Episode #3 - FREE ADVICE VS. BEST ADVICE What is best for your Cleaning Business!!

In this episode of Cleaning Business Life, we dive into a crucial topic for every cleaning business owner—how to distinguish between free advice and the best advice for growing your business. While social media platforms like TikTok, Facebook, and YouTube are full of cleaning business tips, it’s essential to evaluate whether that advice truly supports your long-term success.

Key Takeaways from This Episode

🔹 Investing in Yourself & Your Business
Free advice may seem appealing, but investing in expert guidance and business education can take your cleaning business to the next level.

🔹 Pricing Strategies for Maximum Profit
Pricing can make or break your cleaning business. Learn proven pricing strategies in the Pricing Blueprint Master Class to ensure you're charging the right rates.

🔹 Contracts & Agreements for Business Protection
Having solid agreements in place prevents costly misunderstandings. The Basic Contract Bundle Master Class provides ready-to-use templates for essential cleaning business contracts.

🔹 Preparing Clients for Cleaning Crews
Setting client expectations is key! Educate your customers on how to prepare for their cleaning appointment, such as picking up personal items before the crew arrives.

🔹 Establishing Payment Boundaries
Clearly outline payment policies to protect your cash flow. Avoid late payments by setting expectations upfront in your contracts.

🔹 Why You Need a Bookkeeper & CPA
Managing finances correctly is vital for business growth. Work with a professional bookkeeper and CPA like Corsbie’s Bookkeeping Service to keep your finances in order. Contact Andre Corsbie at 863.236.9226 for expert support.

Final Thoughts

• Not all advice is created equal—seek professional guidance tailored to your cleaning business.
• Investing in coaching, courses, and financial professionals can provide long-term success.
• Avoid falling for trendy but ineffective business strategies. Stick to what works!

Resources Mentioned in This Episode

📌 Pricing Blueprint Master Class – Learn how to price your services profitably.
📌 Basic Contract Bundle Master Class – Get ready-to-use contracts for your business.
📌 Corsbie’s Bookkeeping Service – Bookkeeping and CPA services for your business.

📣 Share your thoughts! What’s the worst free advice you’ve ever received for your cleaning business? Drop a comment below!

Hashtags for SEO

#CleaningBusinessTips #BusinessGrowth #CleaningCompanySuccess #PricingStrategies #SmallBusinessFinance #ContractsAndAgreements #BookkeepingServices #CleaningBusinessMarketing #Delegation #EntrepreneurLif

**Resources Mentioned**
The Pricing Blueprint Master Class link: https://klean-freaks-university.newzenler.com/courses/pricing-blue-print-master-class

The Basic Contract Bundle Master Class for agreements:
https://klean-freaks-university.newzenler.com/courses/pricing-blue-print-master-class

Book Keeper and CPA are there to help you with your business

Transcript

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SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hello, hello, hello. Oh, hello, hello, hello. This is Shannon Miller from Cleaning Business Life, where you can have profit strategies for growth. And I am CEO of Clean Freaks University, where I teach other cleaning business owners how to run the back end of their cleaning business instead of being run over by their cleaning business. And my co-host today is Ms. Kimberly Gonzalez, Miss Inventor Extraordinaire of Pure Evergreen Cleaning Products. Kim, take it away.

SPEAKER_00 0:26

Hello, hello, everybody. My name is Kimberly, and I invented a new natural product to make all of your lives simpler. I used to own a cleaning company, and Shannon and I are putting our brains together so we can help give you guys some fun and resourceful information. And today we are talking about what are we talking about today?

SPEAKER_01 0:48

Free advice is not always the best advice for your cleaning business. Yes. There's a lot of really bad free advice that you see. For example, we'll just check off the list. How many times have us have we all watched a TikTok video with them putting 50 pounds of chemical and mixing those chemicals together into a toilet? I'm laughing at this because I'm like, why? Why? With a scrub daddy, no doubt, right? So it could accidentally get it jammed into the pipe and then you have to call plumber. And the plumber is going to be mad at you because all those chemicals are creating some sort of reaction that could be detrimental to you, right?

