Hello, hello, friends!
Here is your content advisory warning for this fabulous episode.
It's a long one, guys.
I think I killed it, I must say, but to advise you, to warn you, there was a lot of ADHD rambling in this one.
I was hopping around like a little jumping jelly bean.
Okay, so fair warning, and then I do swear a lot.
This one, I cuss a lot.
So if you got little ears, maybe put those earbuds in.
Save this one for later, but make sure you come back because it's a good one.
Enjoy.
This is Filthy Rich Cleaners, presented by ZenMaid, the podcast where real cleaning business owners share what works, so you can earn more, stress less, and make your business filthy rich.
Hello, everyone.
Welcome or welcome back to the Filthy Rich Cleaners podcast.
I am your host Stephanie from Serene Clean, and today we are talking about CleanCon Austin 2026.
My takeaways, the things we've already implemented.
Do I think it was worth it?
And do I think you should go to it next year?
There's a lot to go over today.
My head is still buzzing from all of the incredible conversations I had at CleanCon, the ideas, the people that I was exposed to, it was just such a wonderful experience in so many ways, and I can't wait to get into it.
First and foremost, if you do not know who I am, my name's Stephanie.
I own a residential and commercial cleaning company in Western Wisconsin.
I have about 30 staff members, and I run my business remotely from Savannah, Georgia.
Here, I am a crazy cat lady.
I love the fall.
Let's see, I enjoy long walks on the beach.
What else, guys?
Also, when I was in my team meeting today, my cleaner McKenna said I should dress up like a genie for Halloween, and then I started whipping my hair around like this in the team meeting.
So that put me in a good mood.
So every time I move my head with this little ponytail, I just want to whip it around.
So for my audio listeners, just like imagine me like whipping my ponytail around, going woo woo woo.
Go to YouTube if you want to see it.
I don't know what to tell you.
So CleanCon, guys, it was absolutely fabulous.
I do not regret going.
I cannot wait for the next one.
The biggest piece of value for me was meeting you guys.
That was actually crazy and a very bizarre experience for me to have.
So many people come up and be like, "I know everything about you, Stephanie.
I listen to everything."
And then I would be like, "I know everything about you too.
I watch you sleep."
And nobody would laugh.
I thought it was funny, but that was so wonderful.
I'm so grateful for each and every one of you that came up and said hello.
It was just so special to me to connect on that human, human basis, hear your stories, and just answer any questions that I could in person.
I had some really in-depth conversations.
Some very personal things were shared.
People were really vulnerable, and I just can't tell you how much I appreciate that.
Because if you know me, your girl likes to be vulnerable, and she likes to have those real conversations, cut through the bullshit, and just talk about what's really going on in your business and your life.
So thank you, every one of you.
I really mean it.
I really mean it.
I'm so glad that I got photos with you.
I'm so glad we had fun and we danced and it was just, it was a blast.
So I wanted to get say that first because that was that was the best part for me.
I want to actually go through my biggest takeaways.
I I thought about it.
I went through my notes and I have it listed here.
So if you see me looking over, I'm just looking at my notes because I want to make sure I cover as many points as possible of what I thought from CleanCon, what I took away, and what I am going to be implementing at Serene Clean, as well as what information I'm going to disseminate to you guys in the future when I am making suggestions.
Because I just thought there was so much great advice and points made and presentations.
It was it was spectacular.
So before I get into the points, I just want to highlight the actual event itself.
I want to say personally to Drew, Molly, and Holly, who are the owners, and of course Drew's beautiful wife, Erin, who they celebrated their wedding anniversary at CleanCon, and that was just so beautiful.
It was a really beautiful moment.
So, how many times can I say beautiful?
Take a shot, right?
But it was beautiful.
I don't know how to call it spectacular, romantic, lovely.
So, congratulations to Drew and Erin.
I thought that was really special, and Erin is a powerhouse.
I just cannot say enough about the way the event was organized.
They're not paying me to say this, guys.
We paid to go to the event.
I just want to say, I for one am somebody who notice notices details, and I definitely could tell how much thought and work went into the flow of the event.
They took a lot of feedback from the first event, not that the first event was bad, but when I say this one was five times better, I'm not being facetious or hyperbolic.
Fun words of the day.
Okay, put those down in your little dictionary.
I'm not being dramatic when I say it was five times better.
It really was.
The flow was incredible.
Just everything moved so well.
We had the time we needed to do what we needed to do.
Bathroom breaks, snacks, just those little things that really make an event feel great, in my opinion, are those those little moments of just being organized and the flow and the music, the audio and visual.
Like, that was very impressive to me.
I saw when we were setting up our booth for ZenMaid, just how much work went into that.
I mean, they must have spent a pretty penny on the audio, because that was quite the impressive setup.
So the actual venue itself was wonderful.
I much preferred the venue this time.
The hotel last time was beautiful, but because the where the presentations happened was closed off from the vendor tables and the bathrooms and things like that, it felt more divided.
Where, because the vendors were able to sit around the edge of the room while the presentations were going around, because it was all just one giant room, it felt very immersive and that everybody was experiencing it together, not like vendors and attendees separate.
And of course, I was both technically I was a vendor and an attendee, and I really appreciated that.
I thought that was nice, and we could just have a lot more interactions because of that.
And there wasn't just this like separation.
I think it was important and valuable for all of the vendors to hear what was being presented as well.
So that was really cool.
So I wanted to just highlight that the first night they had a incredible band.
I mean, some of the best live music I have ever seen.
It was so good.
It was so fun.
At first, I thought they were just going to do country, but then they were like live singing like Bruno Mars and you know dancing songs and all of this fun stuff.
So that was really fun.
It was Western themed.
I had my little like sheriff outfit on, which I love to dress up.
So any opportunity I can to bring some whimsy to the world, you know, I'm going to.
So I really enjoyed that.
The food was really great.
Just the mixer part in general was awesome.
I did not go to the VIP boat experience the night before.
I had a ticket.
I had a ticket, guys.
But the fucking planes.
I swear to God, I'm so sick of traveling by air.
Like I am so burnt out on air travel.
It seems like I think 75 to 80 percent, I'm going to guess, of my time I travel, like there are significant delays or problems or whatever.
And I get it.
Like, I understand that it's just that's the system, and I should just avoid it if I didn't want to deal with it.
But I'm gonna bitch, okay?
This is my platform, and I'm gonna bitch on it.
