Category: <span>CRM</span>

Category: CRM

The important questions to ask when selecting roofing software

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By Heidi Ellsworth, RCS Partner.

The question is – are you asking the right questions about potential roofing software?  Every day contractors encounter companies selling the next best thing to grow their roofing business. Sure, it can sound great, but it’s so easy to get lost in the minutiae of choosing a software and end up going down several trails that really do not pay dividends for the big picture – a stronger, more profitable company. The right software can relieve many of your pain points, like labor tracking, productivity, diversification, job profitability and more.  But, you need to ask the right questions to ensure you choose the right product.

As roofing companies are looking for the right software there are many questions to consider. Here are 7 tips and questions to help:

1. Labor Tracking
You will want your roofing software to include labor tracking features. This will not only help with getting invoices out faster, but it will assist you with having a clearer understanding of your job ROIs.
Question – Does the software track labor?

2. Customer Data
There are several Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems and many of them integrate with project management software. Some systems offer customer portals where you can share data, photos, job progress, inspections and invoices with customers at their convenience.
Question – Does the software offer a customer portal?

3. Mobile and Table Use
It does not seem possible to survive in today’s world without a smart device and that is especially true when it comes to business. Smart phones allow contractors to be in touch with their customers immediately – giving them a clear edge when it comes to customer service.
Question – Does the software work on all mobile and desktop platforms?

4. Cloud-based Access
Today, it’s all about communication.  Progressive contractors can operate and communicate with customers and employees from anywhere, anytime. This is only possible with cloud-based solutions. Every step of the process is at the fingertips of management, crews and the sales team. The ability to communicate across numerous, if not all employees, allows for strong communications that correlates into a great customer experience.
Question – Is it cloud-based and available to all employees, anywhere, on any device?

5. Aerial Measurements
Aerial technology has been in place since 2008 and it just keeps getting better. Gathering roof measurements traditionally was a time-consuming process prone to mistakes such as mathematical errors or simple human error, but has now become a quick, easy and reliable technology.
Question – Does the software integrate or include aerial measurement technology?

6. Estimating
Advancements in estimating software, as well as the introduction of cloud-based access, enables strong estimating technology for virtually any size roofing contractor. Not every solution will fit every business right out of the box so it’s important to understand your company’s needs, how the technology fits into your existing processes and what new efficiencies can be realized through the implementation of an estimating tool.
Question – Does the estimating software fit the business needs?

7. Implementation
The most important thing you can do before purchasing any new technology is to take the time to do your research. Talk to other contractors you find through roofing associations or networks and see what has worked for them. You can also look at online reviews and utilize free trials to try out and get a full understanding of the options that are out there and how they are implemented.
Question – How will this work for the company/employees and how easy will it be to implement?

Jobba Trade Technologies and many other technology companies are also members of Roofing Technology Think Tank (RT3), an organization, which RCS is a part of, that helps roofing contractors understand  important questions to ask about technology.

Stay up to date on the latest roofing industry trends when you sign up for the RT3 Smart Brief e-newsletter. 

Source: RoofersCoffeeShop.

3 ways to eliminate mistakes that cost you

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By RT3 member Jobba Trade Technolgies.

Elmer’s glue to seal your TPO? I don’t think so… so why use the wrong tools to manage your business?

Surprisingly, many contractors still rely on time-consuming manual procedures and antiquated systems that are inefficient and fraught with potential for human error. Misspellings, wrong addresses, wrong amounts – not only can these errors frustrate your customers, they can end up costing you big time.

1. Guarantee You’re on the Right Roof

It’s happened to everyone – when you have a big customer with hundreds of properties or a smaller customer with a large shopping center, it’s easy for your crew to mix up addresses or roof sections. Having the aerial image, roof section drawing, and correct address together in one place is the only way to ensure they’ll get it right.

2. Ensure Your Invoices are Always Correct

Do you have one program for quoting and a separate program for invoicing? If so, that could mean two (or more) people are manually entering data in two places, leaving huge opportunity for error. Fortunately, you can significantly reduce or even eliminate the potential for error by incorporating an integration or automated synchronization between the two programs.

