How To Start A Cleaning Business In India?

Are you looking for a business that requires little or no experience? Are you tired of your 9-5 job? Are you looking for resources to earn? Then, this one is for you. You can open your cleaning service with a small investment.  

Your mind must have flooded with tonnes of questions like, how can I start a cleaning business, is it beneficial to start a cleaning business, what are other requirements and many more. This blog serves as an answer to all your questions. 

When a person is planning to enter into a particular industry, the first thing that strikes a mind is the scope of the business. 

Scope of Cleaning Business 

Starting a cleaning business could be a great idea. It is rewarding at both the residential and commercial levels. Cleaning is one of the most laborious and time-consuming tasks. People don’t mind handing over the cleaning tasks to a professional cleaner. If the couple is working, then they do not consider giving a second thought while handing over cleaning chores. And from the company point of view, it is not plausible for a big company to look over matters like cleaning and ensuring whether they are working properly or not. Hence, they choose to outsource. 

Talking about the scope of the cleaning business it is growing at a faster rate. The preference for an outsourcing cleaning business is showing an upward trend. The market for the cleaning business is anywhere and everywhere. Can you imagine running a hotel, hospital, hostel anything without cleaning? The answer is no. The demand for cleaning business is everywhere. Every business needs your cleaning business.  

One of the most favorite advantages of the cleaning sector is that it has job opportunities for the unskilled sector. A survey revealed, nearly 10 million people are employed in this industry.  

From an entrepreneur’s point of view, you can begin this amount with a small investment and with little or no experience. People are rapidly stepping into this industry. 

The cleaning industry has two primary market groups- residential and commercial. The residential group includes maid services, carpet cleaners while commercial group target business and not individuals or households. 

No business is free of cons. Many-a-times you may face difficulties like exertion but handsome profits serve as a great source of motivation. You can provide these services either on a part-time or full-time basis.  

The essence of every business is uniqueness. You need to maintain it here as well. You can choose to work according to your comfort, style but the strategy should be unique. The idea should be unique. 

Every business has pros and cons. And getting acquainted with both of them is a necessity for the one who is planning to enter the concerned industry. Here we go with the pros and cons of a cleaning business in India. 

Advantages and Disadvantages of a cleaning business in India

Positivity brings peace! So, beginning with the positive aspect stating why you should start a cleaning business. 

• Less Investment- Who doesn’t want a business that yields heavy profits with a small investment? The cleaning business is one of those businesses in which you can begin with a small amount. 
• Feeble overhead expenses- You don’t have to pay heavy rents for this business. You may require this later but at the initial level, you don’t have to spend on such matters. You have to bear minimal overhead expenses. 
• Work from Home- You can even begin working from home. Many-a-times people start their cleaning business from homes or garages. You can prepare the whole plan by sitting in your room. 
• No experience- You don’t need to possess extraordinary knowledge or experience, to begin with, in a cleaning business. You can lead the market even if you are a beginner. All you need is a sound and effective strategy. 

The downside of a cleaning business might stop you from going for it. But one thing you should keep in mind- nothing is perfect in this world. How can this business be? Here is a list of shortcomings associated with a cleaning business- 

• Loads of physical work- If you are not ready to bear the exertion, you are not ready for this business. The cleaning business is not a lightweight business. You have to work tirelessly to succeed. 
• Income might be slow at the start- This is the story of every business. You may earn slowly in the beginning but eventually, you are going to make heavy profits. 
• Competitive- You cannot escape competition here. People are making nimble movements towards this business which is bringing hype in the competition. You need to maintain uniqueness throughout to remain in the race. 
• Team management- It is not everyone’s cup of tea to manage a team. It takes both physical and mental energy to manage a team. You need to consider the expectations of your crew without sacrificing the needs of the business. 

After becoming aware of the pros and cons of the cleaning business, it is up to you whether you want to go for this business or not. Cons aren’t that powerful. They are manageable. All you need is persistence, patience and hard work and you can run a cleaning business successfully. The cleaning business is lucrative. It offers tonnes of advantages and can prevent you from regular 9-5 grind if you manage to do well in it. 

Now you must have got convinced to start a cleaning business. The first thing to begin with a business is an estimation of finance. You need to analyse the capital requirements of your business. 

Estimating the Finance 

As we said, a cleaning business can be started with a small investment. If you have arrangements, you can even begin without any external help. But if you do not have enough money and are planning to get equipment for your cleaning business you can consider the following options- 

• You can approach SIDBI (Small Industries Development Bank of India). It has been set up to offer financial support to small scale businesses. 

• If you are planning to purchase heavy equipment, you can go to National Small Industries Corporation Limited (NSIC). It supports the import of new machines. 
• You can also go to National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD). It assists small businesses to get established at the initial level. 
• You can also consult your family and friends or begin in partnership. 