So I missed the boat, guys.
I missed the boat by like ten minutes.
I was supposed to get in at two.
The boat was at six.
I had plenty of time.
Chicago was delayed to Austin, so yeah, I missed it just by a hair.
But the positive was I was standing up by the Uber like line, and I hear my name getting shouted out at the airport, and I look over, and it's this guy, and he's like, Stephanie.
I see your reels all over my Instagram, and it was one of my listeners, which is amazing.
And he is super cool.
He's Serbian.
He lives in Chicago.
He's starting his cleaning business up, really going full force.
And so we just hopped in the Uber.
We shared an Uber, and then we ended up spending a bunch of time together at the conference.
So that was really cool.
I actually appreciate that happened because we were able to connect.
And then I was able to go and have some killer barbecue, Terry's, Terry Black's barbecue in Austin.
If you guys have had that, is it not the best?
It was some of the best barbecue I ever had.
And of course, I got to have dinner with Jonathan and Anna from Cleanzilla in New York, who are some of my favorite people.
I have had Jonathan on the podcast.
Anna, you are spectacular.
I love both of you.
So that was really fun to have dinner with them.
So all in all, though I did not have the fun boat experience, I did have a really good time hanging out with friends, new friends and old friends alike.
And then went back to the hotel, and that's where I was reunited with my ZenMaid peeps.
So who was at the ZenMaid booth?
Was Kylin, who is our fabulous editor, and he films the content and all of that stuff.
Kylin's amazing, and then Elizabeth and Kayla, who are both in customer success, and that was so wonderful to have them with.
I think it was such like at all future conferences, I'm like, we need to have them there because it was so helpful from a conversation standpoint at the booth itself to have those ladies there because they really know their stuff and they can really get into the nitty gritty.
Because a lot of you guys who came up to the booth, you had very specific questions of like, I'm looking for this feature or this is what I need from this, and they were able to like easily give you guys solutions and how that works with ZenMaid.
So that was really cool, and I just, I love all of them.
It was, I think, such a bonding experience for us.
We just, we haven't ever just had like the four of us in a, in a group at an event, so it was just really special, and I will absolutely cherish all of that time with them.
When I say these are my friends, guys, these are my friends, and I feel so blessed to be able to work with such amazing people.
It's, yeah, it just, I'm feeling so much love towards them because it was really special and it made it so successful.
So those were the first days.
So we had the wonderful dance.
We, you know, mingled and had the fun bingo cards where everybody had to.
That was a really good way to mingle people.
Is the bingo card meaning like you have to find somebody to sign off on that square of your bingo sheet that fits that specific thing, right?
That is like cleaning business oriented or business ownership oriented.
So that was really fun.
So first evening was a hit, and then we got into the first day.
So we had our ZenMaid booth set up, and I am not trying to toot our own horn here, but toot toot.
Okay, that booth was fucking sick, was it not?
Anybody who was there, please leave it down in the comments below.
I need that ego stroke.
Just, just reach through the camera and stroke my ego right now because that booth was awesome.
I am so proud of what we did with the booth.
It was really, really fun.
It was silly.
It was interactive.
It was very cool to have a free gift for every single attendee there, every business there, which was an SEO audit.
We literally got the attendee list ahead of time, and we prepped for every single business, there an SEO audit of their Google My Business profile and of their website, and gave them a checklist of things that they're doing well and things that they could improve on, so that they are more visible on Google and their website is showing up better, and just from a branding perspective, it looks good.
So that was really cool and exciting, and that was no strings attached.
That was to literally every attendee.
You did not have to be a ZenMaid customer.
So I really like that, and I want to take that forward for future events, is making sure we always have something of value for you guys.
We want it to be worth your while to come talk to us.
We had killer stickers.
Again, I love stickers.
I wish I could hold up my laptop so I could like show you guys my little stickers on my laptop, but that makes it really fun, and like it always takes me back to where I was when I got that sticker, and so that's why I find stickers really fun.
We then also had, frankly, my favorite thing, which was the backdrop, the filthy rich cleaners backdrop with the like police lineup lines, where you guys would come and write your cleaning business crime on it.
We'd snap a Polaroid and stick it to our little billboard with everybody else's crimes, and that was so much fun.
It was honestly, again, coming back to like the topic of vulnerability.
I feel like that opened up so much conversation and connection because we were sharing things that maybe we were a little embarrassed to share, and it wasn't even necessarily something we did bad, but just a crazy thing that happened to us.
I couldn't believe some of your guys' stories.
I mean, I'm not.
I want to share.
You're anonymous.
You're anonymous, and I mean, you did agree to take pictures of it.
So somebody cleaned up pig shit.
Somebody walked in on their clients doing it in the shower, and the clients fired them.
Like, it's not their fault.
It's not the cleaner's fault.
One of them was crazy.
I won't say their name, but the cleaners went to do an Airbnb, and the guests had left behind some chocolate, and so the cleaners ate it.
Turns out it was weed chocolate, and the cleaners got so high they had to go get their stomachs pumped because they'd never even touched alcohol, let alone marijuana.
So that was fucking crazy.
So, like, those stories were so a lot of cleaning the wrong house, breaking things, you know, just all sorts of stuff.
So I just, it's not like I revel in like misery, but I think there's that vulnerability of like, oh, you had that happen.
I got one crazy one too.
Let me share with you, and that's it.
I feel like it brought the spirit of the podcast to CleanCon, which is just so special to me because I feel like that is one of the my most favorite parts of the podcast is that we can share with you guys, you listeners, that it's not just you.
It's not just you that this is happening to, or that this insane, awful thing is only targeting you.
It truly is a universal experience.
Of, we may not experience the same exact problem, but we are having crazy shit go on.
And that thing that you're embarrassed about, just by sharing it, that weight off your shoulders can really, can really change things for you, and and make you feel a lot lighter.
So that was so fun.
And then just of course, connecting with everybody at the booth was amazing.
So that is my booth spiel.
It was awesome, and we had great neighbors right next to us.
We had, well, the DJ was right two two down, and then the guys from the digital, the digital something marketing.
They're gonna be on the podcast.
I really like them.
Great guys.
So shout out Justin.
Okay, on to the keynote speaker, Kristen Hadeed.
So many of you may have read Kristen's book, Permission to Screw Up.
That's what it's called, I believe.
I actually had never read it before, so I'm definitely having that on my reading list.
