Play Powerball with Your Business

​As we emerge out of the pandemic, people are wanting their homes and offices cleaned again. This week alone, I got 5 opportunities to quote! Before I share the 5 leads, I want to explain a principle. Are you familiar with the lotto machine?

The Power Ball Lotto Machine has 69 white ping pong balls that bounce around off each other and the machine walls until 5 are selected. There's a second machine with 26 red balls, where 1 is selected to go with the 5 white ones. I want you to think about your marketing machine like this lotto machine. Every time you make a new connection and build up the know, like, and trust factor in that relationship, you enter a new white ball into your machine. If you only have 1 ball in there, you will get a lead eventually, but you will have to wait. What if there was only one white ball in the lotto machine? Well, you'd have a 100% of winning and therefore the Lotto would not allow that game to run. The 'house' would lose every time. One white ball is a losing game. What about adding a second white ball? Well, if the Lotto game was drawing one ball as the winner, you'd have 50% odds like a coin flip. The house would lose here too, so they would only run this game if the payout was small. As you add more balls from 1 to the full 69, the odds of winning reduce dramatically. Therefore, the payout increases as the odds decrease. Check this out, the odds of winning Powerball are 1 in 292,201,338! With odds this low, the house knows they can create HUGE payouts to entice more players to play with the higher payout stakes. And the house knows that they will make money. They will have payouts to winners of $150M, $300M, $500M, or 63% in total payouts (according to a CNN Money article from 2017). In other words, the 'House' or state governments that run the Lotto count the 63% in winner payouts as an expense. There is still 37% leftover that pays the overhead and variable costs to run the Lotto. The profits remaining according to the article can be upwards of $16B annually for states. It's a profitable business for sure. 

Here's the concept I want to draw from this. The more balls in the machine, the lower the odds and higher the payout. Treat your solo cleaning business like a Lotto Machine. Put yourself into position as often as possible to create new connections for future business. Nurture those relationships by serving them. Build your Know, Like, and Trust factor over time. This will add tons of white ping pong balls into your marketing machine. They will bounce around and leads will start coming more and more frequently. As you get more leads (due to more connections and ping pong balls), the demand for your service goes up... and so do your prices or payout!

If you're been following this podcast, you've listened as I've built my new cleaning network in the Philly Area. I've made many connections and I've served them. In early 2020, I had a handful of ping pong balls in my marketing machine that generated a few leads. I invested time during COVID to educate and serve. This added a ton of white balls. Now, I'm seeing the fruit. This week 5 white balls were drawn from my machine:
 

1. Mike - He's in my MCBA networking group. He needed a new cleaner. He knew and trusted me, plus he's been reading my cleaning newsletters. He called me within an hour of receiveing one of these weekly newsletters.
2. Dennis - He's a current client that is very happy with my work. One of his tenants needed cleaning and he gave me the chance to bid on the job because of the trust.
3. Mary Ann - She's in my BIB networking group. She referred me to a colleague at Berkshire Hathaway real estate for a presentation cleaning. Mary Ann knows me from the group and trusts me.
4. Jim - He's in my MCBA group too. He referred me to his aunt who works with autistic kids and needs a cleaner weekly for her classrooms and restrooms.
5. Tom -  I did an estimate for Tom's office months ago and then he appeared as a new member in my MCBA group. He referred me to a friend in his chamber with an insurance business that was interested in starting a podcast. I'm the first guy that Tom thought of. Tom mentioned that it could lead to a future cleaning client as he owns a small agency with an office.

This week, I completed a sale-ready presentation cleaning for Lon Clemmer from Sanford Aldefer Real Estate. The property sold in 1 day and got 9 offers! They were so pleased with my cleaning. Lon invited me to stop over the office to drop off cards. I stopped there after my estimate with Jim Hardy's aunt.

I also connected with another cleaning business owner this week, Alonzo Adams of Busy Bee Cleaning Company in Chester County, PA. Alonzo is very successful in business. He is also a founder, past president, and current chairman of ARCSI. We had a great conversation. I'm going to join my industry's professional organization finally, take certification courses to up my game as a specialist ("Train Your Clients"), and possibly lead some webinars for ARCSI on the power of using solo cleaners in your large business. This new connection is another white ping pong ball into my machine!