Choosing the source is the decision of the owner. You just need to consider your repayment capacity before choosing the source to prevent yourself from falling into uneasy situations. 

Residential or Commercial 

The choice of your service may affect your budget as well. The market groups for a cleaning business are divided into two areas- residential and commercial. 

The residential group focuses on individual households and the work at the client’s home. Residential service providers supply all the cleaning products and cleaning equipment to the client. You can provide the following residential services- 

• Home maintaining cleaning jobs– It includes basic dusting, washing, vacuuming, mopping, and all. Most of the time it includes helping a client with household chores. 
• Moving-in and moving-out jobs– Now this is laborious. This kind of service goes beyond simple home maintenance. It includes heavy work like cleaning the house for tenants and more. 
• Deep Cleaning Jobs– You can offer this service at both the residential and commercial levels. It includes cleaning cupboards, pantries, fans, and other hidden areas. You can charge on an hourly basis for this type of service. 

• Residential event cleaning jobs– You are expected to the cleaning work on special occasions like parties, marriage, or others. 

Commercial cleaning focuses on providing services to businesses. Here is the list of services you can provide to the businesses- 

• General cleaning job– General cleaning includes janitorial services like mopping the floor, vacuuming, window cleaning and others. 
• Large-scale cleaning services– This specific job require specific equipment. It includes window cleaning, carpet cleaning, and other heavy cleaning jobs in the office. 
• Construction clean-up jobs– Cleaning of construction sites is also an option for service providers. You can provide this service and charge a good amount. 

• Disaster and hazardous waste– Such services are provided when natural calamity occurs. You can provide cleaning services in the affected areas. 

You can choose the type according to your comfort. The next point of concern is whether you should run an independent business or go for a franchise. 

Franchise or Independent business 

When you are planning to start a cleaning business, you need to consider whether you want to start your business or go for a franchise. 

When you go for a franchise, you can enjoy several benefits. You do not have to establish your brand name or create awareness as people already know about it. If you are planning to provide commercial cleaning services, then you should go for a franchise. As many a-times, businesses choose to outsource their work to reputed firms and you may not be able to gain that confidence for your business. 

But if you go for an independent business, you do not have to walk in the footprints of the Franchise. You can say you don’t have to consider the norms of Franchise. You can make your rules and break them. You can run things according to your comfort and will. But you need to spend on marketing for creating brand awareness. Also, you are expected to provide first-class services to gain the trust of your clients.  

You can make this choice as per your comfort and other factors. But the thing you need to possess is a sound strategy and an effective implementation of the strategy. 

After all the decisions are made, the next requirement is a stepwise guide to start a cleaning business. 

Guide to Start a Cleaning Business  

1. Research is the key!- Every business is a slave of research. The success of a business depends on the research. A right start is necessary. You need to research the market, demand, customers, preferences, and other relevant factors. Your decision and strategy should be based on the research. Research about the cleaning products, equipment, and everything, you feel is required. Research on how to avoid cross-contamination from one client’s home to the next. Educate yourself with what you are going to begin. 

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2. Choose proposition value and name– The next step is to choose a name for your business. Also, before choosing a name, write the values and ethics of your business. Getting your value proposition on paper eases communication with customers. While deciding your propositions you need to consider certain factors like price, your services, cleaning products, online bookings, and everything. It should be narrative. After that, you need to choose a name for your business. The name should be chosen cautiously. It should be short and descriptive. It should state what you are offering to your customers.  

3. Get License– When you start a business you are expected to comply with the legal requirements. You need to obtain the necessary license to start a business. In the next section, we will be discussing all licenses you are expected to obtain and other essential requirements you are expected to meet. 

4. Get cleaning insurance– This is a step towards the protection of your business and employees. You should not clean your home or office without insurance. It is quite risky to start cleaning without insurance. You may break valuable things or burn something. There are chances of accidents. So, it’s better to take prevention. Insurance serves as a perennial source of safety for your business. 

5. Build your brand– Now you have got a name for your business. The next step is to build your brand. You need to choose the colors and create a brand logo. Your logo should comply with the theme of your business. Either you can do it by yourself or you can consult digital marketing agencies for the same. You can consult traffic tail- one of the best digital marketing agencies that have a team of graphic designing experts who can develop a unique and expressive logo for your business. 

6. Build the service list and pricing– If you want to appear professional in front of your clients, prepare a list of the services you are going to provide. Do not forget to mention the prices, offers, and other numeric data. Timings and the type of services should be mentioned. The list should answer the questions of the clients. 

7. Purchase your Equipment– The next step is to purchase the equipment for your business. This depends on the type of services you are going to provide. Some materials will remain the same while others may vary. Divide them into two categories- 

• The items that you will use daily like rags, cleaning products, gloves, mask Etc. 
• The items that will last for a longer time like carpet cleaning machines, vacuum cleaners etc. 

