Commercial cleaning website: what facility managers check

If you're working out what to include on a commercial cleaning website, start with the person who reads it. A facility or property manager has three names from a search and time this week for one or two walkthroughs. Before they call anybody, they open each website and look for answers to about twelve questions. Your site is the first page of your bid.

Most cleaning company sites were built for homeowners. They lead with a move-out special, a price per bedroom and a "Book now" button. A manager looking after a three-story medical building reads that and decides you do houses. Below are the questions a buyer works through before picking up the phone, and what your site should say to each.

"Do they clean buildings like mine?"

The first thing a manager does is match. A dental practice wants a cleaner who knows operatories get different treatment from the front office. A warehouse manager cares about a big concrete floor, a break room and the restrooms on the dock, and hardly at all about glass. If your home page says "residential and commercial cleaning" and stops there, none of them can tell whether you're a fit.

Give each type of building you take its own short section: offices, medical and dental, schools and daycares, churches, banks, retail, warehouses, whichever ones are true for you. Two or three lines each is enough if they say what you clean there. Leave off the types you don't want, since a list of fifteen industries reads like you'll take anything.

Under that, write your scope the way a scope sheet reads, area by area: lobby and entrances, offices, restrooms, break rooms, floors. Facility managers often put a scope of work in their bid package, and they'll hold yours up against it. If you do floor care, say which kinds, like VCT strip and wax or carpet extraction.

Then cover hours and area. Say when your crews work (after hours, weekends, a day porter if you offer one) and name the cities and suburbs you cover. That saves the manager a call and saves you from walkthrough requests an hour outside your route.

"Can I trust them with keys and alarm codes?"

Handing over a key and an alarm code is the biggest step a buyer takes with a cleaning company. They want three answers before they'll book a walkthrough, and they look for them near the top of the page.

The first is background checks. Say who gets checked and when, in plain words: "every cleaner, before their first key" is a clear line if it's true for you.

The second is how you handle keys and codes. Say how keys are stored and logged, and that they're never tagged with the client's address. If each crew gets its own alarm code, mention it, because the manager can then see in their alarm history who came in and when.

The third is insurance and bonding. General liability covers damage your crew does to the client's property. A janitorial bond protects the client if one of your employees steals from them. Many buyers ask for a certificate of insurance before the first night. Say on the site that you send a certificate on request, and then send it the same day when someone asks.

Write only what's true. If you aren't bonded yet, leave the word off the site and talk to your insurance agent before you chase contracts that require it. The same goes for certifications and training programs: list the ones you hold and can show paperwork for. A manager who asks for the certificate and gets an excuse drops you from the list, and property managers talk to each other.

"How do they make sure it's done?"

Most managers have had a cleaner who emptied the trash, ran a vacuum down the middle of the hall and left. They know you won't be there every night, so they want to know how you check work nobody watches.

Start with a written checklist for each building, agreed at the walkthrough. Say on the site that you have one and that the client gets a copy. Then say how you inspect: how often a supervisor or the owner walks the building after the crew, and what the manager gets from it. That might be a short inspection report each month, a nightly log by email, or a call.

Put a name on the account. A line like "Your account manager is Dana, and here's her direct line" tells a buyer more than "dedicated customer service." If you're the owner and you take those calls yourself, say that.

Then say how a miss gets fixed. Pick a promise you can keep in your worst week and write it down, for example: "Tell us by noon and the crew fixes it that night."

"What happens if someone calls out?"

Night crews call out, and every facility manager knows it. What they want to know is whether their building still gets cleaned. Say what happens on your side: a supervisor or floater covers, or you move the night and tell the manager before the building opens. If you keep the same crew on a building, say that as well, because a regular crew knows the alarm, the problem restroom and the office where nothing on the desk gets touched.

Leave out lines like "we never miss a night." Nobody believes them, and the first time it happens you've broken a promise in writing.

"How do I get a price?"

You bid per building, so a price list doesn't help. Make the walkthrough the thing you sell. "Request a walkthrough" should be the main button on every screen, leading to a short form that asks for the facility type, rough square footage and cleanings a week, then a name and a phone number or email. There's more on the fields and the wording around them in what to ask on a commercial cleaning quote form.

Next to the form, tell the manager what happens after they send it: who calls, how fast, how long the walkthrough takes and when the written bid arrives.

Say what's included before they ask. State whether you bring the chemicals, equipment and trash liners, and whether restroom paper and soap are supplied by you or by them. Managers compare that line by line. If your agreements run month to month, say so.

Larger buyers often send an RFP instead, so give them an email address for it.

"Can I send this to my boss?"

The person who finds you often isn't the one who signs. They need one page they can attach to an email, and that page is a capability statement: your services, the buildings you clean, what sets you apart, past work you can name with permission, your insurance and bonding, company details and a contact.

Government and larger commercial buyers sometimes ask for a capability statement by name. Put it on your site as a PDF next to the walkthrough form. We go through it section by section in how to write a capability statement for a cleaning company.

FAQ: what to include on a commercial cleaning website

Should I put prices on my commercial cleaning website?

For contract work, usually not. You price each building after the walkthrough, so the site's job is to get the walkthrough booked. If you have a flat rate for small offices, a starting price for that one service can work, as long as it's labeled as a starting price.

I do residential and commercial. Do I need separate pages?

Yes. Give commercial work its own page or its own site, with its own button, so a facility manager doesn't land on a move-out special and a booking calendar.

What if I'm not bonded or certified yet?

Leave it off and say only what's true. Write about your background checks, your key handling and your insurance if you have them. Talk to your insurance agent about a janitorial bond before you go after contracts that ask for one.

Should my site show reviews from commercial clients?

Yes, if they're real. Ask the office managers you already clean for to leave a Google review and mention the type of building. Never post a review you can't trace back to a real client, and ask before you name a client on your site or capability statement.

How much of this has to be on the first screen?

On a phone, the first screen should say what you clean and where, show one or two trust facts like background checks and insurance, and have the walkthrough button. The building sections, scope and capability statement can sit further down the page. To see how your own first screen does, the free site check scores it.

If you'd rather not do this yourself, we build and look after commercial cleaning websites with credentials near the top, a section for each building type you take, and a walkthrough request on every screen. See one on Keyholder Commercial Cleaning, a sample design for a fictional business. It's $99 to start, refunded if you pass on the preview, and $399 all in at our founding price for the first 25 clients. Hosting is $99 a month.