3. Remember to Follow-Up

You’ve spent hours quoting a job and probably hours acquiring a new lead. All of that goes to waste without a follow-up procedure in place! If you don’t use roofing software, consider using a spreadsheet to track follow-ups or even an online calendar with automated reminders.

For roofers using technology in their businesses, the ability to drastically reduce the opportunity for human error is just one of the many benefits they enjoy for better managing their businesses.

Stay up to date on the latest roofing industry trends when you sign up for the RT3 Smart Brief e-newsletter. 

Source: Jobba Trade Technologies

5 ways contractors screw up when hiring their first salesperson

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By RT3 member Ryan Groth.

So, you are about to hire your first salesperson. Here are the top 5 ways you will screw it up.

As I’ve been working with company owners in the contracting and building materials industry, there comes a time when an owner asks themselves “do I want to keep this company as a lifestyle business, or do I want to build something bigger than myself?” When people come to me and inquire about how to go about taking the next steps, I offer my advice. Sometimes the owner listens and gets results, sometimes they ignore the hard pill that I just gave them to swallow and they end up hiring someone who was never set up to succeed. Unfortunately for them, the salesperson is gone in three to six months primarily due to underperformance. There are several variables that can be the cause of this, but one thing is certain – it’s the owner’s fault that the first sales hire wasn’t a success. Here are 5 ways you will screw it up when making your first sales hire for your business.

Screw up #1 – Hiring early & not putting a system in place that you digest first.

Typically, owners are good sellers themselves because they have their backs against the wall and have the decision-making ability to dictate prices. Owners are motivated enough to sell deals and take action because they know that they’re working themselves out of the job and passionate enough about what they do to take the deal to the finish line. However, most owners don’t have a good process that they follow themselves, they wing it. They rely on their instinct and knowledge, but it’s almost impossible to translate into a person’s mind in a short period of time. However, even technically gifted, operationally oriented owners can “learn” the fundamentals of sales.

I make this point for two main reasons – if the owner invests in themselves with a solid sales plan, process, and coaching, they may not feel the need to hire a salesman at all for a little while longer because they’re more productive. That’s the ideal situation, right? After all, who needs overhead and distraction just for the fun of it?

The second reason for an owner to digest a strong selling system before hiring a salesman is this – the owner is going to have to be the sales manager! A huge part of wearing the sales manager hat is coaching, motivating and holding people accountable. If the owner doesn’t have an approach to sales that they’ve incorporated themselves, there will be a strong disconnect and it won’t be authentic. Worse than that, the selling system won’t stick, and your salesperson will fail. Hiring should be born of necessity, so optimizing the right habits, leads, disciplines, and approaches should occur first.

Screw up #2 – Having the wrong expectations

Nothing is worse than unmet expectations. Emotions will come up like anger, disappointment, anxiousness, and even panic. Owners shouldn’t expect their first salesperson to be the sudden replacement of all your productivity. If you imagine a Major League Baseball team – there’s big leaguers and minor leaguers. Your new salesperson is essentially a new minor leaguer that needs to prove themselves productive to be able to contribute on a larger scale (think bigger jobs, clients, etc.). Being realistic with the ramp-up time for a salesperson to becoming a strong producer is important. If you’re taking a laborer from the field, or a college hire or someone from a different industry, you should expect it to take about one-year until they’re an average producer, then three to five years until they’re a Rockstar producer. Anything faster than that should make you tickled pink.

What does this mean? This means you’re going to have to remain focused, keep your eye on the ball and produce – all while mentoring someone else to eventually take more responsibility with leads and accounts. Expect them to fail, make mistakes, screw up, forget something, not know something and must take their kids to the doctor’s office and miss the meeting.

Screw up #3 – Not tracking your own selling activity

I’ve tried this myself and it’s impossible to effectively and objectively manage what’s not being measured. Owners should already be adopting a CRM program and tracking their own selling activity and numbers to achieve the goal. If an owner doesn’t have a vision, mission, goal and game plan in place for the company then the weeds of life will get all up in the garden and kill the plant. It takes saying “no” very often to remain focused and to keep from all the distractions that come to a business owner. Therefore, adopt a CRM and track the activity first. This way, the owner can have a good set of data to work with for appropriate expectations for the salesperson. A salesperson will often tell owners what they want to hear, not what they did wrong or avoided doing. Therefore, make measuring their activity and results in something that’s already part of the culture and expectation from the onset. Of course – after the owner(s) do it themselves.