So, I one, she was beautifully dressed, immaculately dressed in this gorgeous blue suit.
You know, I love a good power suit, on a woman.
This woman could speak.
I aspire to speak even a fraction as well as Kristen Hadeed.
I was blown away.
The she had the entire room absolutely locked in to every single word that came out of her mouth, and that is what I want.
So from just a aspirational as a person speaker, for me, I just was so blown away.
It was, it was very impressive the way she could articulate her thoughts, and that's something that I am always striving towards, is being able to do that while also balancing what makes me me, which is being a little spazzy.
So I really, I really loved her presentation style.
She had owned, why can't I think of the name now?
College maids, is that what it's called?
Student Maid.
Thank you, thank you.
Who's telling me this?
Stephanie's brain.
I just said thank you to myself.
What the fuck?
Okay, so thank you, Brain.
She owns Student Maid, or she owns Student Maid, which got to a hundred plus staff members, huge success, and just the way she told the story about what she was miserable and resentful over when her life on the outside looked so good, and I feel like I could really relate to that.
I think a lot of us could relate to it as she was telling it, and then just her lessons on leadership, because the topic of CleanCon was leadership, that was the focus topic, and she had such a beautiful mindset about it, as well as some very practical takeaways and tools to use and to communicate more effectively, and to get everybody on your team working in the same direction, so you don't feel that resentment.
And so there was a few that I really like that I want to share specifically.
So one of them is called FBI feedback, and that's an acronym, of course, that makes it a lot easier to remember how to provide feedback.
And so she absolutely recommended against the compliment sandwich because it is confusing.
Because you're coming in with something good, and then you're coming in with something they need to do, and then you're trying to like soften or deaden that feedback by giving them something good.
And somebody could walk away from that being confused, of like, well, so am I?
Like, do I need to change something, or what's going on?
Right.
So I thought that was really true, and I totally understand where she's coming from with that.
And so the FBI tool is giving a feeling, behavior, and impact when you need to provide feedback, and it does help take the sting out of hard conversations.
But it's also not sugarcoating it to the point that somebody is walking away from confused.
And honestly, I am going to use this in my personal life.
I've already started when I have provided something.
I've already started using this framework just in general, and I think it's amazing.
So if a staff member or a client or whatever is doing something that you don't want them to do, and they are not supposed to be doing, perhaps this is a really good way to frame what the situation is.
So, what is the feeling you're having about it?
What is the behavior in a one sentence?
And what is the impact of that behavior?
And I think the example she gave was when you are 20 minutes late, it makes me feel that I cannot rely on you.
So, there's the feeling, there's the behavior, and then the impact.
And what that means is I am less likely to schedule you next week to the hours that you want because I don't think I can rely on you.
What can we do about this?
What what needs to happen so we can make sure that you are on time, right?
And like that, just like very plainly stating, and it's a really good structure, especially for those of us who are people pleasers or who really struggle with providing feedback, which is most of us.
I think it was a really good framework, so I loved that one.
I already shared that with my managers right away.
The next one that I really really love is the one three one framework, which is to you guys know how much I dislike a tit baby, right?
And so all I could think of in my head when she was talking about this was like, this is for tit babies.
This is wonderful because what it does is it teaches your team how to problem solve themselves and how to believe in themselves and to give them the autonomy to make decisions without needing to run it by you every single time.
And some of the examples she gave were were insane, ridiculous and hilarious.
So it was it was a great speech.
What the one three one is, when a team member brings you a problem, they bring you one issue, they bring you three possible solutions, and then you ask them, which one do you think we should go with of those three solutions, and they pick right, and you go with it, unless it's something horrific, right?
And the whole concept of like permission to fail falls really in line with this, is as as long as it's not catastrophic.
Like sometimes going with their suggestions, I think that's a great idea.
Or going with their idea so that they can learn, right?
Instead of you swooping in saying no, I think we should do this.
They didn't learn then, right?
And what this does, this framework, if you do it repeatedly enough, they'll realize that they're going to have the answer if they just think about it long enough.
Because so many times, I can't, can't even describe to you how many times this happens, where a staff member comes to my management team or myself and asks about something, and then we don't get to it because we don't see the message right away, and then three minutes later they're like, never mind, like I figured it out.
This was the solution, right?
And so, or we run around and try to find them the answer, and then they're like, oh, sorry, like I we had the answer all along, right?
And so, so many times the answer is right inside of us, is right inside of our staff members, inside of everybody, but because we do not believe in ourselves, we do not believe in our autonomy to make decisions, or just do not have the confidence, because perhaps we've been trained to just go to somebody and ask, and we always need an outside voice to tell us what to do, or maybe they've been at a workplace where they were micromanaged and they were not allowed to have autonomy and decision-making on themselves.
So this helps teach them how to do it, and it'll become a habit.
And again, I think that this framework works so beautifully in so many facets, and like even in myself, before I go ask a question, like what are three possible solutions?
What are three avenues I could take, and which one do I think is the best?
Because I think that is what helps build our confidence in ourselves.
So I'm really excited about that one.
I think that it will absolutely help.
And Hannah, actually, so I talked about all of this in my operations meeting last Wednesday with my management team, and Hannah, my field manager, she was really excited about this one because there's some situations where we're like, you know, Crystal brought up.
Okay, it's not always practical when they like need, like it's a very time-sensitive piece of information, and they need a response to be like, well, what three options do you think we should go with when they're in the field, right?
But Hannah specifically said that she wants to start implementing this concept in training.
So when she is showing something, instead of like, instead of just telling them what to do, make asking them and making them think, like, "What do you think we should do here?"
What are some options that you could see about going either through this house or this, going about this situation, or how to clean this thing?
Right, and asking them instead of just automatically like showing them, which you know, that it kind of reminds me of like, I've heard.
I'm not a parent, but I've heard this from parents that some of the most difficult to be patient moments is when your child is first learning how to do something, and it would be so much faster for you to just do the thing because they don't have the fine motor control that you do, of course, because they're a child, and sitting there and letting them struggle, and that's got to be just so hard.
I'm not what I consider a patient person.
I need to work on like that, and even just saying that I need to work on the identity of that, right, because I identify as not a patient person.
Maybe I am, and I feel like this is, it's like that, right?
Like allowing them to struggle, allowing them not necessarily to get the answer right right away, or swooping in and saving them.
