you own?
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_00: Do you care you know, because I'm I'm looking to be the you know in the room with businesses that are you know million, two million, that because that's where I want to be, right?
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_00: And and pro and gross revenue.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_00: I ask questions now.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_00: I know how to ask questions and make sure.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_00: Like, do you are you there?
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_00: I agree about that.
• 24:48
  unknown: Definitely.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_01: So if any part of this is where you're feeling overwhelmed, that's exactly why I built the pricing blueprint masterclass 1.0.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_01: It's legitimately 10 bucks off my website at Clean Street University because we simplified this and walk you through it step by step so you actually understand certain numbers.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_01: This is the starting point, it's not going to give you all of the D the KPIs or anything, it's a very basic rundown of how to price to get to get the math behind the thought process of what you're doing.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, because once you understand it, everything else starts to hear you guys.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_01: Leave it.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_00: And that's probably right, yeah.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_00: That's probably what most people are totally.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_00: So what if I'm not good at my numbers?
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_00: What if is is that where we're yeah, what if what if I'm not good with my numbers, right?
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_00: What if it feels overwhelming?
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_00: And do I really need to know all of this?
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, yes, and yes.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely you do, absolutely you do.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_01: You don't have to be good with your numbers initially, but you have to have some basics.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I think okay, I can experience before whenever it was littler, my business was a little i I could I can manage it.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_00: I knew a little I felt like I I was comfortable.
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_00: I could I knew what I was doing.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_00: But as it and more and more money was coming at me, I got really like n I won't say imposter syndrome, but kind of something like that.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_00: But I've also gotten to where I was getting analysis paralysis.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_00: Like I was analyzing everything before I could pull the trigger the move, and that will I I knew that was not something that I needed to do.
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_00: And yes, you absolutely have to know all this stuff, just a little bit in the beginning.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_00: As you oh I you know, the verses uh for QuickBooks, um you might have to pay for them, but it it's like a from the SBA, like a seven or six part series, you know, before you start selling it of the read, you know, and then later on, then you can go with your K, you know, KBS and all that stuff and and learn your your pipeline and where's your bottlenecks and download.
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_01: One layer deep.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_01: Go Libby, go Libby.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_01: Oh my gosh.
• 27:47
  SPEAKER_01: So you don't need to be good at math, you need to be willing to look at it and take it in steps.
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't have to be all done at once.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_01: When I first got into the cleaning industry, I actually took, I'm dating myself, I took a college course on QuickBooks.
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_01: I wanted a basic knowledge of what I was talking about because, you know, the only math I got was my mom balanced her checkbook.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_01: I had balanced my own home.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_01: I had had other businesses, but they were micro businesses.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_01: They weren't like big, big, big.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_01: What I consider micro businesses, that might be a different story for you because my price point's a little different than yours.
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_01: But that that way I gave me some basics on, you know, what a deductible was, what this was, what why this is considered this.
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_01: And I get gave me some roundabout information.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_01: Has it changed over time?
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_01: Oh my gosh, has it changed?
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_01: Do I like to do it all the time?
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_01: No, but at least if I'm looking at something, I have an idea of what I'm looking at.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not guessing.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_00: You need to on your your whatever you're using to track your numbers at.
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I can't say I'm in there.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_00: I am in there and I am asking questions if I don't know.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_00: I am looking at from this quarter, from last year's quarter, and how we can fix that.
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you need to be in there looking.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_01: You do.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_01: Your person, if you're not doing your books yourself, your person should be giving you reports regularly.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_01: Make sure that you're checking with whoever that is, your bookkeeper or your accountant or your CPA, so that they are giving you the information you need.
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_01: Because if a huge opportunity lands in your lap, you won't know if you can afford to do it because you're gonna have to cover payroll, you're not gonna get paid for 30 days or whatever's going on with your business.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_01: So that's super important so that you understand.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, maybe I why am I spending eight grand in advertisement and I've not getting any any ROI?
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_01: And people are like, What's ROI?
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, return on investment.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_01: So there's all of this stuff that's swirling around.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_01: So just take it in small incremental steps.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_01: You don't have to take a college course.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_01: No, things are way easier now.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_01: You can go into the small business administration.
• 29:49
  SPEAKER_01: They I can't, I think it's like 12 bucks a class.
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_01: It's pretty economical considering charge.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_00: There are resources out there, but you do be aware.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_00: You you do need to have a little bit of idea of how to read not every single thing, but you do need until you get you know start getting up there, and then you'll start nerd.
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_01: That's okay too.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it is.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's I you know, I'm trying to make it to a million dollars.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_00: I ain't trying to collapse over whenever I get there, neither.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, you know, I'm not and I think that's a lot of people's or a hundred thousand.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_00: I remember my first year, I thought Shannon was absolutely insane saying that I could make a hundred thousand my first year, and I surpassed that and it yeah, just get in there and and peek around QuickBooks.
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_00: It's a common one, and it does all the work for you.
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_00: You just put it in your you know, your numbers or your your invoices, and then it kind of starts spitting it out for you.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_00: And what's great about QuickBooks is if you have it for years, like we have, you can start seeing the patterns.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_00: I know we'll take I know March of the year, so is I believe it's either September or August.
