How to make it easier?

[matt spinniken]

What would be an awesome software product to make running your business easier?

[newguy123]

Originally Posted by matt spinniken

What would be an awesome software product to make running your business easier?

Service Auto Pilot.

[JB1]

Quickbooks
Posted via Mobile Device

[matt spinniken]

let me rephrase, what is something that you would like software to do for you that does not exist now, or is not being done well?

I am thinking about developing some software for the lawn and landscape market and I wanted to hear from people, some needs to be filled.

[newguy123]

Originally Posted by matt spinniken

let me rephrase, what is something that you would like software to do for you that does not exist now, or is not being done well?

I am thinking about developing some software for the lawn and landscape market and I wanted to hear from people, some needs to be filled.

Okay that's a really good question. How about a better lead generating software? Not quite sure how to go about this though.

[tonygreek]

Originally Posted by matt spinniken

let me rephrase, what is something that you would like software to do for you that does not exist now, or is not being done well?

I am thinking about developing some software for the lawn and landscape market and I wanted to hear from people, some needs to be filled.

Knowing what I know about the SaaS space, and after watching advertisers come and go here, especially in the online-related services and products, I would only take on an intensive effort that had appeal to other markets. For a long list of reasons, this is a very difficult industry to gain any profitable traction in, so I would use this, or any other service industry that has overlapping needs, pilot to the chosen field, and then scale up and out from there.

[Falcon50EX]

A program that could target one area and let you pick and choose what house or business you would like to send marketing info to. Say you stat with a zip code then narrow down to a group of houses. You could cross that into other professions. Make it work on Mac a lot of the stuff does not.

[TuffWork]

I know others will say service auto pilot already does this, but I have been looking for a cheaper simpler alternative to scheduling and it just isn't there. Our schedules have these headings across the top:

Address

Height

Instructions (push mow all, ride front/ push back, mow front only, if it's a call in it says TIME so they can time it and we know how much to charge, etc.)

Mowed (Y/ N)

Amount (if not billed for some reason - this will change next year)

Collected? (Cash/ Check/ Invoiced)

Frequency (W, EOW, Call in)

Contact (Customer Name)

Phone


These are the things I need from a scheduling software. That way I can stop using excel, and stop having to double check and recheck the list because every time someone calls to switch from weekly to EOW somehow it doesn't make it to the permanent schedule. Why not have one that does "week 1" and "week 2" and automatically adjust frequency, keeps lists of call-ins, etc. This doesn't have to be as complicated as it is. It was easy when I had 30 customers, but we now have close to 200 and it's a huge pita.

[McFarland_Lawn_Care]

Tuffwork: SA does all that for us. I also wasn't sold on it at first, but after may calls to customer service and getting everything setup the way we wanted it, then it has become an amazing and powerful tool. However it IS quite pricey. The more systems you can set in place and get everything the same it helps. Invoice everyone at the same time, have the same crew mow the same customers on the same day each week. Setup all your schedules once and it's good for the season. Then put in the info and it get's auto-completed and invoiced. It's not extremely user friendly but is very powerful!

[matt spinniken]

Some great ideas, Falcon50EX, can you describe your idea a little more? It sounds like you are looking for a mailing list service but I may be misunderstanding your idea.

Also, TuffWork I like the direction of your idea can you elaborate a bit on it??