Screw up #4 – Hiring from the outside first before looking from within

I’ve seen owners hire salespeople from the outside and from different industries and fail, even when they had people, not in sales that were already contributing in different ways and loving being at the company. This is the construction industry, not pharmaceutical sales. Salespeople don’t have to look like GQ and Victoria’s Secret models and speak eloquently like politicians to sell and make a strong contribution. I’ve worked with many companies where we promoted a field worker, a surveyor/inspector or service coordinator and because they had the desire and commitment to grow and help people – they learned the mindset and fundamentals of selling and have made wonderful contributors. A huge part of having a successful first hire in sales is chemistry and trust. Be sure to see if this exists in your company or personal network before looking outside.

Screw up #5 – Not having a Sales Talent Acquisition & Ramp Up Plan

Let’s pretend the owner found a candidate (either from within or outside) and is excited about seeing them become a strong contributor. Be sure that the company uses a professional sales report to see where their skills measure up against the best in the world and objectively determine what skills need to be worked on for them to grow. Don’t do this one alone, use a tool for this! Then, interview them on their previous track record of overcoming obstacles.

A career in professional selling is different from most, it takes serious focus, discipline, grit, determination and the ability to learn constantly. If a person isn’t conditioned to function this way, they’re going to be overwhelmed in this role. However, if they pass these and have earned their stripes, they are bought into the unique DNA and company direction and are ready to be part of something bigger than themselves, pitch them and keep the momentum. How does one do that effectively? Go through the sales training system with them that was already adopted. Don’t leave them to their own devices, why? A huge part of their knowledge is what they learn from the owner and having discussions about the content is hugely valuable.

Could you imagine a new player in a minor league organization that doesn’t receive coaching and instruction? Could you see an organization not providing them a uniform, equipment and a structured learning environment for them to practice and apply to game-time performance? We can learn quite a bit from sports and other performing teams – bring these best practices into your organization. Salespeople should be self-starters, yes, they should be. But they’re not going to build the company for the owner, that’s the owner’s job. They will thrive with a strong company vision, good systems, selling tools, accountability, coaching, direction, and training.

I hope this helps with hiring your first salesperson – hopefully, I convinced you not to and become a stronger one yourself!

To learn more about my online sales course and group coaching program, visit here.

To your success,

Ryan

Be sure to sign up for the Smart Brief e-newsletter to get the latest roofing tech news in your inbox.

RT3 Member Kelly Roofing Featured for Use of Microsoft PowerApps

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By Karen L. Edwards, RT3.

Microsoft recently shared in a blog post how RT3 member and recent recipient of Roofing Contractor’s Residential Roofing Contractor of the Year Kelly Roofing found success with a task-focused field application that keeps everyone update in real-time using PowerApps on Microsoft’s Power Platform Solution.

Kelly Roofing partnered with PowerObjects, an HCL Technologies company, to implement Microsoft Dynamics CRM in 2012, Field Service in 2015 and Dynamics 365 in 2016. Dynamics 365 allowed them to manage all of their customer and work order information for each roof repair and installation project. They had success managing the complex details and information needed for communications, dispatching, driving directions and status updates.

Their challenge came in needing a solution that would allow crew members in the field to provide status updates while on a job site. Not every job site has great cell service meaning they would need a solution that would allow updates and photos to be stored on the smartphone or tablet with the ability to sync later, when service was available.

Their existing process before Power Platform was inefficient and causing their teams to spend their days on the rooftops and their evenings on the computer, trying to find, organize and upload the day’s photos. Ken Kelly, president of Kelly Roofing, wanted to find a solution that would ensure the “team is spending time bringing value to our customers, while improving the time we spend with our own family.”

Kelly evaluated software programs designed for capturing job photos but found them to be costly and would result in creating additional data silos, something they wanted to avoid. He turned to partner PowerObjects to help create a PowerApps mobile app that would simplify the process of job photos and status updates while in the field.

PowerApps was deployed to all 120+ crew members who have been using it since spring 2019 with much success. Crews take photos, before, during and after a job. They are stored offline and upload to SharePoint Online when the device has a connection. Photos are automatically named and include the status and location of the job.

