How To Start and Grow Your Junk Removal Business In Year One

Thinking about starting a junk removal company? Have you started looking for tips and tricks to get more jobs? As a junk removal business owner, I network with hundreds of other junk removal business owners worldwide. I hear the same questions over and over. One of the biggest questions, especially when starting, is, “How do I get more jobs?”

This is a big question. One with a multifaceted answer. But, it’s one of the most important questions, because you won’t succeed without jobs. (Sounds simple enough, right?)

We can go down one million rabbit holes regarding the junk removal industry, but I want to focus on this LOOMING question. Before we get into the actionable steps, let’s discuss something essential. Attitude.

ATTITUDE

I’m beginning with attitude because this is very important. You will never truly grow your junk removal business without a go-getter mentality. You MUST have the attitude to get up every day, work hard, and GO AFTER jobs. You CANNOT just set it and forget. 

You must constantly look for new ways to get your company in front of the people who need to see it. This involves having a “hustle” mentality, especially in the formative years. You need to make time for family and friends and have a life outside of junk removal (make this critical), but when you are “on the clock,” you must have the nerve to get out there and make it happen. No excuses. No laziness. And an attitude that says I WILL be successful.

LEAD FUNNELS

Now that we have dealt with attitude, how do we bring the jobs in? Here is a list of the different areas that worked for Augusta Junk Removal. These are in order of highest priority (what you need to do RIGHT NOW) to lowest priority (but still extremely important).

1. Website

Without a decent-looking website, customers will not take you seriously. This is just the world we live in today. Everything is digital, and when you have a Facebook page ONLY, and no website for your prospects to go to, this simply looks like you are “chuck in a truck” (No offense if your name is Chuck). Your reliability is questioned, and people will quickly move to the next company that DOES have that professional look. 

The website must be SEO-friendly (topic for another time) and conversion friendly. Have pictures of your company doing work and not stock photos. Unless you are already a website/SEO expert, HIRE THIS OUT. Make sure you have this website constantly growing. You CANNOT make a website, forget it and think it will perform. There is so much here to unpack, but I will leave you with this. This is so important.

2. GOOGLE BUSINESS PAGE

This is another way to get that professional look you need. Also, this is the best place to get customers to leave you a review because those reviews help you the most when posted to GBP over any other social media asset. Ensure you have a fully optimized GBP, post to your GBP, and constantly ask for customer reviews.

3. SOCIAL MEDIA ASSETS

It may not seem important, but it is. Make a Facebook, Instagram, Yelp, Twitter, Linkedin, Yellow Pages, and ANY other social media platform you can. Make sure the name, address, phone number, email, website, and bio is 100% identical across all platforms. 100% identical. Post regularly to as many as possible.

4. BUSINESS CARDS

I hand out as many as humanly possible. I WANT to run out of business cards to buy more to hand out. Make sure they are professional looking. Please outsource this if needed, and don’t cut them out of construction paper.

5. DIRECT OUTREACH OUT

Join as many local Facebook groups as possible. Real estate, investment, connect pages, networking pages, contractor groups, all. Do this for every city in your service area. Then, post to these groups as often as allowed. 

Follow up with anybody interested, and even direct message anybody you think would be in the market for junk removal based on their profession. Follow up with them as well. I can’t count the number of people I have reached out to and then heard nothing from them for months until one day, they call me for a job. 

Some of my biggest clients came from these cold reach outs on Facebook. Do the same thing on LinkedIn. Soon enough, everyone in the groups will know who you are. This can sometimes lead to immediate jobs, but more often than not, they will keep you in their back pocket, and one day, BOOM, they will call. 

Apply this to many areas. Go on Google and find realtors, contractors, estate sale owners, and investment companies. Email them, then follow up with a phone call. This takes a lot of time, but it pays off well. There is a lot to unpack here, but direct reach out can be very beneficial for getting jobs.

6. YARD SIGNS AND DOOR HANGERS

Get professionally made yard signs and door hangers. Every time you do a job, ask them to can put a sign in their yard! Then, hang those door hangers on 10-15 houses in that neighborhood. Check local ordinances first, and think outside of the box on how/where you can get these signs in front of people.

7. LEAD GENERATION COMPANIES

Companies like Checksammy, Hometown, JiffyJunk, and Thumbtack can be very helpful when first starting out. You have to pay a specific dollar amount per lead, so you have to ensure you are watching your profitability on each job. Sure, organic is best, but when you first start out, any little bit helps. You will learn which companies are better to use than others, and don’t let them push you around. 

8. ADS

This is a topic with way too many moving parts. Make sure that you are running your ads correctly and make sure you are watching your profitability per job. Google and Facebook ads can be a good way to bring in jobs, but it can be a very expensive learning experience if you are not doing them correctly. Outsource this when you are ready to run ads. Eventually, if you grow, you SHOULD be running ads, but maybe not google ads on day 1. This is something that you need to watch very closely and understand well before throwing a ton of money into it.

CONCLUSION

There is not a one-size-fits-all answer on how to grow your junk removal business. Some of the above-mentioned may do better for one company than others. That is why it is so important to be doing them all. Do all the things mentioned with an attitude of success and determination, and you will see which ones work best for you. 

That doesn’t mean stop doing the other things. When you do all these things, you will start to see jobs trickle in from so many different areas. People think they just need to find that ONE perfect way to get all the jobs. It doesn’t work like that. If you are doing all of these things consistently, you will grow your junk removal company, and you will get jobs.

This is NOT an exhaustive how-to, and there are many other things to consider. This was a brief overview, barely scratching the surface on each topic, but meant to show you which areas you need to dig and dive into.

My name Is Tripp Patat. I am a husband, father, and business owner. My company is called Augusta Junk Removal and we service Augusta, Georgia, and the surrounding areas with full-service junk removal, dumpster rentals, and demolition.