SPEAKER_00 1:31

Exactly. It's like, so if you start seeing like TikToks and how to do this, you know, if we're using this product and this product, or even people in the group, and they're telling you to use toilet bowl cleaner in the shower to get it off. Stop right there. Stop. That is one of my biggest pet peeves, Shannon. I don't know about you, but when they start using toilet pay bowl cleaner on anything else but the toilet, that's when I'm just like, I think I got another gray hair that just popped out of my head because these people are stressing me out.

SPEAKER_01 2:01

It really's a mild acid, and you should be really familiar with pH levels and how they can be harmful and what surfaces you need to use for certain pH levels. Um, toilet bowl cleaner is a mild acid. And if you know anything about how a toilet is made, it's actually porcelain, it's enameled porcelain. So um, if you ever have watched that show, I don't even know if that show is still around how it's made. But I remember watching that. I was totally involved. I love to see the process of different things. So when you're using toilet bowl cleaner to get the grout clean, or you're slinging it on someone's shower wall and then it dyes it blue or it takes off the finish of the natural stone. Yes. And then you come running to one of us. We can't fix it. You have to get a stone guy in there to you know re-reseal it and and they have to sand it off. It's an involved process. It could be a thousand dollars or more in damage. So please use caution. Toilet bowl cleaner is only for toilets and bidets.

SPEAKER_00 3:01

Let's let's let's repeat after us. Okay, ready? Toilet bowl cleaner is only for toilets toilets. Good. I know the sizes. Toilets or bidets, yes.

SPEAKER_01 3:13

Or urinals if you really want us to go that far into the commercial end of it, urinals. There has been actually a couple of houses here that have urinals in their home. I always snicker when the girls are.

SPEAKER_00 3:23

I do, I've seen them before. I've seen them before. So yeah, products, knowing what products to use, find the product experts in your group. Find out who they are. Um, you can even find me. You could come find me. Shannon knows a lot about products, so come find us and hunt us down. If you're not sure, just to be on the safe side, let us know. Tag us in a post. Um, you know, bleach. I personally am a huge big no-no on bleach because I've seen so many people get in situations where they end up passing out or they end up having lung issues because they clean the whole bathroom with it. And it's chemical pneumonia. Yep, and you are hurting yourself. So yeah, I just think about what you're putting on things, knowing what is acidic, what's not acidic. That is the huge thing. So do not take advice from people in the group that are gonna tell you wrong. Find the experts and reach out to them. Right.

SPEAKER_01 4:17

And and chemical pneumonia, and I'm not a medical expert, is a prelude to lung cancer. I actually had a client who unfortunately caused his own demise. He used that Tilex shower spray and he had a huge master shower that was larger than my very first apartment. And he spent like 15 minutes every day spraying that stuff down and squeeging it. Well, he gave himself chemical pneumonia and ultimately lung cancer, and he ended up dying. So um just use caution. You know, read your safety material data sheets, I think is what they're called now. They're not MSDS anymore. Um, if there's ever a question, you can always do more research. There's good chemicals and bad chemicals. That's why Kim Kimberly made this awesome product called Pure Evergreen, and um, it really does kick butt in showers. If you've ever used it, we were playing around with it the other day when I was out um training someone who um paid me to train them. So um, and I whipped out all of these things that we had to that I use, and she goes, This is it. I go, Yeah, I only use four products. Four or five products. If if I were still cleaning all the time, that would be all I use. This is what I teach. She drove up from Phoenix, spent the day with me. We had a nice lunch together, and I got you know it was a it was a fun day, definitely. So um, yes, be careful where you get your advice from, especially when it comes to chemicals. You could really hurt yourself in the long run. Um, I don't even want to tell you about chemical sensitivity and your chemical load when you get older and don't do what I did. I can't even handle people with perfume sitting next to me.

SPEAKER_00 5:47

So And just think about who is in the house. You know what environment is around you? Is there children? Is there families that have lung issues? So when you're using these products that are strong, just remember who's in that house, who's paying you that money.

