Challenges Small Cleaning Businesses Face and How to Overcome them

Challenges Small Cleaning Businesses Face and How to Overcome them

Oct 15, 2022 | Audrey
Cleaning service providers are big players in the cleaning business industry. Having gained maximum acceptance and popularity during the recent COVID pandemic, the cleaning industry has experienced tremendous growth as business owners and customers continue to invest in clean and better environmental conditions. 

A recent study by Jobber Academy revealed that the trends of companies that focus on residential cleaning show a steady 20% annual growth. By 2024, it is anticipated that 80% of families will make use of house cleaning services. And interestingly by 2027, more and more people are expected to use commercial cleaning services with an anticipated revenue of more than $468B. Nearly 10% of all American households spent money on house cleaning services in the previous year. 

Although the global cleaning services industry is lucrative and has experienced massive growth and innovation in recent years, a lot of small cleaning businesses close down after a few months of operation because of several  challenges. Is there a way out? Yes, of course! 

TimeConnect is the best software for small cleaning business owners. Also, the prices of our cleaning software features are super affordable and can help you manage your small cleaning business with smooth and efficient business operations guaranteed. This is why you need to invest in a residential cleaning business software like TimeConnect to boost operations, close deals faster and improve customer experience. 

In this article, we will discuss the several challenges faced by small cleaning businesses. We will also present some common reasons why they fail and how you can overcome them in order to succeed as a cleaning business owner. Let's get started! 

1. Poor Customer Data Analysis and Satisfaction Management

Every successful business thrives on quality service delivery and one or more happy customers. Inability to carry out adequate customer data analysis and proper customer experience management is one of the major challenges faced by small cleaning businesses today. Remember the popular mantra that "customer is king". You can't build a good cleaning business without proper customer experience management. 

As a cleaning business owner, you should focus on analyzing customer data, get valuable insights from customer feedback and reviews, and use that as a blueprint for ensuring improved customer satisfaction. A reliable solution for this challenge is the TimeConnect application. 

Small cleaning business owners can now upload customer data and stay up-to-date with  references using TimeConnect's automated customer management features to set appointments, create cleaning service proposals, upload and manage all your customer data from an easy-to-use dashboard. 

2. Inability to Adapt to Increasing Technological Innovations of the Digital Age

Adapting to advancements in technology and staying up-to-date with trends in this digital era is another reason why most small cleaning businesses shut operations after the first few months of commencement. Life as we see it today has gone digital. Staff and owners of cleaning businesses often find it difficult to reach new customers because they still follow the old ways of customer acquisition in marketing per se. 

The Internet has come to stay and digital marketing is one of the reliable solutions for reaching new customers which most cleaning businesses ignore. Platforms like Facebook, Instagram and Twitter are great places to start. The goal is to reach the right audience for your small cleaning business irrespective of their location.  

3. Poor Staff Management Due to High Employee Turnover

Yes, poor staff management is another major reason why most cleaning businesses shut down after a few months of operation!  The rapid growth in the cleaning service industry coupled with high employee turnover as a result of the subtle rise in remote work opportunities has made managing employees and staff of cleaning businesses more difficult than ever. 

With the TimeConnect application, however, employee management is easy! TimeConnect is also an employee location tracking app that allows cleaning business owners to  monitor and track the location of their staff, manage clock in and out through automated Timesheets, and download or print employee data at any point in time. 

4. Increasing Competition in the Cleaning Industry

Most easy-to-find cleaning services focus on residential/ home cleaning. The entry barrier for residential cleaning businesses in the cleaning industry is super low. Although this means that starting a small cleaning business may be easy, it exposes cleaning business owners to fierce competition. 

To overcome this challenge as a small cleaning business owner, you need to learn a lot of strategy by observing your competitors and the pain points of their customers. The harder part is figuring out how they relate with prospects and close deals. Improving the services you offer with reasonable discount packages is also a great way to beat the market competition. 

Overall, your goal should be to understand your competitors in the industry and offer better services while being armed with quality service delivery to ensure that your customers stay happy after patronizing your services and discount packages. 

5. High Cost of Operations

Now, here's the most important part of our discussion in this article. Many small cleaning businesses close down because of high cost of operations. Although starting a cleaning service business is not expensive, running the business actually is. 

You may have to buy new cleaning equipment, tools, fuel and maintain them, and also cater for your staff too. All of these require good money. And with the high rate of competition in the cleaning industry coupled with inability to find new customers for business, most small businesses have no other choice than to bow out of business. 

In order to avoid significant financial issues along the line as a business owner, you have to carefully evaluate the cost implications of managing staff, purchase and maintenance of cleaning equipment, and also modify operations in light of global inflation rates. 


TimeConnect is an affordable cleaning software with automation features that reduces the cost of operations, ensuring effective employee management and reduces staff recruitment costs as most of the jobs done by manual labor can be delivered effectively through this house cleaning business software.