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How Stress Free Maids Generated $4,000 In First Month | Kacper

Kacper, who works remotely for a tech company as his 9-5 job decided he wanted to start Stress Free Maids as a way to earn extra income for his traveling endeavors around South America. Living in Buenos Aires, he started his business with just under $1,500 and put that towards marketing, business formation fees, website and branding as well as BookingKoala as his maid service software. 

Stress Free Maids generated $4,000 in revenue in the first month and currently have $9,000 in booked cleanings for their third month. What Kacper has done by starting a service business remotely is not uncommon. In fact, more and more people are learning how to start a cleaning business remotely because it gives you the freedom to work from anywhere in the world. 

Why did Kacper start Stress Free Maids? 

Like all entrepreneurs, Kacper wanted to build something that was his own. Living in Buenos Aires, Kacper has always had a love for travel, so when he knew he could work remote for his primary source of income he did just that. 

Now, after experiencing all the wonderful things that Argentina has to offer, Kacper wanted to travel more but he did not want to rely on just one source of income. This is where the idea for starting his maid service came from. 

How much did Kacper invest? 

He saved up around $1,500 to put in as his initial investment. How did he get everything he needed with so little capital? First and foremost he did his research. After gathering all the information he needed he knew where he needed to put that money in order for his business to get off the ground. 

With the help of a friend who works as a designer they created his logo and put the website together. Once that was done, he set up Google Ads which he used $250 of his initial investment to test and track conversions to see if that would be the right marketing avenue for him. Kacper is also reinvesting his profits back into the business so that it can grow faster. 

What sets Stress Free Maids apart from other cleaning services? 

Choosing to go with independent contractors versus traditional employees this helped stay within his initial budget. That is because there was no need to worry about providing supplies, uniforms and various other expenditures that come with hiring employees. Yet his main focus with his contractors and customers was that they would always be on time. 

Speaking with his customers, he quickly realized that one of the biggest pain points was that cleaners from other companies were either showing up late or missing appointments. This is where Kacper saw his opportunity to have Stress Free Maids stand out from the rest. He incentivizes his cleaners with bonuses if they arrive on time which some of you may think “Why would he do that if that’s their job?” This is a good way to build a solid relationship with your cleaners from the start so that you can quickly figure out who is taking their bookings seriously versus the ones who don’t. 

He also credits using BookingKoala as his online booking management as another tool in his arsenal that helps him stay in line with todays growing trend of online ordering. Giving customers the flexibility to book and edit their cleans online without having to call in and speak with someone gives them peace of mind. 

What marketing strategies did you use to get your business up and running? 

The first thing he did was create accounts on every business directory like Yelp, Google, Facebook and Yellow Pages. As we wrote earlier, he started with Google Ads with a first months budget of $250. He then tracked the ads to see how well they were performing and if changes needed to be done. 

What Kacper understood from the beginning was that every ad platform has different success rates for different regions. For example, an ad on Facebook with the target market being Chicago, can have a much different success rate versus that same ad targeting Tampa. 

Once he got his Google ads situated he then went on to Facebook groups and Nextdoor. Creating a simple post introducing himself as a new business owner with a link to his site without being overtly pushy. He was delightfully surprised to see the responses of people who were willing to try his services because he was a local business. He would also post a coupon code for new customers to use on their first clean which helped to break the ice. 

After each first time clean he would call his customers to see how everything went and also offer them a “Refer a friend” discount. This is a great tool to use and is one of the many features built into BookingKoala. He would also not be afraid to ask his customers to leave him reviews on various sites like Yelp, Facebook as well as Google. He states that it starts off slow but if you answer the phone and give great customer service, referrals and word of mouth will help you gain traction quickly. 

How did you hear about BookingKoala? 

Like most of us trying to find something new to use, Kacper started his research on how to start a home cleaning business as well as the best CRM options to use for his service business. After learning about BookingKoala, he started to compare that to the other options that are available. Looking into the reviews, studying all the comprehensive features that are offered, and reading about other users experiences on Twitter he decided to jump in. He chose the Growing plan for $57 per month and hasn’t looked back since.