SPEAKER_01 6:06

Ventilation is um all often encouraged um every single time. Um, another big advice thing we get hit up on, and this is probably the number one question when your first brand spanking new in the industry is what and how to price. I think I get asked this maybe a thousand times every single month. I need to know how to price this, I need to know how to price that. There's a lot of variables when it comes to pricing. There's specifics that you need to ask. So when you're reaching out to a mentor or someone who is gladly giving you the information, please try to have some pertinent information available, like, you know, how often are you gonna clean? Is it a two-level home? Are there more than one person in the home? How many doggies or kitties? These are all basic things that you should be asking. Um, and then you should learn how to be able to bid um with a flat rate price. That's the only way you're gonna make over 100K your very first year.

SPEAKER_00 7:04

Yeah, because if you go to start pricing hourly, then that's when the people are gonna come back and be like, even a nurse will be like, Well, I make like 50 an hour. So that's and you're you clean houses and you want to charge me 50 an hour. So that is where you're gonna separate because there, if you think about it, their company is paying for them. So yes, they are making the 50 an hour, but that company has all those other expenses and they don't see that because they don't run a business. When you run a business, that $50 an hour, you start from that, like you're charging $50 an hour and they're gonna hassle you. You're not gonna get that because they're not gonna pay that. So when you do flat rate, it kind of like is the hidden behind the scenes of all the expenses that you need to break down. So right.

SPEAKER_01 7:48

I I've been scolded thousands, tens of thousands of times. So you should be ashamed about charging that money. You I may, you know, I have two college degrees, and I'm like, dude, I have two college degrees, right? It doesn't, this is the business, right? Or you'll have the time watchers. How many of us have been? And I'm guilty of charging by the hour myself when I very first started out.

SPEAKER_00 8:13

I did too. I charged $20 an hour when I first started out because I didn't know better.

SPEAKER_01 8:16

Yeah, because I didn't know any better. And then I tried to figure out like why it was it was left into the hands of the homeowner when you charge by the hour. Because, for example, I live in Arizona. So um, let's just say hypothetically, Mary had Susan coming up from Phoenix for lunch. Well, if I was banking on my whole eight hours, I wasn't gonna give my eight hours because Susan was coming up to meet Mary for lunch. So they I I ate two hours a time, or the reverse of that is you left five minutes early this time and you left five minutes early that time, and you left five minutes early than I want you to deep clean my bathroom. And it's like 15 minutes is not gonna make up for the deep cleaning that you're you're asking me for. It has to be an e an even exchange, and we can talk about that another time.

SPEAKER_00 9:00

But um, and I I want to throw my two cents in too. I think that when you do hourly, I feel like that they're cheat people that come in because they say, Well, I only need you for two hours, or I only need you for one hour, so all I can afford is, you know, 2.5 hours. Right. And that's not where you want. You don't want to be with those types of people because that's not how you're gonna reach your hundred thousand a year, right? Is working with those types of people. So when you start doing the flat rates, those flat rates um are nice because I think I don't know about you, but I know my clients always appreciated when I had my flat rate because they knew what the price was gonna be every time and they can write and leave me a check or leave me cash or whatever. So they knew and I think they understood that. And I was able to get the house down in a certain amount of time because you know, my whole method and I made good money. So I was able to knock out two or three houses a day being solo back, you know, when I was in my 30s, and I was able to make like, you know, $500 that day instead of like all week. Right.

SPEAKER_01 10:01

And it makes it nicer too when you are charging the flat rate and not the hourly wage because they will, they'll try to say you owe them money, you know, minutes, and it's exchange you're taking you're exchanging, you know, time for money, which we all do, but just varies in different formats. So um, it is really important. Kim um grossed over 100k when she was solo. I've done it, I averaged 158k most of the time. Once I figured out how to bid the flat rate, there were some crashing and burning.

SPEAKER_00 10:32

Yeah, and then once you even start getting employees, that's when you're really gonna start seeing the money come in and you start doing flat rates because you can budget in how much to pay your employees and you still have enough to pay your bills, pay yourself, and put money away. So when you do start getting employees, you can go above 100K and really start seeing that money come in.

SPEAKER_01 10:50

Yep. And then, you know, within you grow to the 250 mark, and then you hit the 375, and then you hit the 450, and then you hit the five. When you hit the five, make sure you have a margarita. Yeah, because then you do the 625, and then you hit the 750, and you should definitely have another margarita. And then when you hit the seven-figure mark, you should buy yourself a big fat diamond ring. Yes, and have a margarita, exactly.