So I really like this, just as a general kind of mindset of like allowing people to swim in the discomfort of not knowing and putting their brain to use, because then, as as Kristen said, when they come to the solution and it wins, it's their win, and that hit me like a ton of bricks of you are taking away their win and their accomplishment when every time you swoop in and give the answer, because now it's your win, it's not theirs, and that was just oh my gosh, mind blown!
I loved that, I can't stop thinking about that, and just it's so so true.
Is that by allowing people to struggle when they do finally win, it is truly theirs, and they can be proud of that win?
So that was amazing, I loved it.
This as much as I loved Mike Michalowicz at the first CleanCon, because you know finance.
Obviously, I've read all of his books.
Like, just an amazing man.
I just, Kristen, was just amazing.
Like, bravo to the CleanCon team.
What an incredible speaker it was?
It was amazing.
It really set off the morning and the entire conference in such a beautiful trajectory and got us, I think, all in the right framing.
And then, of course, just in general, the permission to fail with thresholds, setting yourself a limit, perhaps a dollar amount, a scope or a risk ceiling for decisions.
Which, like, what is?
And actually, Amar has said this before.
Of like, there is a number in his head of like, okay, team can spend this much to fix a problem, and they don't have to come and ask me.
Tell me about it later, but solve the problem.
You don't need my permission to solve it.
So, what does that look like for you?
Right?
Is that fifty bucks?
Is that a hundred bucks?
Is that five hundred bucks?
Right?
Like, maybe it's $0 right now because you don't have a team.
So, but the point is, is just giving them some space because sometimes a decision or a solution is going to cost money, right?
Whether that's a re-clean, it's a refund, it is replacing something.
I don't know, but the point is you have to give them some space and sometimes that means like some runway financially in order to make that decision because if they feel they can't spend a single dollar, meaning your management team, if you have one, if they feel they can't spend a single dollar without consulting with you, well, guess what, they're going to be coming to you a lot, right?
And so for me, usually, I would say my team.
If it's going to be more than like a hundred bucks, they come to me.
For the most part, we'll talk about it later.
If it's under that, but oftentimes they will.
I guess they still kind of do ask me permission a lot.
I feel like I need to establish like if it costs less than this, then fix it.
But definitely under fifty bucks, like that they're not talking to me about that.
My next favorite talk, I would say.
Okay, I don't want to rank them.
That's not true.
Kristen's was my favorite.
That is true.
But the next, there is simply no order because they were all incredibly high value.
This is just how I have them organized in my notes.
So this is not a ranking system, Drew Larison.
Do not get your head all big just because I'm saying how fabulous your talk was, because it was.
So Drew did a fairly short talk, but incredibly impactful talk about sales and about the concept of why today.
And the fact is, as he put it, customers when they're shopping around, they know a lot about us.
They're doing their research.
So when they finally decide to call us, instead of selling us, we need to understand them.
We need to understand why today.
What happened yesterday?
That what happened in the past week that made you say, finally today is the day I'm going to hire a cleaner?
And really probing and delving deeper as to what is motivating them to hire a house cleaner to outsource this.
What is it that's stressing them out so much?
What is it going to look like if they don't have to clean anymore?
And his concept of like, sell Saturday, sell that free time.
And I feel like this is something that I've done like fairly well at Serene Clean in general, is really speaking to the heart of the overwhelm and the issues.
But I think in the past, probably couple years, I've leaned a lot more heavily into just falling back on social proof, if you will, more so, which is kind of like this, but within our customers, with our like with sales conversations.
I don't feel that we've done this like nearly enough, not even close.
And so we immediately have started implementing changes related to like asking what happened that made today the day you picked up the phone, right?
So Katie, my customer relations and sales manager, is working on revamping our lead follow-up process and our conversations and sales scripts to really reflect on this, to understand and empathize and make space for their emotions and their feelings.
And so I love that, and and less needing to sell.
Like, if they found us, if they found us online, especially, like they know we're good.
They know we're good.
That's why they called us.
So, less about us and more about them.
And we are absolutely implementing that immediately.
So that was huge.
Thank you, Drew.
Very impactful.
I know that it's been really meaningful to you to hear that from us, folks who attended.
And I just want to iterate that it was impactful.
It was beautifully done, and your speaking was incredible.
Okay, next, I want to talk about Miss Molly Moran, who I absolutely love.
Her energy is magnetic, and I loved her presentation.
She talked about her daily shine protocol.
Live Bright is Molly's coaching program, and it was really cool to see a lot of her coaching clients.
They are just talking about the impact they gave her this really sweet, beautiful custom like cowgirl hat.
Love that.
That was just I just love like the you could really feel the love and friendship in that room.
Like if it was, it was very special.
It was very special.
It didn't feel like all these separate tribes of thought processes, if you will, of like, oh no, we followed this coaching program and we do this and blah blah blah.
It felt very collaborative throughout, which I really appreciated.
So in Molly's Shine Protocol, she goes over, you know, basically that taking care of ourselves as the leaders is a CEO responsibility.
And part of being the CEO, regardless if you are this small company or this big of a company, this is your responsibility, is to take care of yourself and protect your energy.
And something that she said in this, when I say this, has been playing in my head every single day since then, is taking care of our health is our job.
And I have said that so many times, and this entire week, like I'll talk a little bit more about that just in a moment.
But it's been so different because I keep playing that this is my job.
It's my job to take care of myself.
And so, what Shine stands for is space, health, intentions, new you, and enjoyment.
And she created this protocol so that anywhere she is, she is taking that space and setting, going forth in her day with intention before the day takes over, right, and before the phone, like, is just like sucking the life out of us, right?
Quick little break here.
If you have ever been listening to the Filthy Rich Cleaners podcast and thought, oh my gosh, Stephanie would die at this story.
Well, guess what, guys?
I want to hear that story.
Okay, we are looking for guest applications for the show, and I know many of you have never been on a podcast before, but those are my favorite episodes.
To be frank, is the owners who are just here to share their stories.
So, if you are an owner who wants to share their story, or perhaps you would like to have a free consulting call with me and ask me your questions live for everybody else to learn from, that is also an option.
And then finally, if you know somebody in our industry, you have a friend or somebody that you look up to and have learned from, who you think would be a great guest option for us.
Please go to the link down in the bio, and we would love to see you apply or nominate them, and we will take it from there.
And I would love to have a conversation with you and get to know you more closely.
Back to the show.
I have actually been doing a pretty darn good job, I would say, of utilizing this in the past week since I got home.