In addition to photo organization, the PowerApps has allowed them to do even more:

Scheduling: Crew leaders no longer have to come to the office in the morning to pick up job tickets. The information is provided directly though the app and includes client information, job information, directions and details. They have realized a 25.8 percent reduction in trip time.

Reporting: Customers receive a Daily Job Site Report that let’s them know the status of the job and any notes from the crew. Before the app, crew leaders would need to find a WiFi connection and log into a laptop to provide status reports and customer communications. Kelly Roofing has seen a 36% drop in customer call backs since job information is available to everyone in real time.

Documentation: All documents related to a job are available to everyone from the contract to the purchase order and the entire job history is available.

Since implementing the Power Platform solution, Kelly Roofing has realized a 91% decrease in processing time because of the photo reconciliation time savings. Employees are pleased with the app as well. Frank Viera, project supervisor at Kelly Roofing, said, “I used to spend extra time in my home from 5 – 10 pm looking for pictures. I even had my son help me. Now I don’t have to do that!”

Read the complete case study and see screenshots of the application on the Microsoft blog.

Stay up-to-date with the latest roofing industry technology news when you sign up for the RT3 SmartBrief e-newsletter.

How to choose the right roofing software

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By Megan Brehm.

Whether you’re looking to streamline your business process or simply just wanting to get organized, a CRM or project management system has what you need to do both. But, no two CRMs are exactly the same. Here are a few things to know and look for when deciding on a roofing software company.

Roofing Software vs. Standard CRMs

Knowing the difference between a standard CRM and roofing software is important when deciding on what features work best for your business.

Standard CRMs allow you to manage customer information, track activities, look at project statuses, run basic reports, and view potential leads. Standard CRMs can be used by a variety of trades—meaning it is not roofing industry specific.
Roofing software can perform all the same functions as other standard CRMs. But, it also gets a lot more specific. Most roofing-specific software allows businesses to manage everything including managing production teams, ordering job materials, auto-populate aerial measurements for accurate estimates, tracking and reporting on sales performance, and more!

Areas for Improvement in Your Business

When deciding on what CRM software works best for your roofing business, it’s important to look at the areas you are wanting to improve. Whether it’s something broad like organization or more specific like being able to order aerial measurement reports, these things can help you choose the right software.

One way to get started is looking at areas where your business is lacking and if you notice trends where projects seem to hit snags. Is duplicate information being missed? Are estimates inaccurate? Wherever you’re noticing these issues, this can be a deciding factor on whether you should chose a standard CRM for basic needs or you need something with more detail like roofing software.

Know What Works for YOUR Business

While we’ve talked a lot about the functionality that is out there and where your business might need improvement, the most important thing to consider is what is going to work for your business.

Looking at your current business process and performance will help you decide what functionality you should look for. Let’s say you want different teams to be able to track material orders. With this, you’ll want to make sure the CRM you are working with allows for the ability to place and manage any orders right from the manufacturer.

Understanding the things that you want to help improve and streamline your current process is going to help with choosing the right roofing software.

Source: AccuLynx

The ROI of Roofing Reports: How Understanding Your Data Can Impact Your Bottom Line

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By Michelle Mittelman, Acculynx.

CRM platforms have evolved into a critical tool for roofers and exterior contractors when it comes to managing and organizing the processes associated with owning and running a service-based contracting business. Expanded features have given roofers the ability to create estimates and contracts, manage production calendars, order measurements and materials, and communicate more effectively across teams.

All of this functionality yields an overwhelming amount of job data that is collected and stored within a CRM. However, most roofing CRM’s offer little to no customization of reporting features, making it difficult to garner insight, visualize and disseminate this information to their teams. As a result, in an effort to combat this lack of data accessibility, roofers often run multiple reports across several platforms in order to see the information they need.

The ability to structure, customize and analyze data within a CRM is the most important tool that a roofer can leverage to make actionable decisions, strategize future production and gain a competitive edge.

Every company is different; roofers service different markets, use different materials and offer various additional exterior trades. The data that is important to one business may not have as great an impact on another when it comes to making decisions that affect the bottom line.

The ideal format of data output and the way that information is analyzed and applied to overall business strategy is so varied, that roofers cannot always rely on static reports to see viable results.

