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Learn the Benefits of Field Service Management to Become the Go-To Provider in Your Town
When you first started your home service business, your dream was to grow as quickly as possible. Right?
Through hard work and perseverance, you now own a thriving company, hiring more new team members to keep up with the jobs you book.
This is everything you wanted. But you realize that managing a scaling business is tricky.
For instance, there aren’t enough hours in the day to monitor all of your employees.
And your field technicians might not be able to communicate with your front-office staff as well as they could. Or maybe it’s too difficult for them to communicate at all.
As a result, the situation creates inefficiencies and more potential customers start rejecting quotes for jobs you normally book.
So, what’s the deal?
If you manage your service business through unorganized spreadsheets, basic text documents, or even worse, by pen and paper, your more tech-savvy competitors will leave you in the dust.
Field service management software resolves these pain points of a growing business, helping to automate day-to-day tasks, improve payment collection and offer excellent customer service.
If you employ more than five field technicians, using a field service management solution will likely be an ROI-positive move.
Below, we highlight some of the most important benefits of field service management software and showcase the best software tools on the market today.
Of course, lots of these tools integrate with NiceJob so you can have an amazing stack to get customer reviews, optimize your operations and become a master at reputation marketing.
Top Advantages of Field Service Management Software for Small Businesses
Efficiently Manage Inventory
Keeping track of inventory on spreadsheets is usually manageable for smaller operations. However, inventory management becomes more complicated as you scale.
Field service management solutions like Workiz offer tools that increase the visibility of your entire inventory. Workiz tracks the usage of each item to simplify planning and ordering.
Connect Field Techs With a Mobile App
Another common challenge is knowing what’s happening with your field techs when they’re out on a job.
A field service management solution like Housecall Pro includes a mobile app that equips your techs with everything they need in the field.
This helps your team stay organized and boosts the level of professionalism you demonstrate to customers.
With a mobile app, techs can view their schedule, easily communicate with customers, create quotes and accept payments.
Mobile apps, like Housecall Pro’s, display daily schedules and job details. With one click your techs can mark when they’re on their way, when they start a job and when they finish a job.
A mobile app keeps your field techs accountable while on the job and tracks their locations so your front office can better increase efficiency and optimize routes.
Communicate With Customers Effectively
Online review statistics show that a common topic discussed by customers when they write negative reviews is lack of communication from the business.
Field service management tools enable small businesses to better communicate with customers.
This not only increases the number of personal touchpoints with your customers but also improves the quality of your customer service.
For instance, these tools often include built-in text messaging so you and your techs can easily connect with customers.
You can send automated “on my way” texts to let customers know when technicians are en route. Such texts also show the technician’s location so customers can easily have an ETA.
Additionally, for example, with a tool like CompanyCam, you can achieve business-client transparency by sending project photos to adjusters and customers with a simple link.
Forgoing email attachments and annoying Dropbox links when sharing photos with all stakeholders improves customer communication to ultimately help you increase your sales.
More communication leads to increased customer satisfaction–it’s that simple!
Win More Jobs With Online Bookings
To stay ahead of your competitors, you will need to create an easy way for your customers to schedule jobs online.
Research shows 60% of customers say they prefer to book appointments online and 94% are more likely to choose a new service provider if they offer online booking options.
Dave Moerman, owner of Revive Washing and a home service business coach, put it best:
“People won’t want to deal with the hassle of having their house washed or windows cleaned–they want to just literally click a button and hit ‘approve.’”
Letting your customers schedule how they want leads to more jobs. Plain and simple.
Field service management tools like Jobber enable businesses to embed online booking forms on their website.
These forms collect all the information you need from prospective customers and minimize the usual back-and-forth with new leads.
This solution streamlines the booking process and saves you time while getting more jobs booked for your company.
Another great benefit of online booking forms is that customers can book jobs even outside of business hours.
This gives your customers the freedom to book at the time they find most convenient and you can go back to enjoy your day off without fearing you might be missing out on business.
Send E-Invoices and Get Paid Quicker
Field service management software also streamlines the payment collection process.
Vonigo, for instance, creates digital invoices based on the services customers received.
These invoices are company-branded giving your invoices a professional touch.
They also include a unique URL that directs customers to a payment portal so they can instantly pay for services through credit card and automatically receive a receipt.
If your customers prefer paying in person, Housecall Pro, for example, offers card readers that integrate directly with their platform.
Empowering your customers to pay however they like can differentiate you from your competition and give you an edge.
Track Your Performance Metrics
Field service management tools help track your company’s performance so you know what works and what doesn’t.
A solution like FieldPulse, for instance, offers an analytics dashboard to easily monitor KPIs such as revenue, conversion rates of quotes to jobs sold and total number of jobs sold.
Why It’s Important to Build a Lead-Generating Website
Part of improving your growing business with field service management software complements optimizing your company website to attract leads and close more deals.
You can include a field service solution’s website tools or leverage a NiceJob Convert website and connect it with your field service management solution to automate your online marketing.
At NiceJob, we know how important a website is alongside improving your operations. It’s why we advise local companies on how to create a lead generation website so they can scale easily.
Having an online presence is not only important but crucial for modern service businesses.
A professional company website is a great way to increase your company’s visibility, attract new customers and turn leads into sales.
NiceJob’s Convert websites are specifically designed to do just that (hence the name). They guarantee you’ll get at least a 10% higher conversion rate than your current website or it’s free.
Key Takeaways About Field Service Management
If you want to take your service business to the next level, it’s time to seriously consider your field service management software options.
Of course, if you're still managing everything manually, the transition to software may sound like a massive task you may want to leave for another day.
But to keep your business thriving, sooner or later you have to embrace technology and the many benefits that come with it.
These solutions help businesses run more efficiently and provide customers with excellent service.
And field service management software solves common problems that growing businesses face by automating day-to-day tasks, improving payment collection and boosting your website.
Solutions like Housecall Pro, Workiz, Jobber and NiceJob can differentiate your business from your competitors and help you reach the success you know you can achieve.
