Running any small business can be a challenge, but it’s particularly tough to run a service business that requires employees or contractors to be in many different locations on any given day. Luckily, we live in an age where technology simplifies a great many things. There are a variety of plumbing software solutions that can make your business easier, more efficient, and most importantly – more profitable.
For the sake of this post, we’ll focus on service management software, as it’s the most all-encompassing plumbing software solution and as a result, it brings the most benefits to your business. At SAWIN, we have both a basic and pro option, depending on whether you use (and wish to continue using) QuickBooks.
The Benefits of Plumbing Software
Access Everywhere
Service management software makes it easy to access important records, accounting details, quotes, and other files wherever you are. With both desktop and mobile solutions, you can easily coordinate between office work and field work, rather than calling back to the office and waiting for someone to get you the information you need.
Controlled Access
Just because you can access information anywhere, doesn’t mean that just anyone can access it. Service management software solutions like SAWIN allow you to set permissions, ensuring the right people get access to the right information – and no more.
Improved Integration
Rather than going with an all-encompassing solution, some businesses cobble together solutions from a variety of companies and platforms. While it can, in some cases, be more affordable on the surface, poorly integrated solutions can hurt both efficiency and security – not to mention, create unpredictable issues if different solutions stop working together.
If you’re using route planning software that doesn’t integrate with other parts of your business, for example, you might find that employees end up going to cancelled appointments, or that other appointments are a challenge to reschedule when there’s an unavoidable delay.
When accounting information and customer details are not properly integrated with the rest of your business, you may find that collections efforts are scattered, or leads don’t receive proper follow-up. By bringing everything together in one system, you improve the quality of information that’s available at a glance, and that improves overall efficiency.
Employee Empowerment
Empowered employees are happier employees, and good plumbing software can do just that. By giving your employees or contractors access to the information they need to attend to customers in the field, they can act more quickly, and with more authority than if they have to call back to the office for every little thing. They’ll be able to give quick and accurate quotes or access customer history without the need to wait for someone else to dig up the records.
Better Dispatching & Booking
Service management software like SAWIN can greatly improve your business’s dispatching. SAWIN’s service dispatch solutions give your team exactly what they need to effectively manage pending service calls, calls running late, truck and technician movement. Utilizing features like SAWIN Dispatch Notifications, customers will be happier, and you’ll be able to use your resources more efficiently.
The booking process is also improved with alerts that pop up to warn your staff of any scheduling conflicts, budget issues, technician qualifications, and other criteria you may have set.
Better Customer & Equipment History
With SAWIN, your customers will be impressed that you are keeping and updating all of their service and equipment history handy. Complete service history is kept on all service calls created, parts used, equipment installed, technicians on the calls, recommendations, billing information, and much more.
Your team can also instantly review the full details of all the equipment at a customer site, including service calls performed, parts used, warranty dates, serial numbers, planned maintenance, parts required, revenue/cost associated with each piece of equipment, and more.
Improved Sales & Marketing
Perhaps the biggest boost to come from using service management software for your plumbing business is the ability for your field service personnel to create proposals out in the field.
Your team can utilize user-defined templates from SAWIN Pro and then modify them as needed for the job at hand. They can also offer the prospective customer a variety of service and payment options based on their budget. By using the latest mobile technology, your business can maximize efficiency and increase profits by eliminating redundancy, double-entry, hand-written proposals, and user error.
A good software solution can also help you better forecast sales revenue and project timelines so you have a better idea of where your business stands at any point in time. Each lead is tracked from interest to close and beyond so that nothing is overlooked and you can keep your calendar as full as possible without getting overloaded.
Software solutions like SAWIN can also help you better identify and respond to trends. Analysis of current and historical sales data makes it easy to spot changing consumer behaviors and adapt accordingly.
Software like SAWIN can also make it easier to track the effectiveness of different forms of advertising, allowing you to segment customers into identifiable groups and deliver a unique marketing campaign to each group.
You can also improve customer communications, lead cultivation, and up-sell campaigns by delivering personalized messages directly to the inboxes of targeted customers or prospects. Target customer lists can easily be imported from 3rd-party vendors and can also be exported for sharing with direct mail houses and partner agencies.
Find Out what Plumbing Software Can Do for Your Business
There are hundreds of potential benefits to switching to a good service management software in your business. If you’d like to explore the possibilities, our sales team would be happy to offer a demo and talk through the potential benefits for your business.
You can contact one of our skilled representatives at 800.774.7230 to learn more.