SPEAKER_00 11:16

But you know what? It's it all goes into making sure that you, you know, and you sell your blueprint pricing. And I think that is worth more than what you even charge. It's liquid gold because once you start getting your pricing down, you're gonna see a huge difference. And any investment that you made in your your training for pricing is gonna come back right to you so quickly when you do the right pricing. So that's where Shannon comes into play for your blueprint pricing, which I love. Oh I just shared it the other day.

SPEAKER_01 11:50

The uh the pricing blueprint masterclass legitimately has been viewed over a thousand times. Um, it teaches you my exact method of how to price regular maintenance cleaning, top to bottom deluxe cleaning, and move out cleanings. Um, and it it's very specific to our industry, and there's a lot of information. There's actually five videos in there. There's a price increase template. There's a little um price increase boot camp inside there now. Um, it really was revamped and redone. It's not just me at the board talking about, you know, how to break down the math and all that. Um, definitely worth um the it's less than $100, it's worth the investment, and you obviously can write it off um as a business expense. Um exactly. So, yes, pricing is probably the number one question that we're asked. And you have to remember too that when you're getting these prices, that you when you're adjusting your prices, there's gonna be a little bit of a lag. You're gonna have to learn how to sell. Once you figure out how to price, selling being able to sell your product and looking at what your customer experience is like, we could talk about that on another podcast, is uh a different phenomenon entirely. Like I just got an iWatch, I bought it for myself for my birthday. That's Apple is I Apple is has a unique experience. Now, I did this without any human engagement, but when you open the packaging, it was just so exciting. It was a great customer experience. It was like they put a lot of thought into the presentation, how it was packaged. So that is something too that we can talk about is you know what your customer experience is. Are you giving a good customer experience? Are you communicating all the time? As a professional, you know, yeah, as a professional professional, right?

SPEAKER_00 13:33

That's huge being professional and going into these houses and acting like a professional, even when a situation happens. That's huge.

SPEAKER_01 13:40

Yes, and situations do happen, but like I say, I say it all the time. I know more millionaires in this industry than in any other industry. So it can happen, it's not um out of reach. You just have to have the right systems in place.

SPEAKER_00 13:53

Yep, I agree. And that's where you're I think that goes that investing back in your business, and that's something that needs to be budgeted.

SPEAKER_01 14:01

So definitely. Um budgeting to learn new things to put systems in place is um just a business expense. I spend 10 grand a year learning new things. It's a line item in my budget. I am in anticipation of and I get excited because I'm like, what am I gonna, you know, learn next, right?

SPEAKER_00 14:20

It's it's part of it. Like even with my product business, I have taken classes and courses, and it's costed me probably I'm up to 18 grand now. But those having that training in place has helped my business grow to the next step. Definitely you take and you invest in your business into professional training and you invest in that person that you're choosing to invest in. It's okay to do research. Do research, reach out to them and get to know them a little bit before you just jump in because not all coaches, uh business coaches or cleaning coaches are not always the right kind of coaches. So, you know, really do your your um what is the word for it? Do your diligence. Yes, and and learn to find out which one is the good fit for you.

SPEAKER_01 15:05

Yes. And I I agree with that. Not everyone is a good fit for everyone, but if you realize that you need help, whether it's through me or another person, figure out if you like you click with that person, right? Does that person give you sound advice? Do they really sound like they know what they are talking about? What kind of experience they have? I get asked that a lot. It was like, you know, tell me a little bit more about yourself. And you know, I immediately go, you know, total FBI. Well, what would you like to know? Right? What exactly would you like to know? I'll be my more than I'm a pretty transparent person, but when you ask it that way, I'm like, what do you want to know? Why, why, why?

SPEAKER_00 15:39

Yeah, get to get getting to know them is just so important because you don't want them to give you the bad advice. You know, I had a friend who um she hired a business coach, and this business coach ran her business into the ground and destroyed her. And she spent close to 20 grand. And that 20 grand is out the door. It left her not only emotional, just drained, but it put a bad taste into her mouth until I was able to, you know, re-talk to her and rework with her for her business that she was able to build that trust again. So, yeah, finding the right business coach for investing in your business is key.

