If you have a business, your business signage is one of the most important assets on the property because it attracts people to your presence and the types of services or products for which your brand is known. However, as is the case with any outdoor item, your sign will get covered in dirt, leaves, or even bird excrement. Consequently, cleaning it will become your top priority.
That said, many companies do not make cleaning a top priority as they might want to focus on sales, or they might want to ensure production continues uninterrupted. However, this is faulty thinking because websites provide digital businesses ongoing passive income, your business signage is a hard working, passive salesperson in that it never sleeps, and you do not have to do anything for it to bring in new or repeat business. Basically, to keep this part of your sales force happy and performing at a rate that will keep your business in the so-called red, all you have to do is understand that not cleaning it will cost you money over time.
Of course, if you do not know how to clean it, there are a variety of strategies to help you protect your brand and continue making a good impression on people who want the products you are dedicated to selling.
1. Clean it regularly
Regular scrubbing and clearing your sign of brush, debris, or dirt will help your sign give customers an idea of how orderly and attentive to detail you are. For instance, if you allow dirt to gather along the symbol of your business, customers will naturally infer that you are not detail minded and that you will often cut corners to save money.
Cleaning signs regularly, however, will cause your customers to feel immediately at ease, knowing that your business is very detailed minded and that the products they buy and the services they subscribe to are the best. Although your products and services might not be any better or worse on a day your sign is clean versus on a day when it is dirty, the dirt creates subconscious prejudice against you and your business. It speaks negatively about your employees and about the overall quality customers might want.
However, if you keep it clean and do so regularly, your customers will similarly feel as if your business is equal to having a good day. This aversion to dirt and desire for cleanliness is evolutionary and impacts people on an emotional level. Ensuring your sign is regularly sparkling and inviting allows you to subconsciously communicate that your customers will be taken care of.
2. High pressure
Unlike small residential signs, a business sign must communicate to customers far away. As a result, the sign has over-sized letters, shapes, and symbols. These can create massive cracks that will collect leaves and dirt. Birds or animals might make small nests in these crannies. Although you might think people cannot see the dirt within these cracks, the dirt will actually create a type of ambient occlusion, which is to say, it will create a shadow in and around the letters of the name of your business. At a distance, this darkness will appear dingy and uninviting. Worse, you cannot simply take a rag to this type of grime.
Instead, you should use a high-pressure washer capable of delivering 800 psi to 1,500 psi. Such pressure can easily get down into cracks and loosen dirt. The high pressure will also be able to remove dingy layers of dust that will make your sign seem faded.
Using high-pressure water spray will also allow you to spray bolts and connectors. Over time, if you allow dirt to collect around bolts or connectors, moisture will eventually create rust. In addition to the rotten impression such a sign will make on just about everybody, the rusting bolts will eventually need to be repaired or welded. This type of upkeep can be expensive as it takes a sign company with a ladder truck to fix the sign.
3. Professional services
In the same manner that your business sign is oversized and difficult to clean, it is also probably positioned between 10 feet and 20 feet or higher in the air. At these heights, cleaning your sign can be dangerous. Even if you are able to safely clean it, it might take you a long time, which can eat up the amount of attention you can pay to all of your needy customers.
The best way to save time and the revenue you will lose by cleaning a sign is to hire professionals. Professional cleaning services have already invested in the equipment that your sign will require. They have also already become skilled at cleaning signs at heights of up to two stories. Consequently, the money you pay for a cleaning contract will be less money per month than the money you lose by not cleaning the sign or by attempting to clean it yourself.
4. Squeegee for the windows
Some businesses have two signs, and one of the signs might be the letters that are stenciled across your store’s window. For cleaning windows, your absolute best friend is the squeegee.
A squeegee can help you because it captures the water that runs down your window. In doing so, it prevents streaking, which can look filthy to customers walking into your business. For customers walking past the window, this type of window makes window shopping impossible, and the customers may never return because they will opt for a business that feels clean.
A squeegee can also collect dirt residue stuck to the window. Finally, the soft rubber will not tear the painted letters of your business name.
5. Equipment to increase safety
To maintain a safe environment for you or for your employees, you will need the proper equipment. If you do not have the proper cleaning equipment, you can end up creating a situation that requires you or your employees to lean too far out or to reach too high into the air.
To combat this, you should have the following items.
- long-handled squeegee
- short-handled squeegee
- power washer
- spray bottle
- glass cleaner
- newspaper