Remodelers often complain that as a market they're underserved. Software developers in particular have moved glacially to embrace the industry.
Construction Computing Systems' CompuTool management software, then, is a rare bird. Conceived, designed, and tested by remodelers, CompuTool is a comprehensive solution with extensive relationship management features.
CompuTool wraps lead tracking, contact management, project management, estimating, and post-sale customer relationship management tools into one package.
The program's interface starts with a lead/contact tracking page. Users can create several project folders for each contact.
An estimating module, powered by HomeTech's pricing data, allows users to create several versions of the same estimate to ensure revisions don't overwrite a good document. The module also features a customizable assemblies tool that allows users to create prefab room or phase estimates to save time estimating typical projects. The assemblies tool "cuts down on your estimating time considerably," says Preston Clark, a Hutchinson, Kan., remodeler who recently installed the software.
CompuTool also offers a bevy of contact management features: Automated mass mailings and customer-specific follow-up mailings keep prospect and customer contacts on schedule, even tracking clients' future needs.
"Once you put a customer in," Clark says, "you keep in touch without having to remember to do it."
A service call module will time and date stamp any customer contacts requesting service and even schedule and assign the job. And a subcontractor management module automatically reminds users when their subs' insurance expires.
The application also includes a contract writer. For Clark, developers embedded his Premier Remodeling logo into the contract template and added language required by Kansas state law.
All that functionality isn't cheap: Clark paid upwards of $6,000 for three user licenses. That also bought him custom adjustments. CompuTool, Clark says, costs more than the other products he considered. But, he says, "I chose to go ahead and spend the money, and I'm glad I did."