• 31:32
  SPEAKER_00: I can't remember.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's September, like the kids are back in school, and people, you know, people are I think it's September, but those are our two slowest months of the year.
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_01: Not for very much longer, but just for now.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, just for now.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, like the business owners.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_01: Like I talked to a lot of business owners and Mike, so would you gross last year, and 50%, 50% of the people I talk to don't have an idea, not even a random idea of how much money they pulled in last year or the year.
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I I feel like also a lot of new people are their nose is to the ground.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_00: Just trying to and I I think something clicks inside of your head, like I I think I want to give it a go at this and see if I can't scale it.
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_00: And then that's whenever it's like, oh, I should have been tracking my numbers all along, you know, and and you're trying to do a catch-up.
• 32:34
  SPEAKER_01: That happens too.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_00: I they don't they're they don't even know what what do you mean, numbers?
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like yeah, what'd you what'd you make last year?
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_00: And they don't that is something I believe that I have always done, but again, I've talked to people where they don't know neither to, so I you know recently wanted to go big.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I'm I'm dramatic anyway, so you're not everything has to be over the top.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_00: Like I don't want to be the biggest.
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah.
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_00: So even just tracking, yeah, go ahead.
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_01: So let's keep this simple.
• 33:14
  SPEAKER_01: And here's what to do next.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_01: You're gonna decide your hourly target.
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_01: If it's$50 an hour, start off there.
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_01: It's easier for math.
• 33:21
  SPEAKER_01: 50 50 is really easy to break down.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_01: Track how long your jobs are actually taking, and and and put this in a sheet, an Excel sheet, pages or number sheet or Google Docs sheet, I can't remember what it's called over there on Google Docs, but you'll you'll know what I'm talking about.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_01: And compare what you're charging versus your time spent and you'll start to see a pattern and adjust pricing where needed.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_01: And we talked a lot about price increases last year.
• 33:45
  SPEAKER_01: If you come across a house and you're ready and you're full, I would give them your legacy clients a bump just to kind of make sure that you're you because then you, if you're spending more time than what you initially had anticipated spending in the house, it's already underpriced, and then you're bleeding out money.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_01: You can never scale that house.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_01: Someone else can't go and fill it in because guess what?
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_01: They're not going to clean as fast as you clean.
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_01: They're not going to do the same job as you because they're stressed out because you are pushing them too hard and you you cut it short, right?
• 34:15
  SPEAKER_01: And then you don't need to emphasize, you don't need to, you don't need to have perfect numbers, but you just need to start having awareness of what those numbers are.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_01: So as Jamie gave the example, you know, 50% of the people I talk to don't know their numbers, and it's because they are nine times out of ten, they're out and doing the grind still, and they just are exhausted and they don't have the time to get those numbers in there.
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_01: So that's when you decide that that might be the first person that you hire is a bookkeeper or an accountant.
• 34:43
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, good idea.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_00: So even just help you.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_00: That'll just get you started.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_00: Just try and track it for one week and then see what happens.
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 34:58
  SPEAKER_01: That alone will open your eyes.
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_01: If you take anything from this episode, stop guessing your pricing.
• 35:05
  SPEAKER_01: Stop, just stop.
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_01: Start understanding your numbers because clarity creates confidence.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_01: You never know when you're gonna get that big fat contract.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_00: That's true.
• 35:17
  SPEAKER_00: We just we had a government reach out to us, like, yay! And once once you understand it, everything starts to feel a little more in control.
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_00: Whenever you're growing, it's just and you're learning all this, it so feels so overwhelming and a lot of pressure, and that kind of it's growth.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_00: It's growth.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_00: I literally have to tell me that congratulations.
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_00: Why Jamie don't does not need to stress.
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_00: I just got a loom video over that, and it's it's because I know I'm growing, and it's like, well, I have at least a one-day freak out day a month, once at least like, oh my gosh, I can't do this.
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_00: I'm aware not anymore.
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_00: Oh my gosh.
• 36:09
  SPEAKER_00: Well, yeah, you're up there though.
• 36:11
  SPEAKER_00: You're up there, so yeah.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_01: So your business should be built on numbers and not emotions.
• 36:17
  SPEAKER_01: Remember, you always hear me saying every time I make an emotional decision, I end up eating a lot of money.
• 36:22
  SPEAKER_01: Just remember that.
• 36:23
  SPEAKER_01: And when you understand your numbers, you stop reacting and you can start leading because then you'll know you'll be a little more aware.
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't have to be perfect, you just have to have a general awareness about it because it's important to know where you sit.
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 36:36
  SPEAKER_00: So if this episode helped you, make sure you're subscribed so that you don't miss out on the next one.
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_00: Like, share, comment, leave some comments down.
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe we should do a QA on some of the comments that we get one time or something.
• 36:53
  SPEAKER_00: How much you love the show and and we'd like to be able to share it to other people and reach others.
• 37:00
  SPEAKER_01: So definitely.
• 37:02
  SPEAKER_01: So if you're ready to fix your pricing and actually understand your numbers, check out the pricing blueprint master class 1.0.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_01: We walk you through this step by step so you're not guessing.
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_01: As always, we love you.
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_01: Farewell.
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_01: Talk to you guys soon.
• 37:15
  SPEAKER_01: Bye.
• 37:15
  SPEAKER_01: Bye.