SPEAKER_01 16:19

Definitely. Um, another thing that we um asked, get asked a lot of advice for is um agreements. There's a lot of DIYers out there. Yes. And there's a lot of you can go to Penrist and look it up, but you're not gonna necessarily get stuff that's specific to our industry. Sorry, I have a little tickle still. It's never everyone has a different cleaning agreement, but it you need to have something. Something is better than nothing. When you have nothing, it gives the client too much power over you and your business to run amok. And they will. If you if you allow them, oh my gosh, I could tell you story upon story of how I gave someone too long of a leash and they just ran me through the coals, and I'm just like, that didn't feel good at all.

SPEAKER_00 17:07

No, and a lot of times too, Shannon, people don't. So there's a difference between a contract and agreement, right? And I had I had explained this on the groups before. A contract is a legal binding, um, what is it, a legal binding like agreement, like a contract that has to have lawyers involved and that it's between one and two people. An agreement is just something that is put down that you guys are agreeing, like they're agreeing to your terms. So just like if you were to hire a plumber or an electrician, you know, they do have their agreements put in place before they start working. And those are things that they just expect that you know that you need to follow, like payment terms. And um, I know for the cleaning ones, you know, for the agreements, it's it's the you're laying down what your expectations are of what you expect from them and what what they're gonna expect from you. Does that does that seem about right? How you would word?

SPEAKER_01 17:59

It's the boundaries, it's having clearly defined boundaries. Like for example, you show up to the house, they have kids, and there's toys everywhere in every room. And there's not just one toy, there's like 50 toys in every room, and then there's dishes piled high, dishes dishes piled high. They haven't done dishes since the last time you were there, and then oh, and they haven't taken out the trash, and the dog took a poop in the utility room because no one let them out, and then the hamster hasn't, you know, there's all of these things that have life happens and we get it because without people, we wouldn't have jobs and industry and everything like that, but that's too far. You're it's not your job to tidy before you can clean. You can tidy before you clean, but it's an extra service, you need to charge for it.

SPEAKER_00 18:41

Yeah, think how long it's gonna take you to pick up every single thing in the house, like all the toys and to wash the dishes and put them away. Do you have that budgeted into your pricing? Because if not, you're making pennies, pennies below minimum wage. Below minimum wage, you're in the negative, but yeah, so it's like you know, having those agreements put into place, you know. My my agreement, one of my agreements stated that everything has to be picked up before we will even start cleaning. And if things are not picked up, then there's an extra $50 fee. Yep. So inconvenience charge. Yeah, and I put that in place. And let me tell you, when I walked into the houses that I had and I had that agreement put in place, everything was picked up. Even this lady that owns a daycare and she didn't work on Fridays, every single thing was picked up because they did not want to pay that extra fee. Um, another thing in an agreement is you know, payment. Payment must be left at the time of service. If I do not see a check sitting on the table or cash, then guess what? I'm not gonna go clean. And I even there was one couple that I have cleaned for for years, and there was no check on the table. And so I sent a text before I even started. I walked in the door, didn't see the money, sent a text. Hey, I just want to let you know that I didn't see a check left. Um, I can wait here for another 15 more minutes, um, you know, and see if you're able to come by and get a check to drop it off, or I can leave and we can reschedule and I could charge you my my fee for canceling since the money was not left. Let me just tell you, she sent her husband because she was at a doctor's appointment. She sent her husband to turn around and come back and write that check for me because she wanted her house clean.

SPEAKER_01 20:25

Right. And that's how it should work. It's not the you pay, I you uh you do the service and then I pay you and it's convenient. We don't operate that way anymore. That used to be something that they did in the 50s and 60s. It was based on honor and integrity. We no longer have that in business because we operate so fast, everything is so instantaneous. We're always looking for that gratification. So be careful when you are waiting for someone to give you um payment. So they need to Venmo it to you beforehand, or it's done, like when you're done cleaning, and they don't get to continue you don't continue to clean and clean and clean until they finally figure out that oh, you know, you're oh, she's chasing me for money. I hate chasing money. And if you make me chase you for money, I'm gonna make you pay. So that's that's just cut and dry.