So another tangent.
After CleanCon, I immediately flew to Boston for my very good friend Nicole, who has been on the podcast here.
She works at ZenMaid.
She got married last weekend, so I went from wedding to wedding.
So I flew up to Boston, and I was exhausted.
So after I got back from that, then I was like, okay, let me think about all this stuff and actually implement it, right?
So I feel like this.
I'm sure a lot of attendees felt this.
Like I needed to hear that.
I needed to hear the impact that not taking care of herself had on Molly, how miserable she was, and just like the whole concept.
If I just work harder, life's gonna get better, right?
I'm just gonna do more, and then because that's always what's worked for me.
And so I, it was really good.
It was almost like permission to say, like, yeah, like this is not selfish.
I need to take care of myself.
And this year has definitely been a big whirlwind when it comes to a lot of things.
This is the most I've ever traveled, and the travel has absolutely taken a toll on my physical health because I have not been able to like maintain any sort of like I would say habits or structure within the travel.
So I need to figure out how to sustain that.
But what I've been doing, just like briefly, is when it comes to space, like I have purposely this past week.
It's been a successful week of I do not pick up my phone and start scrolling right away.
Like, that was such a bad habit for me, was doing that immediately checking Slack, checking my email.
Like, I'm laying in bed, I haven't even taken a piss yet, and I'm on my phone scrolling and responding to things.
Like, and I don't need to do that.
Like, there is no need for me to do that.
It's like I just need that spike to my cortisol.
Apparently, the second I cracked my eyes open, so like, there was no need for that.
It was just a nasty habit.
So, just I wake up, I do not touch my phone.
I go take care of things.
I go, I go feed the pets, and then I make that space for myself for my health right away in the morning.
And so what that means is, I have been waking up a little earlier, and I've been taking Lily, my dog, for a walk every morning.
And the bit of a perfectionist in me has been, it's been really good for me because the other day I did not have time because I had a full day of consulting calls, and like my full walk with Lily is about, I think, like forty minutes, forty-five minutes every morning to do my full like loop that I like to do, right?
And typically, if I do not have an hour to get the forty-five minutes in and have enough space, I just won't go for a walk at all because I'm just like, I can't do the full thing, so therefore I shouldn't do it at all, right?
Because that makes sense, right?
And so instead of that, instead of being like, "Oh, all or nothing," I went for a fifteen-minute walk just because I was like, "No, take this space, you need to do this."
This is about to be a really hectic day for you.
Like, this is so important that you do this right now.
And so, success, I've successfully walked every single morning, and what that's done for me just in the past week, it's is kind of insane.
And I don't go on my phone.
I just walk.
I get some sunshine.
I move, and it's just been wonderful.
I haven't been listening to any podcasts or like, like, nothing, just listening to nothing because that's another thing I think that, like, previously, when I would be moving my body, like I'm always trying to distract myself with like entertainment, and so just having that quiet time in the morning has been so wonderful and so, like, I look forward to it.
It's my favorite part of the day, honestly.
And then when it comes to intentions, like thinking about, I really liked how she said, "What do you want the day to look like today?"
Right before the day decides it for you.
How are you going to go about this day, regardless what comes at you?
How do you want to feel at the end of the day?
And so, this hasn't been like an everyday thing, but it has been coming more and more to my mind this past week.
Of like, what do I want to feel like at the end of the day?
How do I want to feel when I look back at the end of the day?
And that was so.
It's, it's helped.
It really has helped.
I can't, I can't tell you.
It's kind of crazy.
New you is, you know, just challenging you, pushing you out of your comfort zone, doing things that maybe feel a little bit uncomfortable.
And then finally, enjoyment.
Like, where's the fun?
Where's the fun in the day?
Like, how can you have fun doing?
Like, how could I make this fun right now?
Right?
Like, I started recording this before, guys, and I actually I cut it at about five minutes because I was not having fun because I was, I was trying to be too formal, or like, let me give you the synopsis of this conference, and I was like, "What am I doing?
This isn't fun."
Because if I'm not having fun, you're not having fun, right?
And so I caught it.
I started over, and I was like, "Just, just have fun.
Just have fun, right?"
And so I feel like I always do a pretty good job with that of like finding enjoyment and like bringing whimsy.
But I'm really, I just want to lean into that even more of like, how could this be more fun right now?
Or like, how could I, how could I turn this thing into fun?
So you know, just really focusing on my nutrition this week too, and like I said, my health.
It's been a very difficult year in a lot of ways.
You know, if you guys ever want like a full episode on like mental health, I think that would be a really interesting conversation to have.
I think it affects us so much as business owners, and that can really rule the roost.
Is if we are struggling with our mental or physical health, like it's hard to, it's hard to give it your all, right?
And so for me, this year it's been a very challenging year with mental health.
I went through, you know, a pretty severe depressive episode and anxiety, PTSD.
I have all sorts of things, guys.
Did you know?
Now you do.
And so, like, all of these things have been really tough to deal with this year.
And so my physical health has absolutely gotten a lot worse because of that.
And so, like, I just I keep telling myself, like, this is your job, Stephanie.
And for me, like, I do really well with external expectations.
If you've ever read the Four Tendencies, the author is Gretchen.
Her name is Gretchen, but I can't remember last name.
It's a really good book.
If you want to learn how you react to it's basically how you interact with expectations, with both internal and external.
And personally, I do really well with external.
I'm an obliger through and through.
And so when Molly Moran said, your health is your job, treat it as such, I meant, I took that.
I took that seriously.
I took that personally.
That's what it is.
I took that personally.
And I have.
I just keep saying, this is your job, Stephanie.
Like, no, you're gonna eat breakfast.
You're gonna get your protein, and you're gonna not drink alcohol, right?
Like, I'm not drinking right now because that's like a big, like, can be a big problem for me too.
And so, like, I'm sharing all of this to say, guys, like, it is not just your business.
When I say I have had such a good work week this past week because I took care of my physical and mental health, I took care of me first.
It's been such last week was so good.
It was such a good, a good week.
And you know, things happened.
Definitely, like, not great things happened.
But I was just able to have a lot of clarity and a lot more calm because I had I followed this.
So Molly, thank you so much for sharing that.
That is, you know, encouraged me to share and be vulnerable here too with you guys because I like to create that space as well.
So that one was like, it was so useful and it's literally affecting my life in so many ways right now every single day because it's my job and when it's my job I'm gonna show up for my job, right?
