For us, the first commercial wins came less from one magic lead source and more from being willing to do the unglamorous outreach consistently.
I’d prioritize a few things in year one:
Get very clear on who you want to serve and build a simple offer around that market.
Then start direct outreach. Property managers, office managers, facility managers, HOAs, apartment communities, local businesses. Walk-ins can work, but I’d pair them with phone and email follow-up so you’re not relying on one touch.
The biggest thing I learned with commercial work is that winning the account is only half the battle.
Early on, I landed a multi-property commercial account worth around $5K/month and lost it because our expectations, communication, and service systems weren’t strong enough yet.
That changed how I approach commercial completely.
Now I care a lot more about clear scope, walkthroughs, written expectations, who supplies what, what happens if something is missed, and making sure we actually have the capacity before saying yes.
So I’d chase the work, but build the delivery system at the same time.
A big commercial account can accelerate growth, but it can also expose every weak spot in your operation very quickly.