Reporting solutions for roofers need to be flexible.

The ability to create detailed reports, as well as the ability to manipulate the way that the data is grouped, calculated, displayed and shared needs to be customizable.

For example, a company may need to create a sales report for different material lines, or even get as granular as shingles sold by color. Other companies may need to report on the ROI of shingle recycling programs, or rebate offers year over year in order to better understand their overall performance.

Roofers need to be able to see their data to understand it.

The ability for roofers to easily visualize their data is another critical function of reporting. Dashboards can help roofers quickly see and understand high level key performance indicators. The ability to customize dashboards for specific teams or set permissions allows everyone to understand and measure their own success in correlation to the company.

Data should not live in a silo.

The data compiled in your CRM is only useful if it’s being shared with the people who need to see and understand the information. The ability to automatically share detailed reports, dashboards and analytics with your project managers, team leads and sales are critical when it comes to providing transparency and aligning department goals with those of your business. When key employees have access to these reports, they are better able to make adjustments to their strategies, analyze employee performance metrics, and identify existing issues and opportunities.

Successful roofers see the value that comes from understanding business performance. The ongoing ability to monitor reports drives meaningful changes, and ultimately contributes to revenue growth.

What is a Sales CRM and Why Should You Care?

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If you don’t have a sales CRM in place, you’re leaving a lot of potential money on the table.

By Ryan Groth.

A sales CRM (customer relationship manager) system can tell you how much work you can expect to come in the next week, month or quarter. It gives roofing contractors the ability to define sales processes and measure the stages of each potential contract. Sales CRM programs also give you reliable reporting to make the right decisions and predict the future. Wouldn’t you rather “know” than “guess?” Making sales predictable so that you have enough work for your crews to do is important, but if you don’t have a sales CRM in place you’re also leaving a lot of potential money on the table. Leads are slipping through the cracks due to mismanagement. Did you know that the first company to contact a lead has a 238 percent higher conversation rate than the second to contact? Companies on average take 19 hours to respond via email and 61 hours to respond by phone, according to a recent study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Given these overwhelming circumstances, there are some key questions you need to be asking: Do you know that following up is important? What are you doing about it? Do you know that if you take managing leads seriously that you’ll smoke your competition?

The problem is salespeople and estimators are telling you one thing, but the reality is they’re doing another. This means that you aren’t in control and you need to keep a closer eye on your projects. Without a good sales CRM, you’ll find that you’re unable to see trends at a glance and see who and what’s really performing well. That makes it very difficult, if not nearly impossible to answer the following key questions directly impacting your company’s day-to-day: How can your sales manager manage his team objectively without knowing what your closing ratio is? How do you know where to spend your marketing dollars, or is it just a guessing game? What can you anticipate in future sales without understanding your pipeline? Are you thinking that you can buy that next big piece of equipment, building or two more service trucks based on hope? It’s better to really know.

Think of it this way, would you hand-weld an entire TPO roof just because you happen to already own a heat gun, or would you rather do the field laps with a robot? A sales CRM is like the robot. A heat gun is like most database software.

In a sales CRM, one must be able to insert and measure their identifiable key performance indicators, or in layman’s terms, each step of the sales steps. Sales managers also need to be paying attention to reports like sales pipeline, closing ratios, selling cycle, achievement against goals for sales and bid volume, lead source tracking on a per-salesperson, per-division basis. If you’re not keeping track then how can you hold your team accountable to performing the right activities to close more deals? It’s better to “know” than to “guess.”

So, is a CRM all about the sales manager after all? No, CRM’s can be user-friendly even for roofers and can actually help sales people sell. Sales reports are a huge pain in the neck for salespeople because they get paid to produce revenue. But if the system can actually help them sell more and keep them focused on the right priorities, everyone wins.
So, if you knew your competition was following up with every lead and tracked every step of the sales process, would you want to compete against that guy?

Ryan Groth is president of the Florida-based Sales Transformation Group, Inc. Over the past decade, he’s helped roofing companies from around the country improve their technological capabilities and transform their sales organizations. Reach him at rgroth@salestransformationgroup.com.

Note: This article first published in Roofing Contractor Magazine and can be viewed here.