And it's turning out that it's helping every other area of my life as well.
So I'm really happy that.
So moving on to the round table, which is our time that we get to meet with other businesses that are similar revenue sizes as us, and we get to talk about our one big question or problem that we want to discuss and get their feedback.
And this is most people's favorite session of the entire retreat.
It's the last session, is the mastermind roundtables, and I loved it.
It was amazing.
I actually did not know what my question was going into it because I just like, I don't know, I don't know what to ask.
But then hearing everybody else and just they said they, you know, several people said some really interesting things about like how many leads they were getting and how they're handling their sales, and they were getting hundreds of leads a month, and I'm like, oh my gosh, like we get like at most fifty, like that's our most.
This we've had this year is fifty leads in a month, and obviously we're in a rural area and all of that.
But my question was about paying for marketing because I have been pretty not against it, but I felt like it hasn't been necessary, and I don't think it was really necessary previously.
But we're in a new era of Serene Clean where we are keeping up with hiring.
We are having a really good pipeline of applicants, so that means that we need to look at sales more.
And I'll get into that briefly in another section here.
But just asking, like, how?
My question was, you know, like, how much are they spending on the marketing and just like overall thoughts of like, do you think this is really holding me back?
And it was really good.
It was a good mindset of like, yes, you need to invest in this, and it made me realize that one of my, I guess, limiting beliefs is like, I don't need to spend on marketing.
Like, it just kind of comes to us because of all of our amazing, you know, our branding and our online presence and things like that.
And while that is true, it's like, yeah, but if you could spend this much on marketing and it brings in this much ROI, like that makes sense.
And I just like, I'm scared because I'm like, I don't know what to do.
And so this may involve hiring a marketing agency.
Probably, this is more going into the Claude route of things, a lot more first.
I'll see.
But just being open to spending money on certain things.
Just like last year, I feel like my biggest, like, breakthrough was spending money on Indeed.
It's like, am I am I cheap?
Am I a cheapskate?
Am I Mr. Krabs?
Leave a crab emoji down below.
I don't think I am.
I think I'm pretty, like, not cheap, but apparently in some, some areas I am, because, like, that changed our life when we started spending on Indeed.
So I'm like, maybe I need to start spending money more on marketing.
So I'm definitely going to marinate on that.
I'm going to put things in place.
I'm going to have some conversations, maybe with some agencies.
Stay tuned.
Stay tuned, just to increase our lead volume for sure.
So I love that.
I love giving advice to the other owners.
That was really fun.
So the next section I want to talk about is kind of a segue from that of sales.
And the thing I kept hearing over and over again was having a dedicated salesperson and not putting customer support on your salesperson, which historically has always been the case for us.
And so it was just so abundantly clear from these conversations I was having, and the things that I was hearing is that this is hurting us greatly because between a new customer and a current customer, we are always answering the current customer first, which is important and wonderful, but that means that oftentimes sales gets pushed and pushed and pushed, and we're not getting back to them very quickly, and that means they're moving along, right?
Whereas if we get a hold of them right away, they're probably closing.
And so that means Katie, my customer relations manager, I want her as a full-time dedicated salesperson.
That is what I want for her, and I took this back to my team meeting on Wednesday, my ops meeting, and I was like, this is what I want.
I want this restructure to happen.
We need to create the space in order to do this.
So what does that look like?
Because when I was up in Wisconsin two weeks ago, we had the in-person conversation of we do not want to add another office person.
We don't want that overhead.
We don't want to add another manager.
So how is it possible that we can continue to grow and scale with the same management team?
What does that look like?
And so then when I come back and say, all right, Katie, all customer relations after the fact, of after point of sale, now that is now that is going to be somebody else.
Well, how does that happen, right?
Because all the work still needs to be done.
And so this is happening.
This restructure is going to happen so that Katie is fully that.
And how are we making the space?
Well, that leads me into the next big takeaway from CleanCon was agents, AI, and automation, which you guys already know we were moving towards that.
But when I say what has been accomplished in the past week at Serene Clean with AI and agents and automated tasks, it is absolutely mind-blowing, blagging, blagging, guys!
I say mind-blagging.
I cannot believe how much has been accomplished this past week.
It is been crazy.
We've automated like I just, I can't even describe how much.
Like every day I log into Claude and there's more and there's more scheduled tasks and there's more skills and all sorts of things.
It's crazy.
So I saw in the mastermind, the ZenMaid mastermind, like a week and a half ago, somebody commented, "Oh, Briarcliff Cleaning, right?"
Yeah, Briarcliff Cleaning commented on a post.
Somebody asked about AI, and they said that they had AI like logging to ZenMaid, and I'm like, what?
That actually, let me just pull up my what's my scheduled tasks so I can look at here as to what we've created.
Sales, we're checking LSA calls against ClickUp twice a day to make sure that we're not missing any LSA calls that came through, and we're like getting back to them quickly because they didn't necessarily fill out a booking form.
Daily invoicing check, daily sales availability availability report, so that Katie can have a printout on her desk right away in the morning of our current availability for big time slots in all three of our locations, so she can at a glance say, "Cool, that time slot would work."
Like when she's on the phone, because that's one of the biggest struggles that we have for a challenge when booking clients is like finding the best time for first times because of the drive time of like, what is the most efficient place to put them, right?
Because we want to eliminate as much drive time as possible.
Especially, we're pulling multiple cleaners for that, right?
Daily lead follow-up sweep.
So, what that's going to do is, it's going to be scanning through all of our ClickUp, which is where we do like our sales process and lead management flow.
It's scanning that.
It's going through the email and the text from Quo, and it is creating follow-ups automatically for us, which is just crazy.
Based on what needs to occur, there is some HR stuff that Crystal has created for our compliance check reviews, for weekly time-off reports, quality check reviews is going to be running.
I see.
I got Friday afternoon invoicing, monthly CEO report preparation.
I did that one last week.
So, like, one of the presenters, I'm so sorry, I can't remember her name, but she talked about having like 70 agents in her business or something, and I was like, that's insane, that's crazy, and I'm like, oh God, that's going to be us, that's going to be us, and I'm obsessed because this is how we are going to create the space.
So that now April, she is payroll and accounts manager, right?
So like hours of her week is spent on payroll and doing invoices and keeping all of that up to date.
So if we could eliminate that, even by like down to 25% of what it takes for now, oh my gosh, there's the space.
