In cleaning, the first job is worth very little and the twelfth is where the money is. So we build the engine around contract value and retention, not around the cost of a single lead.
Most cleaning businesses judge their marketing on what a lead costs and what the first clean is worth. On those numbers almost nothing looks profitable, because a single end-of-lease clean at $350 cannot justify much spend.
But a fortnightly domestic client at $120 who stays eighteen months is worth about $4,300. A small commercial contract at $900 a month that stays three years is worth over $30,000. Those are the numbers the marketing should be measured against. On that arithmetic, and these are illustrative figures rather than a price we are quoting, a $60 lead reads very differently against a $4,300 client than it does against a $350 clean.
The second issue is that one-off and recurring enquiries need completely different handling. End-of-lease and post-build cleans are urgent, price-sensitive and gone forever. Recurring domestic and commercial work is a slower sell with far more value behind it. Treating them the same means you either lose the urgent jobs by being slow, or spend your best effort on work that never comes back.
Separate campaigns on Meta and Google for recurring domestic, commercial contracts, and the one-off urgent work. Different copy, different targeting, different qualifying questions, because they are different businesses sharing a van.
Cleaning is bought on trust and consistency, not on price lists. Police checks, insurance, staff vetting, and what happens when something goes wrong: that is what converts a recurring client.
"Cleaner near me" and suburb-level searches are steady, high-intent and do not cost per click. For a business built on recurring local clients, this is the channel we would build out first.
Instant response for the urgent one-off enquiries, and a longer nurture for commercial prospects who are mid-contract with someone else and will be ready in four months.
| Fortnightly domestic | ~$4,300 | $120 a clean, held for 18 months |
| Small commercial | $30,000+ | $900 a month, held for three years |
| One-off end of lease | $300–$600 | Valuable, but it never comes back |
This is why we measure a cleaning campaign on cost per acquired contract and how long clients stay, not on cost per lead. A business that keeps clients two years can profitably pay several times what one with heavy churn can. If churn is the real problem, more leads will not fix it, and we will tell you that.
It can be, but be clear-eyed about it: those clients do not return, so the engine has to keep producing at a cost per lead the job value supports. It works best when paired with a push into recurring domestic or commercial, where the same marketing spend buys far more value.
Most are, which is why timing beats persuasion. Commercial cleaning turns over when service slips or a contract renews, so it is a long nurture: be visible, be credible, and be the one they already know when the current cleaner lets them down.
Then do not buy leads yet. Booking contracts you cannot service properly is how a cleaning business loses the clients it already has, and in a referral-driven trade that damage lasts. Fix capacity first and we will say so on the call.
Read the full FAQ → covering what it costs, whether you are locked in, and who owns your accounts and leads.
We will look at where your next customers should be coming from and what is standing in the way. If it is not worth doing, you will hear that instead of a pitch.