SPEAKER_00 21:14

Yeah, like even Venmo, I made them pay. They had to pay Venmo, they had to do it by the time I was there, right? Like I wouldn't even wait till I was done. Like it would be there when I was there, you know, because we chasing your money.

SPEAKER_01 21:26

Who you know will have you clean and then they'll they'll try to pull some of the money back because they're unsatisfied. That's not how it works either. Do not let your clients control you. You control the clients, you manage them with your boundaries, which is all in the agreements slash contracts that you have. When you're facing it and pitching it to your clients, it's just an agreement when in actuality some of my um contracts have been to court um several dozen times. So it just depends on the dynamics and how it's written and everything like that. Um, can some of it like can a judge throw it out? Of course they can. But they're they're basing it on facts. So when you have a situation like that, you need to have the facts, not the she looked at me funny and I want $2,000 for it. You know, it's just it can be a little out of hand sometimes. So yes.

SPEAKER_00 22:14

Yep. And you know, it's something that is, I think, huge to have in your business. And that should be one of the one of the things that I think you and I talked in one of our first episodes that we recorded was one of the first things that you need to have when starting your cleaning business, you need to have that agreement in place. That should be one of the first things you should have.

SPEAKER_01 22:32

Right. And and again, I reiterate you can go to a Pinterest. There are people who sell them. I sell them. Um, like I've been doing this over a decade. So mine have been tried and true. And like I mentioned, some of them have been to court with me. Um, whatever you need to have something. Something is better than nothing because when you have nothing is when they just act like a bad house guest. Like, when are they gonna leave? They're beating all my food, they're making a mess, they're their chonies are in the bathroom. We've all had the bad house guests, right? The first couple days you're like, Yeah, this is so fun. And by day four, you're like, When is when are they going?

SPEAKER_00 23:10

Oh yeah, so that's I think that is one of them. Um, what was one of our other ones? Did products, the budget, budget in your training. We talked about investing, free advice. I'm trying to think of some other free advice that was given to me that I was like, Man, I should have never taken that.

SPEAKER_01 23:25

And now I'm like I actually had someone who um was not in the cleaning industry give me advice and it cost me five grand. And um it was and I had to pay. It was it went to court. This person gave me advice and they they charged me for their services. It was um a job that I took on, and so they they it came from the contractor industry, and they're like, This is how you would handle this. I'm like, okay, great. And um, I had them sign the agreement, the agreement contract, and in actuality it was worded incorrectly, and I didn't know because I was new, right? And I took this guy at his godly word and push camp to show I ended up having to pay because I was in breach of contract that I didn't even know because I should have known better because due diligence, right? Yeah, but just make sure that you were following protocol and that you're getting good advice. Um did I enjoy having that happen? No, but sometimes it does happen. That's you learn those lessons. Failure is part of the process of growing your business. If you skate through and you have a perfect business and you never have a blender, there's something wrong. I can tell I screwed up so many times. I mean, there's been my mom. I talk to my mom every day. I'm one of those really fortunate people who it has a really close relationship with my mother. And there's some days she goes, What do you do? I'm like, Oh, I'm checking scotch. She goes, Oh, it's one of those days. And then I'd have to tell her what happened. She goes, Oh, maybe you need two scotches. I'm like, Yeah, sometimes it's two scotches, but there's just days where it just, there's good days, there's fantastic days where I'm running around going, Yes. And then there's other days I'm like, Oh, yeah, I gotta have that scotch because this was bad. Um, you know, typically those are the days that you eat $30,000 or something.

SPEAKER_00 25:08

But it's okay, it'll come back to you and you learned your lesson. You you learn from your your bad experience and you turn that bad experience into a learning lesson.