8. Market your business– Can you just begin your services and sit? Not at all. You need to inform the people. You have to make people aware of what you are doing. This is the only way of getting clients. You have to make use of both online and offline strategies to spread the word about your business. You can also do it by word of mouth. Your friends and family can spread this information all around. But do you think, it is enough? No. Everyone is rigorously promoting their business using innovative offline as well as online marketing strategies.  

9. Customize your service– One of the best things you can provide to your clients is customized services. Make the necessary adjustments as per the comfort of the client. This helps you in earning goodwill.  

Using this stepwise guide, you can start your cleaning business. The next point is what is required and how it can be done. This section includes the necessary information like registration details, license, training, insurance and tax. 

The Essentials- 

You are enthusiastic enough to start a cleaning business but equally baffled about legal matters. Go through this section and you will get to know which license you have to obtain, what are registration details, everything. 

The information we provide here is not a piece of legal advice. You must contact an accountant or solicitor or legal advisor before starting a cleaning business. 

Before we begin, there is a tip- choose a simple structure, this would allow you to complete things easily and at a minimal cost. 

Business Structure & Registration- 

Before you begin with the registration process, you need to decide the structure of your business. You have to decide, either you have to begin as a sole trader or open a partnership firm, a company or One Person Company. After deciding the structure, you can begin with registration. 

• Secure Digital Signature Certificate from Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA). It takes about 5 days. 
• Incorporate the business within INC- 29  
• Now get your Director Identification Number (DIN) from the portal of MCA. 

• Get the name of your company filed with the Registrar of Company (ROC) 
• If you want to get approval by ROC, submit your business plan with the objectives that must be mentioned. 
• Now contact a qualified Company Secretary for drafting the documents related to ‘Memorandum of Association’ listing the primary, ancillary, subsidiary and other parts of your business along with authorised share capital and name of the director and ‘Article of Association containing the procedures that would govern your business. 
• Get your office registered and furnish letters of declaration and director’s appointment. 

While filing INC-29 the payment of requisite incorporation fees is necessary. It is determined by the capital you are planning to invest. 

• INR 5000 for capital of INR 100,000 
• INR 4000 for each INR 100,000 increment in authorised capital up to INR 500,000. 
• INR 3000 for each INR 100,000 increment in authorised capital up to INR 50,00,000 
• INR 1000 for each INR 100,000 increment in authorised capital up to INR 1,00,00,000 

For getting the ‘Certificate of Incorporation, you need to get the physical and digital copies of the following forms to ROC- 

• E-form 1 wherein declaration regarding completion of all formalities. 
• E-form 18 informs the address of your registered office to ROC. 
• E-form 32 declares the appointment of a business director. 
• Duly signed and stamped Memorandum and Articles of Association  
• Power of Attorney documents 
• Consent letter of partners in case you have started a partnership firm. 

Now you are done with incorporation, the next step is to get your firm registered with relevant tax services. It is necessary to obtain- 

• PAN obtainable by applying the TIN-NSDL portal using form 49A 
• TAN (Tax Account Number) obtained by filing Form 49B and submit the same at the nearest TIN Facilitation Centre authorised for receiving e-TDS returns. 

After that, you have to apply for a GST registration number. For securing taxation accounts, you have to pay around INR 10,000-20,000. 

Pricing 

One of the most important points of consideration is pricing. You need to decide what are you going to charge for your services. It is a time-consuming task and needs to be done properly. You need to do it beforehand as the catalogue you are going to offer must contain the details of the services along with the price. While deciding the price, make sure you are not charging too high or too low for your services. If you charge too high at the initial level, nobody would prefer your services and if you charge too low, there are chances of not even getting back the cost. The competition is high in this sector, so you need to be careful while choosing the price of the services. To decide the price, consider the following factors- 

• Labour and materials- Consider your costs. Look how much you are paying for labour and other materials. Labour costs include wages and benefits while material includes, cleaning products, equipment, rags and others. 
• Overhead- Every business has some overhead expenses. Although, the cleaning business does not have high overhead expenses. You need to consider this cost as well. It is usually calculated as a percentage of your labour and materials. 
• Profit- The difference between what it costs and what you charge is profit. You need to consider the profit while deciding the price of your services. 

On what basis you can charge? 

• Hourly basis, depending on the type of service 
• Monthly basis 
• Contract-based 

Pricing is done by the owner of the business. Different factors must be considered while deciding the price of the services. You can use personal judgments to decide the price. All you need to do is keep an eye on the market and the prevailing prices. 