Improve your sales speed: 5 ways to sell more jobs with fewer site visits

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By Kate Foster, AccuLynx.

Software for aerial measurements, templates, automation. E-signatures and CRM produces more profits.

During the busy storm season, everyone in the field is looking for ways to improve their sales speed. Faster sales means you have time for more jobs, and having more jobs leads to more profits, and more profits benefit your company as a whole. However, increasing your sales speed can result in sloppy paperwork, lack of attention to critical details, and a lower quality experience for the homeowner – all of which can hurt your business reputation.

In an ideal environment, your sales staff would be able to make fewer site visits for a job, reduce the amount of time and resources spent on each project, and effectively speed up your sales.

But how do you sell more jobs while at the same time reducing the amount of site visits you take?

Use Aerial Measurements to Save Time During Estimation

One way you can improve your sales speed while making fewer job site visits is to use aerial measurements rather than manual ones.

By pre-ordering aerial measurement reports for areas with storm damage, your sales teams will already have access to accurate measurements that they can apply directly to their estimates, saving time up on the roof, and creating paperwork. CRM systems like AccuLynx work with trusted providers like EagleView and SkyMeasure to directly input data into your job file, so your teams come to their appointments prepared.

Accurate measurements helps sales teams avoid lost information or incorrectly entered data so your staff won’t have to make any trips back to the site to remeasure.

Use Templates to Save Time Filling Out the Details

Every roofing business has their own standard set of paperwork, and oftentimes that means your sales teams are working off of a template. Templates are a great way to make sure nothing is forgotten – but what if they skip a section in haste, or accidentally overwrite a previous document?

Using digital templates like the AccuLynx SmartDocs feature allows roofers to create custom, digital templates from the documents they use most on any project. Admins can set mandatory fields, like phone number or Insurance Company, so your field reps can’t submit the file without first filling out the important details.

Using templates means no information gets forgotten and no follow-up phone calls or excess trips to the field are needed.

Avoid Data Re-Entry with Automation

Using digital templates also means once you’ve entered the information once – you’re done! These templates also have the ability to be auto-populate. When you convert your estimate to a contract, you’re not wasting time filling out the same information over and over – they will automatically fill in the assigned data from your CRM for any job you use that template on. The ability to complete your projects faster means you can focus on the next sale.

eSign Your Legal Documents

Homeowners want to know they’re getting a good deal, so you can expect they’ll be getting several quotes for a job. You can take the stress off your sales teams schedules by implementing a legal eSignature component to your paperwork so once a decision is made, they don’t have to drive across town to get a simple scribble.

Sending your Estimate Packet to a customer via email is faster – customers know where to sign and initial, and once they’re done, it’s returned to your job file so your office team can start scheduling the material drop-off and crews.

And, if your sales staff is so great that the homeowner wants to sign on the spot? eSignatures signed on tablets or mobile devices are equally as effective and legally binding.

Have a Process in Place to Streamline Your Sales Pipeline

Having a sales process in place can also help you speed up your sales. A step by step system ensures your sales team knows exactly what to do after each milestone during a job, minimizing time spent figuring out what to do next and allowing them to work more efficiently.

A pre-set process also makes sure everyone is on the same page, facilitating communication and eliminating potential confusion. This allows your sales to proceed faster because everyone is clear on what needs to be done and you do not need to spend time clearing up miscommunications. CRMs can provide your company with a sales process through pipeline features, which guides a job through the various steps of a project from the time it is a lead to the time the job is closed and paid for.

There are many ways to cut out inefficiencies in your sales process without letting your quality and professionalism suffer. Finding the right balance for your company can help shave hours of redundancy off your sales team days, allowing them to visit more homes, make more sales and deliver more profit to your roofing business.

Note: This article was first published on AccuLynx’s blog and can be viewed here.

7 Steps to Opportunity Automation in Roofing

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By Ken Kelly, Kelly Roofing.

CRM, or Customer Relationship Management, is a software system designed to track potential customer interactions and help manage the sales process.  There are a number of players in the CRM space, but the two most robust offerings are Dynamics CRM and Salesforce.  The key to their success is the ability to automate and customize.  This article focuses on the opportunity.

