Outdated processes can create issues within workflows, especially as a business continues to grow. Roofing software can help minimize inaccuracies, improve communication between departments, and get ahead of problems before they occur. Many contractors dump roofing spreadsheets and turn to a CRM to help manage their business.
Just last year, J&B West Roofing and Construction, a successful roofing company who has served Northern Indiana and South West Michigan since 2007, implemented AccuLynx into their business. Within the year, they were able to move away from roofing spreadsheets, eliminate manual processes, and improve communication across teams. We had the chance to sit down with General Manager, Tasia Stockstill, to discuss what caused her to help advocate for incorporating a CRM system into J&B West Roofing and Construction’s day-to-day operations and how much of a difference it has made.
Q: Before using AccuLynx, how were you using spreadsheets to run your business, and what challenges did that cause?
J&B West Roofing and Construction used approximately 50 different roofing spreadsheets, not counting those individual staff members had, to track everything from lead generation to sales and production. As their company continued to grow, the more people working on these spreadsheets also increased. “More and more people had access to and were editing the spreadsheets, which just decreased the accuracy so much because it’s all based on consistency. So it became really cumbersome, checking and making sure that it was right and moving things down the line that way,” said Stockstill. The process alone of confirming the data could account for a full-time job. But even then, it still wouldn’t be updated in real-time.
Q: How would you know who was working on what jobs, and how did you monitor job progress?
When it came to the visibility of who was working on what job and the job’s progress, J&B West Roofing and Construction incorporated a packet system. In this system, all the information would move from one department to another. “If someone needed to know the progress of a job, they would have to track down the packet by physically going to each department. Not only was this inefficient and wasted a lot of time trying to hunt down information, but it also lacked real-time visibility,” said Stockstill.
Q: What has made AccuLynx stand out from other CRM systems?
The support AccuLynx provides throughout the training process is one thing that made AccuLynx stand out, according to Stockstill. Starting from the beginning, Stockstill had many meetings with AccuLynx before signing on, going over every aspect of the system and different scenarios of what could happen and how AccuLynx could help.
Once J&B West decided to go live, they could roll out the program at their own pace. “AccuLynx provides tons of support on the training side to get everyone trained and to make sure everything runs as best as possible. It wasn’t such a dramatic change for us and aligned well with how our system works,” Stockstill said.
Q: Since implementing AccuLynx, how has your sales and production productivity improved?
For J&B West Roofing and Construction, communication has improved dramatically between the sales and production departments. “Sometimes, there can be a disconnect between what a salesperson sells and what can actually be done. So that link right there has really cleaned up. We can get in front of potential problems a lot quicker,” Stockstill said. “We once had a miscommunication on the scope of work, and our sales rep saw it before it got finalized in production. I don’t think this would have happened before AccuLynx.”
With paper files and roofing spreadsheets, there’s no way for the salesperson to know what’s going on at the site. “Now, they can pull up the job, see if there are any notes or communication about what is going on, and can easily update the customer,” Stockstill said.
Q: What feature in AccuLynx has helped you save the most time?
Incorporating SmartDocs has saved the most time for the sales department at J&B West Roofing and Construction. With SmartDocs, contractors can provide legally binding documents such as estimates, proposals, contacts, and more that can be sent over to customers and digitally signed from any device. This feature has helped eliminate many back and forth trips to the homeowner’s house for signatures. “Just emailing the scope, even if it isn’t for signature, has really limited the number of return trips that we have to do,” said Stockstill.
Q: How have the integrations in AccuLynx helped your process become more efficient?
J&B West Roofing and Construction use many of the integrations within AccuLynx to help their business become more efficient. They love the EagleView integration. After ordering a report, it goes right into the job and populates directly into the estimate. Then, the sales representative can calculate the materials needed based on their material pricing.
On the production side, they have saved time by ordering through the SRS Distribution integration. “The ability to just pull the estimate over to the ordering side and then send it to SRS, which is our distributor, straight out of AccuLynx has been one of the biggest places where we’ve seen time saved.”
Q: What has been the overall impact you’ve seen since implementing AccuLynx?
Initially, Stockstill didn’t think the owner of J&B West Roofing and Construction would really get involved in AccuLynx, but when he did, his visibility increased across the board. Stockstill said, “he doesn’t have to call people and ask about what is going on in the sales or production department. He can see it on the dashboard in any of the reports he has set up. That has made a big difference, just giving him the ability to really feel the pulse of the company. There are a lot of moving parts working at all times.”
Not only that, Stockstill had positive things to say about the company’s future, thanks to AccuLynx. “We are growing and have more and more departments we want to make and things to do. Because of AccuLynx, we will be able to roll that into our already well-established system.”
The Roofing CRM That Helps Companies Grow
Tasia Stockstill is just one of many contractors who have seen greater business success after switching to AccuLynx. Hear from other contractors like J&B West.
