I know this gets asked a lot but things change regularly so maybe there’s new info out there. I need a crm software that is more robust than what I’m using now. I’ve been using Housecall pro for the last 4 years and it’s been ok but not great. I do like house easy it is to use however. We have 6 employees, one of them being our sales and office guy. Here what I’m looking for:
provide an estimate for multiple location on one estimate( such as for chain restaurants)
have package options when putting together an estimate so the customer can pick which package they want
put together detailed reports for CAC. New customers added in a month. Compare lifetime value of customers, Average job size. Things to easily know the health of the company.
have unlimited users preferably
email marketing campaign, and postcard
-all the other basic crm stuff, scheduling, card processing, time tracking. Google maps to jobs.
also really important is a good mobile platform. We are away from computer 90% of the time.
we pay on a commission basis so maybe even a way to put together payroll costs for that day( this might not be available)
This might be a lot to ask but I’m sure there’s some better options out there. Thank you all for your time and input.
i’ve been using the customer factor since 2016. it is not perfect but i looked a lot including HCP and it did not have nearly what tcf has. we use other software as well.
Sounds like you might need a few softwares. Let me know if you find one that does everything! We use TCF Which works decent with responsibid for selling with packages and also integrates with SendJim for follow up post cards.
the customer factor is our base, since 2016 scheduling with route, employee time with gps, hours, commission, , snail mail, bulk and individual emails for any purpose, invoicing, payments, and more added this year
pipedrive to help stay organized, added this year
quoteflare for quotes office or customer online
quickbooks online (desktop since around 2009)
nice job for reviews
i always keep an eye out for better but a quick look shows me to get most of what i get with tcf for $40 per month would cost me $279 with jobber and in addition i would need other software and be missing features i get with tcf.
Thanks man we decided on this one. You should get a credit on your account. It’s hit all the points we need in a crm except commission. Then the things it doesn’t do no crm does from what I see.
surprised by your choice in that you said you wanted email and card marketing which is only on the most expensive plan. and the base plan doesn’t sync with qb.
which plan did you choose and what drew you to it?
We picked the grow plan which after discounts and credits it’s came to $160 a month. The reports and the way the package option works for the estimates really sold me. I feel it will help us to sell higher ticket jobs the way it laid out. The price point was nice for TCF and Markate but I feel jobber is a good fit. Sometimes things just don’t strike you the right way and TCF just has a weird feel and layout. Maybe that sounds weird but I figure if we use it all day I wanna enjoy the software too. It has lots of good content but just wasn’t doing it for me. I really appreciate your input and help. @DelirousDungo
Customer factor all day, does more than house call pro & same as jobber at a fraction of the cost. Also I spoke with Steve privately 2 weeks ago & he said they have been so busy on features but now they are working on modernizing the layout.
For me the customer factor is just more efficient. Everything that needs 3 clicks in other crms needs 1 with CF. I will admit house call and some others have a sexier home page/dashboard. I have used CF for 2 years so learning something new is a nightmare. I don’t see anything that could make me inquire 3 times the cost to leave the customer factor. However I acknowledge sometimes your eyes just take to a certain crm and some might click better with something besides CF. I tried free trials with some others and there was some annoying things I couldnt get past.
that’s what he said to me years ago haha.
he has added many many functions/features but i no longer expect a change in format. if it happens it happens.
One of the deal breakers with me for jobber is how the calendar has to be viewed like this also it is annoying that it shows from 12:00 a.m. to 11 :00pm and you can’t edit the calendar to just be like 7 to 5 etc. If you are scheduling on the app like I am when a customer calls you have to scroll through day-by-day by day-by-day by day while the customer is sitting there to schedule something during this long pause, on the customer factor you can just look for a day without a green dot. You can also click the day with the green dot and see everything. Jobber requires endless swiping & dragging. Cannot imagine being on the phone with a customer when I am booked weeks out while they’re sitting there waiting for me to schedule them. A 30 day view was a must for me. I also got Steve to put Holidays on the app. It was supper annoying when I am scheduling a customer and they reply YOU ARE GOING TO COME ON MOTHERS DAY. Lol
I am in the process of having custom crm made. My upfront cost was huge 20k plus, however I now have crm software that does everything listed below. With the exception of Google maps, coming in the future.
It actually does much more then listed, tracks employees during the day, sends auto email reminders to clients for bookings and A/R, has features equivalent to quickbooks, quoting tools, unlimited users, employee timer for my non comission crews, tracks vehicle maintenance and more.
It is however 100% app. Ios and Android. The office uses 300$ chromebooks and all the employees use their cell phones.
I’m hoping when it is finished the programmer and myself can market it to window cleaning companies. To recoup my costs. I also have to pay nominal server fees.
If any of you are interested in viewing or using it feel free to reach out and perhaps we can come up with appropriate pricing. [email protected] is the best way to get a hold of me personally.
The best part is I can keep adding features I want. The programmer is an ex employee that went back to school for this stuff while he was training on the national rowing team. He went to Rio Olympics.
Probably the sexiest looking dashboard lol it is very attractive to the eyes
Good training & customer support
*Okay amount of features but Lacks functionality (1 example is the customer has to accept your whole bid or nothing) no itemized selection of what they want which leads to resending the quote and more phone calls/emails/time.
Price is competitive with other higher priced crm’s but not the best price wise
Jobber
Great training & customer support
Lots of features & functionality but has some deal breakers for me with it’s functions
Price is competitive with other higher priced crm’s but not the best price wise
Looks attractive on the eyes
Markate
*Great price
*Tons of features
*Looks okay. Not super clean but not clunky or old
*I have heard it freezes from time to time and gets glitchy
*Don’t know much about the customer support or the functionality because I did not play with it long enough
Workiz
Competitively priced with other higher cost crm’s but not the most cost effective
Lots of functions & features ( you can actually record your phone calls with clients)
Seems unique, not sure how to describe it but it has a different feel than the other crm’s
Great customer support and training
Absolutely annoying to look at lol it is bright yellow and feels very blah & outdated with how it looks to you & the cusomter
Customer Factor
Good price
Lots of features & functionality is much simpler to operate (Could be bias as I have had it for 2 years and just did free trials with the others
Big Proposal might be the single coolest feature of any feature of any crm
Lacks modernization on the desktop and looks I guess you could say overcrowded
Lacks customer support and training. Usually you get an automated email back saying your concerns are received and then you hear back that day, a few days or never & you have to follow up.
I feel like the Customer Factor is one of the easier ones to set up which makes up for it’s lack of customer training. I also like how the Customer Factor allows you to edit the Customer Factor you can change quite a bit of things about the Customer Factor where as the other CRM’s pretty much look how they look. I think all CRM’s have something over one another it just depends which one clicks for your eyes and learning ability.
It is like going to a gym! One is a long drive, great price and has lots of equipment, one is a short drive, great price, lots of equipment but the hours are limited, one is a medium drive, high priced, best equipment, great hours but too busy. You have to decide what you can & cannot live without.
For me I cannot give up having a 30 day calendar view on my app because when a customer calls I need to see all of my availability on one screen and not be swiping endlessly while the customer hears this long pause and the big proposal for quotes cannot be touched & as a bonus it comes with a good price.
When on mobile, I use my web browser to view the 30 day Jobber calendar. I prefer to do the office side of things from a computer though. Too much typing copy/paste on a mobile, for me