Being able to implement the booking form onto a preexisting site is a big deal for established companies but having the ability to create and host a website within the platform is a no-brainer for users just starting out because you don’t have additional fees to pay and you can have everything under one account. 

His favorite part of the software is being able to have email and SMS notifications which helps him stay on top of his needs of having his cleaners being on time. There is immense flexibility within the software for managing schedules, scheduling the providers and also at the very basis accepting bookings from customers. 

How much time do you spend on the business? 

In the beginning, outside of working his 9-5, Kacper spent about 4 hours a day getting everything set up properly and trying to hire his providers. Since he was working remote in Argentina he would spend his weekends at cafes building out his automation flow for emails as well as taking calls from customers. 

It didn’t stop there, he was integrating various other apps to help streamline the business as well as working with lawyers to create contracts for the providers he had hired. Although it was not hard to get everything set up it still took time to get everything in place and set up properly. 

Taking the time to learn what needs to be done and how to accomplish that properly should be a priority for anyone thinking about starting a service business. It will help to avoid headaches in the future when running into any issues. 

Now that he has everything set up efficiently to suit his needs, he spends about an hour or two a day to focus on growth as well as monitoring the performance of his marketing strategy. Kacper has also taken the time to record onboarding videos for his providers on how to use the BookingKoala app for providers as well as his various processes. This has saved him vast amounts of time for onboarding which now only takes about five minutes.

Where do you see Stress Free Maids within the next 5 years? 

Kacper wants Stress Free Maids to be regarded as one of the highest quality maid services in Chicago. He knows that primarily focusing on fantastic customer service and providing them with the best possible experience will lead to growth and reaching his goal of $1,000,000 in annual revenue. 

Understanding that there is a lot more work to be done, as well as adding more automation flows, he knows that the biggest part was taking the first step. 

Would you recommend BookingKoala? 

Kacper says that he would 100% recommend BookingKoala, because it’s incredibly intuitive to use and it helps to automate a lot of processes. He goes back to the fact that it helps to reduce time answering phone calls because the online booking form is incredibly easy for customers to use. 

The provider app is very helpful for the cleaners to be more autonomous and reduce communication. Having the ability to clock in and out of jobs is big but also in the event of a cleaner running a bit behind they can send automated messages to the client to inform them. 

He sees BookingKoala as an outstanding tool for his business as it’s the only one he uses and doesn’t plan on switching. As his business grows he knows that the platform will accommodate all his needs and allow him to continue his success. 

Do you have anything else valuable to add to our viewers? 

Kacper believes that if you’re on the fence about starting a business, just jump in and go for it. If you’re spending a lot of time trying to pick between the best cleaning company names just pick one that’s simple and easy to remember. Days will turn into weeks, weeks will turn into months and before you know it so much time will have passed you by that you could have used to already be working on building and growing it. Business owners don’t know everything from day one, quite frankly nobody knows everything. We are always learning and growing each and every day. 

Utilizing the resources that BookingKoala offers like blog posts and the Facebook community group will take you far. Of course there will be obstacles like in all aspects of life but reaching out and asking for help will get you to overcome those obstacles much quicker and easier. 

When he landed his first booking, he still didn’t have a cleaner hired. He said that he went through several test cleans on his apartment back in Chicago with potential providers and none of them ended up working out. He worked relentlessly on finding a provider to take on that first booking until he finally found one. Being over 5,000 miles away he had no way of knowing if this cleaner was going to work out but the main thing he knew was he was not going to give up. 

Adding on to everything he already mentioned, Kacper says that it is incredibly rewarding and a great way to have an additional source of income.

Want to learn more about Kacper and Stress Free Maids?

If you’re interested in learning more, you can check out BookingKoala education, where Kacper shares more tips. Click here to view the course.

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