There's the space for her to take customer relations and customer support, so that Katie can be fully sales and everything is moving more smoothly and their mental capacity is more focused on the things only a human can do, right?
And that is the human to human connection.
That is the conversations.
That's not freaking out because your sales call is taking 30 minutes and you're booking them, but you have this huge line of like manual tasks that you need to do, right?
So like I, this is like literally work in progress.
Every single day it's changing, guys.
I know, I know.
I posted in the mastermind, I think last week or the week before, and you were like, "Please tell us, tell us what you're doing.
Like, show us, show us all of the things."
I promise, I will, but give me some time because I want to fully build this out.
I want to build this out a little bit further so I can show you what I mean.
But the biggest thing that you need to know is that Claude or AI can log into any website.
They do not need an open API.
Okay, ZenMaid does not currently have an open API.
If you don't know what that means, it just means basically like a key into the lock of a software.
So, for example, ClickUp has an open API.
I think Gusto does, like QuickBooks does.
So, what that does is when you give that to like something like an AI, they can easily go in and like it can make tasks in ClickUp.
It can do everything in ClickUp, right?
Because that's what the open API does.
But now, because Claude can log into any website, you don't need that necessarily.
An open API is definitely faster, but for the things that we needed to do, which is like export files and reports and things in ZenMaid, it's doing that automatically.
Like so, this morning at 8:15, it logged into ZenMaid, it exported the appointments for the next month, and it then analyzed that, found the large chunks of time, turned that into a PDF, and emailed it over to the office so that Katie had it to print off right when she walked in the door.
Fucking crazy, crazy!
And yes, can she look at the computer and scan?
It is so much easier when you just like have it at a glance on your like, you're not fucking with the computer because you're probably already fucking with the computer when you're making a sale, right?
So it then she goes into ZenMaid during the call once she's kind of like pinpointed a day, and then she starts to look a little bit closer as to what the schedule is best for, right?
But yeah, and then she can make her notes, all of that.
So all in all, like this was already in the works, but seeing so many use cases for AI in our business at CleanCon was like, and now it's just, it's like a, it's like a runaway train right now.
It's crazy, and I'm so excited.
I literally just asked Claude because I saw a reel yesterday that said Claude can like do video editing for you, and so I'm like, oh my gosh, I want to take all of my employee like conversations that we're recording.
I want to like put those in a folder.
Claude analyzes and cuts them based on, you know, transcribes and cuts them based on like the most impactful thing.
Do the captions, do the edits, and I'm like, I this is not built yet.
I literally just asked about it this morning.
I'm looking at the chat right now, but like, I'm just like, I can't stop.
I can't stop.
I just want to do everything because it's going to create that space.
Like, any time we can take that manual labor off of us, it creates the space.
So, I know that this is probably really overwhelming.
If you are not an AI user, trust me when I say this is all new to us too.
Like, we're learning at a rapid rate, and so it's all new.
It's messy.
It's, you know, it's breaking stuff potentially.
But, like, the point is, is like, we're trying, we're getting better, and it is improving little by little.
Every single week we are automating something.
We're just a little snippet, right?
Oh great, that took me half an hour.
Now it's taking me five minutes, right, to do this thing.
So, like, that's the type of shit.
That efficiency, that is leverage in the office, so that all of a sudden we don't need to add another admin person.
We can do it with my current management staff, which is better because then I don't have to teach somebody new.
We all make more money, right?
Because we don't have to share it with anybody else.
Like, literally, that's what I say to them.
It's like, cool.
If we can figure this out, guess what?
All more, all of us get more money as the business grows because there's not another person to person to have and like more benefits and just that's amazing.
So I'm so excited about this, and I'll definitely share more as I discover more.
I'd love to hear how you guys are using AI.
There was a ton of vendors that are using AI really heavily, which was very impressive.
So just all in all, it was really exciting to hear how everybody is using it.
So I want to go into my final couple points here, which I asked a question to Kristen actually about in-persons, and I was like, "How?
Like, what was your cadence for in-persons?
What would you recommend?"
And she said that she kind of had like an open door policy, as opposed to like dedicated in-persons with her people, because she didn't want to influence them to think that's the only time that they can bring something up.
Which I can also understand.
But then after the fact, I had two folks come up to me, Nina and David, and they are from Squeaky Clean.
Is that your cleaning business, David?
And David had a killer presentation too.
Oh my gosh, his was amazing.
It was about basically like create your business as if you were sick, because he got really sick.
He had like really bad Lyme's disease and was exhausted, and they didn't catch it for years, and so his business had to run without him basically, and like his tips on how to do that.
So shout out to David, that was amazing.
I am having them on the podcast.
I have so many future podcast guests because of CleanCon, because I was like, "You have like, we have to get you on the podcast.
You speak so well.
You have so many amazing thoughts and experiences."
So I want to be those being shared.
So both David and Nina from that cleaning company came over and talked to me.
They're like, Hey, you asked about follow-ups, right?
And I was like, yeah.
And they said that they implemented in-person or, you know, huddle slash Zoom follow-ups with the newbies at a specific cadence, and that has dropped their turnover for new hires down to basically zero.
To the point, she's like, the people we want to quit aren't quitting.
And like, oh my gosh, this is crazy.
Tell me more.
And she said that what they're doing is, with like for new hires within the first month, they're having a one-on-one conversation with them once a week, and then I think after the first month, then they go to like every other week, and then they go to once a month and once a quarter, like as the person gets further and further along.
And what that does is it gives them the opportunity to communicate and also non-verbally communicate how it's actually going.
And you know, I brought this up on Wednesday with my managers, and I was like, "What do you guys think of this?
Like, I don't think it could hurt, and I think it could only help because how many times, you know, we are checking in with them.
Right now, we are doing check-ins on a very regular basis for the newbies, but it is all over like Messenger, like, like Slack."
And I was like, I bet, I bet you that a lot of our staff are not necessarily comfortable.
They don't know us yet.
Maybe if something negative is going on, they don't want to share, right?
And it feels very intense to like type that out, right?
Whereas if you just hopped on the phone or a video chat with them, you can see how their faces, you can hear their voice, and say, and they're like, "Oh, it's okay, it's good, it's going good."
Like saying that, I'd be like, "What's going on?
Like, tell me more.
Like, what what is that?
Is there something that we could do better?"
Like, is there something that's making you feel not super great or confident?