Marketing 

Imagine setting up a business without informing anyone. Do you think you can run a cleaning business without spreading the word about it? The answer is No. The cleaning business is a service providing business and usually, at the initial level, people don’t open a store. So, how are you going to get customers? 

Now you will need to consider the concept of marketing. Marketing includes selling and informing people about your products and services. You can market your services using both traditional and digital methods. 

Traditional methods do not make use of the internet to promote products or services. Studies revealed digital methods cost 61% lesser than traditional methods. Traditional methods that can be used to promote a cleaning business include- 

• Share your story- This is the key. Sharing the story of business can fetch user attention. If people find your story interesting or touching, they would go for your services. Share your story attractively so that people get prompted towards trying your services. 

• Offers and discounts- You can offer services in packages at discounted rates. This is one of the best ways of building a customer base. Usually, businesses follow this strategy of low pricing or providing offers at the initial stage of the business. 
• Word of mouth- You can also spread the information of your business using the oldest technique- word of mouth. Your friends, family and satisfied customers can spread the word about your business. This is how you can get new customers. 
• Your values- Your business must have the essence of your values. It should be depicted in your dealing. A tongue can do a lot. You can make or break customers just by using your tongue. Your tone should be gentle and your services should be genuine. Then the customer will choose to rely on your business. He would recommend your services to others as well. This is how you can get customers. 

Digital marketing, on the other hand, makes the use of the internet and other digital technologies to promote your business. Different techniques of digital marketing can be chosen depending on the type of services you are providing. Here is the list of digital methods that can be deployed to promote your cleaning business- 

• Develop an SEO-friendly website- Developing a website marks your presence on the internet. It does not guarantee the visibility of your business. For those purposes, you need to develop an SEO-friendly website. This can increase the visibility and improve the working of your website. Your website must contain enough information related to your business. It should support online booking and reveal your schedule. It should contain the details of your packages and offers.  

• Local citation- Get your business registered in the local online directories. This would enhance the trust of customers if they find the description of your services online as well. Also, get your business registered on Google MyBusiness. 
• Encourage customers to write reviews- Studies revealed, people go through the previous feedbacks before contacting the service providers. Make sure your business appears good. Encourage your satisfied customers to write reviews on the website. 
• Social Media- Every business can be promoted through social media. Building accounts on social media is not enough. Or posting a photo once in a while is not fruitful. You need to develop a social media marketing strategy to grow your business. Make your account on social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Linked In, Twitter. Do not forget to optimize your account. This would increase brand recognition and smoothen the working of your cleaning business. 
• Buy Google Ads- Google Ads can help businesses of all size to grow. All you need to do is optimize your ad. It is worthy to invest in Google ads. Choosing the right keyword is the key. Research and choose the relevant keywords. This can help in enhancing the reach of your business. 

Several digital marketing techniques can be used to promote your business. You may not be able to choose the right strategy at the initial level. We are here to sort things out. We, at traffic tail, can guide you from scratch to end and help your business grow effectively. 

Do you Know? 

• In May 2018, there were about 924,920 jobs in residential cleaning. 
• The Bureau of Labour Statistics revealed that the growth of the cleaning industry is 7% which is more than the national average for all occupations. 
• The area is expected to grow to 10% by 2026. 

Pro tips– 

• Encourage your customers to write reviews on the website. 
• Be clear and visible. 
• Upload the relevant pictures 
• Choose the right digital marketing strategies and go for paid advertisement  

Starting a cleaning business is not difficult. All you need is a will and a unique business plan. You need to understand the requirements of your business and the expectations of your customers. Both should walk hand-in-hand. From the choice of the type of services to the choice of cleaning product, everything should be right and valuable. This could help you in earning goodwill. Choose the marketing strategy accordingly. And for better advice and growth of your business, get associated with traffic tail. We, at traffic tail, provide the necessary guidance and assistance to run your cleaning business smoothly. 

Frequently Asked Questions 

1. Is it worth starting a cleaning business? 

Ans. Yes, it is a great decision to start a cleaning business. You can start with a small amount and earn a lot. It promises a good return on investment.  

2. How can I start a cleaning business in India? 

Ans. Follow this stepwise guide to start a cleaning business in India- 

• Research 
• Choose proposition value and name 
• Get license 
• Insurance license 
• Building brand 
• Building list of services 
• Marketing your business 
• Get started and provide customized services, if possible. 

3. Can I digitalize my cleaning business? 

Ans. Yes, you can digitalize your cleaning business. You can develop online schedules, make bookings, and promote your services through digitalization. 

4. How can I find a strong client base? 

Ans. This is how you can find a strong client base- 

• References 
• Referrals 
• Join Networking groups 

5. What is the logistics requirement of the cleaning business? 

Ans. You need to make arrangements for the following- 

• Transportation 
• Supplies 
• Equipment 
• Technology