SPEAKER_01 25:17

Another um bad advice, and I see this a lot in our industry, is um you get there's a huge movement right now to have a cleaning business on the side without having to work in your business. All great, it's a great business model if you can get it to work. There's a lot of um steps in the middle that have to do that, but there's a lot of people who are in that industry who are giving advice who don't have a lot of real world experience because they've never worked in their business. And I'm not saying that you have to as part of your rite of passage, but you should have enough real world experience. I agree before you go and give advice to others. Um, but it is, it's a it's a new hot thing. I'm not gonna name the name because I'm not here to shout out against someone else because I I see how many they've sold. They have an online course, it sells to, I think, for a thousand bucks. But the the whole premise is like that they have their full-time job and then they have a micro cleaning company on the side and they 1099 everybody, and it really does come down to quality. So if you're be careful when you're getting advice, because you could be miscategorizing a 1099 when in actuality it could be a W2. I really don't know because I've I've not purchased the course to find out what the legitimate steps are for them that they offer. But be very careful on how you categorize because you don't want to mislabel, because that's a $10,000 fine. Um, there's penalties and interest and back pay, all kinds of crazy stuff. So you need to do the right thing when you have 1099s versus W-2s, and that's something that's discussed inside the group at length on any given day because there's always that question in lots of different groups, and that's where I think it comes back to for the free advice.

SPEAKER_00 26:53

Free advice for tax stuff is huge no-no. Um, I see it in the groups all the time, and I will tell you the first thing that I invested in when I started my cleaning company is I got a bookkeeper and I got a CPA because I knew that I wanted stuff done right, right? And I didn't want to be one of those people that was last minute trying to gather everything and everything was all disorganized, and papers were over here, and papers were over here. I there was no time. No, I wanted it to be organized from the beginning. So I wanted any kind of questions I had. I knew that I was already connected to a CPA and a bookkeeper. So I knew I was able to present those questions to them. So that is huge. Do not get free advice for that stuff or anything.

SPEAKER_01 27:39

There's generalizations that you can get, but don't, you know, base it on the gospel.

SPEAKER_00 27:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:45

There are bookkeepers that just specify in the cleaning industry along with CPAs and accountants. Um, I don't remember anyone off the top of my head. Um, Adama's husband is a bookkeeper, and he actually is a bookkeeper. He is for the farming industry. He caters to small farms, but he's starting to branch out and pick up other cleaning companies. Um, Andre Corsby, Coresby Bookkeeping, I believe is his name. I can probably put the link in down below if you want to get a hold of him. But he um you want to have someone who's in the industry who's familiar with what's going on. A lot of times people have they make their 1099 sign and non-compete. Oh, I cannot tell you. That just wants me to vomit. It just you cannot make a 1099 sign and non-compete because you're treating them like employees and you're for you're prohibiting them from prospering and growing as a business because that's what you're treating them as, right?

SPEAKER_00 28:38

That's legal trouble right there, right?

SPEAKER_01 28:40

That's a big check that red flag, you're gonna be audited. Um, so yeah, you and I've I've seen it happen in in the group, you know. They um I have some they have them sign this thing, and I'm like, you can't, and you'll always see me in capitals, you cannot do this, it is not legal. And it's because I'm trying not to be the know it all. I don't want you to get audited, it's never pleasant to be audited. I unfortunately have been audited a lot. Um, it's never, you know, go you have your T's crossed, your I's dotted. It's a big hassle, it's an inconvenience, and it's a waste of your time. That's all I'm gonna say about that. But make sure that you are doing the right thing and that you're getting good advice no matter where you're going. Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 29:20

So I that's just some of the things I think that we were coming up with with talking about free advice. Right.

SPEAKER_01 29:26

Um, not yeah, not all free advice is the best advice for you. Please use your due diligence. Um, when I give out advice, I always say, please don't believe anything I'm saying. Go, go look for yourself. Right. It's always good to get several sources so you can make a collective decision, right? Cognitive thinking is something that I think we lack as a society right now. Exactly. And it's nothing against, you know, it's just we it hasn't been taught. We don't for some reason teach it anymore in school. We go to Pinterest and we go, oh, well, this graphic looks great. I think that's true, right? And it's it could be true, it could not be true.

SPEAKER_00 30:03

Exactly. Go to the experts, you know, because they know what they're doing. Go to the people that are seasoned because they have, you know, we have lifelong experience. Like I know Shannon and I have talked many times, and there's some stories that I've told her when I first started my cleaning company, and it was just scary some of the situations. So, you know, reach out to the people, but understand that the people that are very knowledgeable on this stuff, they value their time so much because when we think about it, um we get messages throughout the day of people wanting free advice. And why I'm okay with helping them, there's that boundary again. I have to put up. Hey, you know, I got this and this and this to do. Let's schedule something charged. You know, that's why Shannon charges what she does, you know. It's important, you know, to to pay people that honestly know what they're doing. And then you're gonna see the value in it and you're gonna understand, and then they're gonna feel valued.

