You may not be getting all the benefits of commercial cleaning software. Take a look behind the door and discover information that will help you grow your business.
You use your commercial cleaning software for a number of reasons. You might like how it helps you stay organized. Maybe you use it to keep track of your invoicing more easily. Perhaps supply budgeting is your favorite benefit. Whatever it is, the chances are good that you haven’t looked much beyond these significant benefits and features. Why would you?
If you have a tool that does what you need it to, why dig into it? I have little doubt there are plenty of features on my phone that I don’t know anything about. But since it does what I need it to, there isn’t a compelling reason to explore the additional functions.
It’s different with commercial cleaning software, though. Whether you realize it or not, there is a goldmine of data that can help you improve your business. But let’s get one thing out of the way: METADATA.
Metadata is not nearly as scary as it sounds. It’s just data about other data. In the digital realm, this is information such as the keywords on a web page or the date a file was created. In the physical world, you see metadata every time you open a book. All that information on the first page or so that no one reads, like the publishing company address, the copyright date, and where the book was printed, is all metadata.
Another way to think about it is that it’s a simple summary of data. Let’s take this post that you’re reading right now as an example. There’s a good chance you went to Google and did a search for “commercial cleaning software.” Google then scanned the metadata of hundreds of millions of web pages to give you an organized list of blog posts, news articles, images, and so on. And now here you are, thank to the metadata we included behind the scenes.
So metadata isn’t scary, but what can it tell you?
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Why (and how) to use the metadata in your commercial cleaning software
So we have all this data, but what are the practical uses of it? What can it actually do to help your business? It’s probably no surprise that your commercial cleaning software stores a lot of this metadata. Perhaps the easiest way to share what you can do with the information is to offer a couple of examples. Let’s start with work order management.
Your commercial cleaning software allows you to create both recurring and one-time work orders. Let’s say you get a lot of one-time janitorial jobs. These could be for special events like graduation ceremonies, weddings, corporate parties, nonprofit fundraisers, or any number of occasions. It’s nice to have the extra money in the bank, but somehow it always feels like too much work. Your teams put in overtime, you rush to order additional supplies, and your schedule turns into something resembling a bumper car derby. It ain’t pretty.
Now let’s get into the metadata. You look back over a list of these jobs and realize they aren’t as spread out as they seem. In fact, almost all of them happen at three specific times of the year. This alone is incredibly valuable information. Here is some of what you can do with it:
- Hire contractors ahead of time for these bumps in business.
- Put a moratorium on employee vacations at these times.
- Order supplies in advance.
- Reach out to these customers to remind them how much you appreciated their business last year and find out if they are planning similar events again at the same time.
- Ensure all your equipment maintenance takes place in the weeks prior to these events so you don’t end up with malfunctioning tools when you need them most.
Here’s another example of how the data in your commercial cleaning software can help your business.
Thanks to the communications function built into your software, all the messages between you and your clients get stored in a location-specific file. For the past three months, Client A has contacted you with complaints about the quality of the work your team does. You’ve attempted to resolve the issue with no luck. It’s time to look into the data.
As you look back through the messages, you find that each one happens on the first weekend of the month. That’s the weekend your team supervisor has been away training people at other locations. Look a bit further into the details, and you find that the same employee has been filling in each of those shifts.
This looks like an easily corrected issue at this point. It’s clear your substitute isn’t doing a good job. But let’s dig down a bit deeper. It also turns out that Client A is the only contract you have that requires specialized carpet cleaning on the first weekend each month, and it just so happens that this employee isn’t trained to do that kind of work. In fact, that shift supervisor is the only person who is certified for that type of cleaning. Now you can truly solve the problem, thanks to the information stored in your commercial cleaning software (aka the metadata regarding messages, work orders, and employee skills).
Your commercial cleaning software is a valuable tool, and when you take advantage of everything it has to offer, the right software can help get more organized, more efficient, and more profitable. And it can do all of that while taking away some of the stress of running a successful cleaning business.
Easily stay in touch with employees and clients, bid on jobs, manage inventory, perform inspections, and more with Janitorial Manager. Check out a free demo to learn about all the great features!