How to Get Cleaning Clients with Facebook and Instagram Ads

A cleaning business lives on regular clients. But nobody hands a house key to a stranger on a whim, and offices rarely switch cleaners. This guide shows how to get cleaning clients with Facebook and Instagram ads in your area: who to target, what to offer, which ads to run, what to spend and which rules apply. The examples are Dutch; the approach works anywhere Meta ads run.

Short answer: The most reliable way to get residential cleaning clients is local Facebook and Instagram ads with a low-risk offer (a short intro visit or a fixed price) and a short lead form. Trust sells better than discounts: show who will turn up, that you're insured and what real clients say. As a rule of thumb, start with €10 to €20 a day, work back from what a regular client is worth per year, and call every lead back the same day.

Why getting cleaning clients is hard

Four things make it tough:

• Trust. You're asking people to let you into their home, often while they're out. A low price won't fix that; a familiar face and clear agreements will.
• Competition. In the Netherlands alone, 20,619 cleaning companies were registered at the end of 2025, plus 3,866 window cleaning firms (Chamber of Commerce figures via Facto). Households also hire cleaners directly: Dutch law has a light-touch scheme for domestic help of fewer than four days a week.
• Price shopping. "How much does a cleaner cost per hour" is one of the standard searches in this niche. If you only compete on hourly rate, the solo cleaner with no overhead wins.
• Seasons. According to Google Trends for the Netherlands, searches for a cleaning company peak from January to March and for a window cleaner from February to April. December is the quietest month for both.

Dutch search interest in "cleaning company" is also about a fifth lower in 2026 than in 2022 (same source, January to September). Waiting to be found isn't enough; ads reach people before they search.

Do Facebook, Instagram and TikTok ads work for cleaning businesses?

For residential clients, yes, if you keep it local. In the Netherlands, Facebook has 9.9 million users and Instagram 8.9 million (Newcom's 2026 national social media study, via Frankwatching). You can target a radius around your base, and your service is easy to show: a spotless kitchen or a streak-free window needs no explanation.

Commercial clients are different. A facilities manager running a tender is found through Google, LinkedIn and your network. Meta does work for small local businesses, like a dental practice or a ten-desk office.

TikTok is smaller, with 4.7 million Dutch users (same source): strong for visibility and recruiting, but start your first client campaign on Facebook and Instagram.

Setting it up: client, area, offer and form

1. Pick one client type and one area

Run a separate campaign per audience: busy two-income households want to hear something different from a 70-year-old who needs help with the windows. Advertise within a radius your teams already drive, for example 10 to 15 kilometres. Anything further costs you travel time and margin.

2. Make an offer that lowers the barrier

Don't sell "cleaning". Sell a first step:

• a free 20-minute intro visit at home;
• a fixed price for a move-out clean, VAT included;
• the same cleaner every week, with a stand-in you've already met.

Discounts attract bargain hunters. A promise like "not happy, we come back for free" often works better.

3. Use a short form with the right questions

With a Meta instant form, people submit their details without leaving the app. Choose the "higher intent" type: it adds a review screen, so fewer leads come from idle taps. Ask for postcode, type of home, frequency and preferred day, so you know before the first call whether the job fits your schedule.

4. Call back the same day

Today the house is a mess; next week a neighbour has recommended someone else. Call the same day and book the intro visit.

8 cleaning ad ideas and hooks

The first second decides whether someone stops scrolling. These angles suit cleaning:

Which format should you use?

• Statics are the fastest to make and test. Test your offer and headline first, the design later.
• UGC with an AI persona works for explaining how the first appointment goes or what a standard clean includes. The persona speaks as a presenter for your company, never as a happy client.
• Video with real footage of your team builds trust, like a time-lapse of a kitchen. Use AI video for mood or explanation, never as proof of a result you didn't actually deliver.

Check the free Meta Ad Library for what local cleaning companies run; ads live for months are probably working. Below are three examples made with Genly for Zeepzwaluw, a fictional Dutch cleaning company (which is why the copy is in Dutch).

Budget and measurement: what should a new client cost?

There's no official number. As a rule of thumb, start with €10 to €20 a day for one campaign and leave it alone for at least two weeks. Meta says an ad set usually delivers stably after about 50 results in a week. Small budgets often won't get there. That's fine, but keep it simple: one ad set with three to five ads.

Then work back from what a client is worth. A worked example with our own assumptions:

• A regular client books 3 hours a week at €35 including VAT.
• They stay for a year on average. That's €5,460 in revenue.
• 1 in 4 leads becomes a regular client, and a lead costs €20.
• So a new regular client costs you €80 in ads.

Plug in your own numbers and log what happened to every lead. Optimise for cost per regular client, not cost per click.

Rules and pitfalls

• Prices include VAT. In the EU, a consumer price must include all taxes and unavoidable charges, such as a call-out fee. Only B2B-only businesses may advertise ex VAT, and then they say so clearly.
• Before-and-after photos need consent. Ask the client first and keep addresses, mail and family photos out of shot: under GDPR, that's personal data.
• Real reviews only. Buying, selling or posting fake reviews is banned in the EU, and showing only the positive ones is misleading too.
• An AI persona is never a client. A persona saying "since Zeepzwaluw I've got my weekends back" is misleading, even with a label. Since 2 August 2026, realistic AI people must be clearly disclosed as AI, and since 1 July 2026 the Dutch social media advertising code states that AI in advertising must not mislead.
• Privacy in your form. Link to your privacy policy in the lead form and don't keep data longer than you need it.
• Hiring staff? Job ads fall under a Meta Special Ad Category (employment), with fewer targeting options.
• Don't cold-call bought lists. In the Netherlands, calling consumers to sell requires provable consent. Rules differ per country. Calling back someone who asked for a quote is fine.

How to do it with Genly

1. Paste your website. Genly reads your site and builds your Brand DNA: logo, colours, fonts, services and audience.
2. Ask for what you need in plain language. For example: "Make three statics for our move-out cleaning in Amersfoort, with a fixed price including VAT."
3. Create statics, AI UGC and video. Statics in your own brand style, AI UGC with one of more than 100 personas, and videos with models like Seedance, Veo and Kling. In the video editor, one click adds an AI label.
4. Let the AI marketing team help. In the AI marketing team, the Ads Researcher tracks what competitors run, and the Media Buyer sets up your campaign paused in your own Meta account. It only goes live after you click.

Genly starts at €39 a month and you can try it free for 3 days (see pricing). Rather hand it off? Genly Leads handles ads, landing page and follow-up for service businesses, up to the appointment in your calendar, with a guarantee on qualified leads. More in what is Genly.

Frequently asked questions