Don’t redraw
Re-drawing product information multiple times during the sales process eats up installer’s valuable time, according to founder and CEO of Tommy Trinder Chris Brunsdon, who is on mission to do something about it.
“Re-drawing things over and over again during the sales process is driving installers nuts,” he said. “When it comes to quoting, installers tell us it’s their biggest bugbear.”
In conversations with over 300 installation firms, Tommy Trinder discovered that in the journey from initial sales visit to placing an order with a supplier, product information is re-drawn on average three times.
“The problem starts with the first sales call, and the pad and pen that installers carry into the house,” Chris said. “The sales guy typically comes away from that first appointment with some rough scribble, often akin to Egyptian hieroglyphs, that needs to be deciphered and drawn out again before the quoting process can even begin
“I do have first-hand experience of this part of the process. My first ever job was to de-code my father’s scrawl after he’d visited a prospect; a time-consuming and tedious job that was always fraught with error.”
Once the sales notes have been interpreted, next comes the pricing stage. Again, Tommy Trinder found this can prompt multiple re-draws.
“Installers are frequently faced with having to juggle multiple suppliers on one project,” Chris said. “An aluminium bifold, some sash windows and a handful of casements, for instance. All sourced from different manufacturers, each with a unique pricing regime. The process of splitting the order and sending some or all parts off for pricing involves more time-hungry redrawing.”
Compiling the items into one presentable document, ready for the homeowner, is another stage, with any subsequent revisions literally sending installers back to the drawing board. Then there’s the ensuing document flow once a customer wants to go ahead.
“Generating a contract, documentation for surveyors and fitters, purchase orders for manufactures, all of this eats time. And, of course, each time you transpose information mistakes creep in: an ‘8’ can look like a ‘3’ after a long day in the office.
Tommy Trinder’s latest release, dubbed ‘Framepoint Once’, aims to solve this.
“Framepoint’s unique drawing interface means that installers can ditch the pad and pen and free-sketch windows and doors on a tablet, live with client. It feels just like sketching on a pad – it’s just as intuitive and collaborative – but of course, we are off to a flying start because the information is captured digitally from the get-go.”
Installers price live on Framepoint or, in one click, dispatch pricing requests to multiple installers.
Thereafter the Framepoint platform transforms the same data set into a finished quote, homeowner contract, fitter and surveyor documents. And, with the release of Framepoint Once, Tommy Trinder has fine-tuned the ability for installers to place purchase orders on multiple suppliers directly.
“A surveyor or order processor can simply touch to split orders across multiple manufacturers, set delivery dates, delivery addresses and instructions for each part, and generate good to go purchase orders in a click,” Chris said. “Most importantly. Framepoint uses the same information throughout the process, saving bags of time and eliminating those costly transposition errors. Now you really can just’draw It once’.”