SPEAKER_01 31:01

That and having skin in the game makes it so much more serious, right? I I legitimately get about 50 people a day asking me for something. Can I have a moment of your time? Can you do this? And there are the occasional inside my group. I'm like, I need you to call me because it's way too much to go back and forth over a messenger. And that's alaudable because I'm anticipating that phone call so I can help walk you through whatever that issue is. But for the most part, you can't call me at 7 a.m. while I'm still getting my littles ready for school because you want some free advice. It's not how it's not how it works. Exactly. But legitimately, 50 people a day ask me for free advice, or they want like they want the free advice, but they want stuff that should be like one-on-one coaching. And I have to tell them I'm like, you know, I do offer one-on-one coaching. Um, right now it's still at a discounted price because my web guy still hasn't gotten around to doing it. It's totally fine. But it I have to be compensated for my time at some point, right? I can't, it's reciprocity, right? You have to, I give and give and give. I'm expecting to get back at some point. That's just how it works, right? So um have respect when you're hit, you're saying, you know, hey, I know it used to be the whole adage, hey, can I hit you up for coffee? And we chatted up. That's not how it works anymore. We don't have time. Most of us don't have time to go have coffee anymore. It's a luxury. Yeah. You're doing stuff like this back and forth through Zoom. And because it takes, you know, 45 minutes if you live in a big city to go drive over there another 45 minutes for the meeting, 45 minutes back. It's a whole hour and a half when you can do. Oops, sorry, it bumps up the mic. Oh, um, when you can just do it this way, it's just easier and faster, and then you can accomplish more. So um be considerate of people's time. Um, when you schedule for a free consult with anybody, show up, have your questions ready. Yes, have a paper ready to go with questions so you can value their time. Totally. I had one the other day who wanted to cancel at the last minute. And I'm like, if you cancel the last minute, you eat that money and it wasn't cheap. I'm like, I can fit you in tonight. I go, let me cook these guys dinner. And I made a special accommodation to her because I knew that she was going through a crisis and I wanted to walk her through. But on the same level, I can't, it's just like with a cleaning company. I can't accommodate last minute change. It's there's too many wheels in this in the air making it all.

SPEAKER_00 33:13

You're gonna start stressing yourself out. Right.

SPEAKER_01 33:16

So yeah, have your questions ready. Um, be professional and courteous and um write things down. Usually when I do when I'm on coaching, it's all recorded that way. You can listen and watch repeatedly because sometimes we get so excited, at least I do, and I'm like, oh my God, then I'm not really listening to what's being said. So it's good to be able to watch.

SPEAKER_00 33:36

Exactly. And if you guys have any uh things that topics that you guys would like us to, you know, touch on or things to chat about, you know, reach out to us. Um, Shannon, we do we have an email that they can contact us at?

SPEAKER_01 33:48

Um cleaning businesslife at gmail.com. So that's clean, not with a K, like it used to be with Clean Freaks University or Castle Keeper Cleaning. So clean uh cleaning businesslife at gmail.com.

SPEAKER_00 34:01

Yeah, reach out if you guys have any topics that you guys would like us to go over or just anything that you would like to chat about, and we'll be happy to go over them and address them for you guys. Perfect.

SPEAKER_01 34:11

And I think we're gonna have um our first guest coming up in a mere three to four weeks. I'm still working out the details on that. Yayful. Anything else to say, Miss Kim or Lee Consolid?

SPEAKER_00 34:21

I just hope you guys have a blessed day. And if you guys had again, we talked about it before, and I was talking to somebody today about it. If you guys have a situation today, this is what I leave with you guys. Something does not work out right, find the silver lining, find the blessing in each day, and that's how it's going to get you through today. So that's what I leave with you guys. Definitely beautiful. Then I shall see you next week, my friend. I'll see you next week. Bye, darling. Bye.