And just by the voice alone.
And so, we definitely want to implement this.
This will take a little bit longer because structurally it's more complicated to make it happen.
But I absolutely think this is again making that space so that Crystal can do the things that AI can't, which is Crystal hopping on the phone with every staff member or hopping on a huddle with every staff member and having these conversations.
Because I really appreciated Nina sharing that, like some feedback that they got, they were shocked at.
They never would have guessed, but because the new person told them and then allowed them to improve, and that's really the goal, right?
Is to get honest feedback, especially in that first month, somebody's with us.
Like, if they're having a bad experience, that is one hundred percent why you're not able to keep anybody, right?
If all of the new hires are, and now somebody finally told you, right?
So I think that is really crucial.
I'm really excited.
I think that's gonna maybe it's not gonna get rid of our turnover necessarily, but it might improve it, and it also will help us improve, and also show to a new hire again that we respect you, we want your opinion, and we take it seriously, just like we take everybody seriously.
So I loved that.
So you know, just in general, the themes that showed over and over was separating my sales from my operations.
That's going to happen.
Protecting my energy as the owner and taking my health seriously.
I've gone through many phases in my life.
Feels like I've lived in ten different lives.
I swear.
And so just really like focusing on my mental and physical health because the way I show up is going to be so much better.
Giving feedback faster and with structure.
The FBI is also within twenty-four hours, ideally, if something happening, so that it doesn't simmer.
Building leaders by handing them real decisions, right?
Not swooping in and solving every problem and saving the day because then you're stealing their win too.
You're not just stealing the loss, you're stealing the win.
And just hearing these all like layered out so well, it just, it, I, I, I really...
It was very inspiring.
I'm not gonna lie, like I, I really enjoyed this.
So some of the things I'm not doing, even though I heard them at CleanCon.
So it was Sarah Hutton that built all of those AI agents, and she pretty much paused all growth to do that.
We are not like pausing, attempting to grow.
We're just building, building these as we can, not like overhauling everything, but just like chipping away at it slowly, kind of slowly.
I would say regularly, very like, you know, a good cadence.
I am not overhauling our compensation model.
That is something that I asked about.
Was like, you know, people are paying by labor hour, they're paying percentage, they're paying performance pay?
We are not changing how we pay.
We just changed how we charge to flat rate for residential.
We're not going to change how we pay right now.
I think that would be unwise.
It's not broken right now.
We also do not have the problem that so many people said that they were having, which is like people, you know, milking the clock.
And I do not feel that happens.
Our cleaners are still getting done early so much, and I just don't think this is a big enough problem to literally overhaul that.
When we have like a very specific, like, this is your pay rate, like your pay raise cadence, and this is how you get the pay raise, like we just built all that out last year, so I am not interested in throwing that out the door and changing right now.
So that's staying the same, and I'm comfortable with that.
I know some people may think that's dumb, that's okay, it's my business, so I can do it, and you guys can do whatever you want, it's all good, but that's not a change I'm looking to make.
I think that we can move the needle in so many other areas before we even consider that.
So, was CleanCon worth it?
What do you guys think?
I think I've spoiled it this whole time.
Absolutely, I will be going back.
I did sign up for their online mastermind group as well.
I think it was like, it was so affordable, a couple hundred dollars a month, and there will be like virtual meetings.
And some of the folks that are in that, I'm so excited.
Folks from Holly's company, Maids and More, and I'm like, oh my gosh, like that alone, like any information I can get from that because that company is insane.
I'm so excited for that.
And then CleanCon next year is going to be in the fall, so I don't know when it is yet.
They haven't released it from what I know, but please, guys, if you can make it, I really hope you do.
Not only to meet me, of course, to give me a big old hug, but this has really had an impact on me, and I have so many.
I just, it didn't feel like a rah-rah, like Tony Robbins, like motivation masturbation type of thing going on.
It wasn't like that.
It was tactical.
It was heartfelt.
It was what can we actually do to move the needles in our business, not just feel good and walk away with nothing to actually do.
Right, that is not my style at all.
If you listen to any episode of Filthy Rich Cleaners, you know that is not my style or what I like.
Do I like motivation?
Sometimes, yes, absolutely.
Do I do that in the morning while I am doing my makeup?
I'll put on a motivational video to get me all jazzed up, right?
Because I don't want to do the thing.
Absolutely.
But I don't do that all the time.
I want tips.
I want methods.
I want systems, right?
And so, I really, really appreciated that.
I will be going back to the future CleanCons.
I know it's going to be spectacular.
It is well worth it.
As for conferences go, now that I've gone to a couple, I think it's priced very appropriately for what it is.
So to everybody who came up, said hello, had a conversation with me, spent any time with me, thank you.
It meant the world.
It honestly, like, it made me emotional to hear how many people have been impacted by this.
Because I'm just sitting here in my room with my broken lava lamp that I needed light for, and it's kind of bizarre to know that there's like all these people on the other side listening right now.
Like, ah, I'm getting emotional right now.
Like, this is crazy.
So it just felt really special to me, and that in per, like, you know, we're all far away from each other for the most part.
So I really loved that time together, and I want to do that as much as I possibly can.
I want to meet you guys, I want to spend time with you, and like so many of my consulting clients that you know I've had so many and like over Zoom conversations, like meeting them in person, being like, oh, you're really tall, I had no idea.
So like, it was just, it was amazing.
So I loved it.
Again, kudos to you, Drew, Erin, Holly, Molly.
You guys are incredible.
I am so proud of you.
I hope you are as proud of you as you should be because that was spectacular.
We'll definitely leave all of the details of things I mentioned down in the show notes, guys.
I would love if you would hit that subscribe I'd love if you hit that like for me.
Leave your comments and questions below for future episodes.
I'm always looking for new topics to talk about, new guests.
If you know somebody who would make a good guest, the application is down in the link.
If you are ready to get on the podcast and join me, I would love to have a conversation with you.
Please don't be shy.
It would be a blast.
I hope you're having a beautiful day, guys.
It's a Monday for me.
It's probably a Thursday when you're listening to this.
That's when this is going to go live.
And I hope you're having a smashing day.
I'll see you in the next episode of Filthy Rich Cleaners.
Bye, guys.
If you enjoyed this episode of the Filthy Rich Cleaners podcast, please be sure to leave us a five-star review so we can reach more cleaners like you.
Until next time, keep your work clean and your business filthy rich.