Many companies call opportunities “leads.”   Opportunities are so much more.  Opportunities are a true request to provide a quote or potential quoting “opportunity.”  In the end, opportunities are either won or lost.  And, you can have multiple opportunities for each customer.  Now that we know what an opportunity is, let’s jump into the creating an automated opportunity process.

1 – Create the Opportunity. 

In most cases, a potential customer will simply call into your office, fill out a web form request or send an email request to have their roof looked at.  If a lead asks for an estimate they are now an opportunity.  Convert the lead to an opportunity and add in additional details about their specific need.  Details needed will include details about the leak or problem, contact details, who the decision maker is, budget, communication channel preference, type of roof, age of roof, time frame, presentation venue, advisors and material preferences.

2 – Set Estimate Appointment.

To truly automate the process there are online calendar systems that allow potential customers to request their own appointment time slot, much like making a restaurant reservation via OpenTable or similar app.  If your CRM program has an integrated resource calendar this is absolutely possible and quite easy to set up.  Set your CRM software to change the appointment duration based on the type of appointment.  Repairs may only take one hour while reroofs may take three.  Commercial projects could take the full day.  The system can use the job type to determine this.  The system can also automatically assign an estimator, sales coordinator and sales manager.

3 – Confirmation Automation.

Based on the potential customer’s preference, an automated confirmation should be generated from your CRM system shortly after the estimate appointment is created.  This communication is most often an email but could be a text or phone call.  I suggest including the detailed information you’ve collected from the potential client and ask them to review it for errors or omissions.   Many times, potential customers have told us what their objections are in a reply email to the confirmation.  Suggested items to list include names, phone numbers, email addresses, time of appointment, type of roof, budget, time frame to decision, decision makers, type of roof interested in, etc.  Also include information about your company to help give some background on what makes you unique.  As a final touch of professionalism, resend the confirmation 24 hours before the appointment and make it easy for the potential client to reschedule if needed.

4 – Estimate Automation.

Time is our most valuable resource.  Constantly spending it reinventing the same estimate wheel is a waste.  Have your CRM system do the heavy lifting for you.  For instance, if you use an aerial measurement service, have your CRM system request a report automatically via addressing.  The service can reply in kind using an importable file type that can then auto-generate estimates, prepopulate proposals and do most of the work without ever involving the sales team.

5 – After-Estimate Action.

Once the estimate is completed the system should be updated with the sales details.  Examples are percentage of probably win rate, likely decision time frame, adjusted budget amount, samples requested, next follow-up date, type of follow-up requested and anything you can think of that will help adjust the after-estimate actions.  Now that CRM has the information it needs, let the automation begin.  CRM can automatically order samples from distribution or manufacturers and have them sent directly to the client.  How about sending an after-estimate survey to see where the potential customer stands?  Send automated communications via snail mail, email, fax, text or phone call reminder to see if the customer has made a decision yet.

6 – Close Opportunity Lost.

Ever wonder what happened to that estimate you gave a while back?  Wouldn’t you like to know who won that big job?  Wouldn’t it be nice to look at a list of opportunities and only call on the ones that are still active?  This is where the Close Opportunity dialog comes in.  Close opportunities lost if they were truly lost, if the customer decided not to have the work done or if it wasn’t really an opportunity in the first place.  Have CRM send the opportunities an email with reply buttons in it.  If the job is lost, just have them simply click on “We’ve decided to not have the work done or have it done by someone else.”  This is a soft way for lost clients to let you know they went elsewhere.  Let the system do it automatically to avoid putting any more time into a lost cause.

7 – Close Opportunity Won.

The customer has just awarded you the job.  Now this is where automation really takes over.  Your CRM software can be programmed to pass over all the important opportunity, contact, account, roof and job-related details and automatically start preparing the project for production.  It’s time to automatically thank the customer and let them know what to expect.  Have CRM contact the customer with a special thank you message.  Include details on the specific job process, timeline of the project, what to expect, what they can do to prepare, what additional details are needed to keep things on schedule and so on.    And don’t forget to bask in the winner’s circle.  You deserve it.

Ken Kelly is president of Kelly Roofing in Naples, Fla. For more information, he can be reached via email at ken@kellyroofing.com.

 

Note: This article first published in Roofing Contractor magazine and the full version can be viewed here.