Contractor-Marketing Expert Crowns Builder Prime “King CRM” (Part 2)

Here’s The Second Half Of Our Interview With Contractor
Lead-Generation Professional Brandon Miller.

Welcome to Part Two of our interview with Brandon Miller, Co-Founder of Uplevel Digital Services. In case you haven’t viewed Part One of our interview, Uplevel Digital Services is a lead-generation and lead-management firm for home improvement contractors across all kinds of industries. They work with remodeling companies of every size—from brand-new startups to industry titans doing $50M+ per year.

One of Uplevel Digital Services’ specialties is setting up and managing CRM software for their contractor clients. Brandon and his team have worked with and vetted just about every CRM on the market. There are very few companies that possess the same knowledge and expertise regarding contractor CRMs.

And do you know the one CRM program they recommend to all of their contractor clients?

Yep… Builder Prime!

In Part One of our interview with Brandon, we focused heavily on Builder Prime’s reporting features and all-in-one CRM capabilities. In Part Two, we hit on Builder Prime’s automation features, follow-up tools, exceptional customer service… and much more.

As with Part One, you can watch video clips of our interview with Brandon, or you can read his transcribed answers below each clip. Let’s get started!

Note: Some transcribed answers have been trimmed and/or slightly altered for readability purposes.

Can you speak about the importance of Builder Prime’s automated email, text, and phone call follow-up?

Brandon’s Answer Transcribed:

“We know that homeowners are busy, right? [If a homeowner] submits a quote form directly through the website and is called within five minutes or less, it’s not a guarantee that the homeowner is going to answer the phone. They could be busy throughout their workday. So you’re going to keep calling back, and they may or may not answer… but by just incorporating an [automated follow-up] text… that step right there helps increase engagement tenfold. Some homeowners like to call. Some like to text. Some like to email. [With Builder Prime], you have three different routes natively built directly within Builder Prime to be able to increase that engagement with the homeowner.”

We’ve talked a lot about how Builder Prime’s advanced technology helps contractors. But what about the “human element” – i.e., Builder Prime’s customer service?

Brandon’s Answer Transcribed:

“The life cycle, or lifetime value, of a lead is not just that first appointment. If you’re not able to get a hold of a homeowner within the first week, they’re not ‘done,’ right? You still have that contact information. Being able to set up call-rehash queues in your CRM to touch base with them once a month… via text, via email to let them know about promotions… Builder Prime offers all that functionality directly in the CRM to be able to maximize your leads now and your leads in the future.”

Do Builder Prime’s automated follow-up features also help contractors secure repeat business?

You can set up triggers, automations, and email templates to stay in front of customers to maximize [your existing] base.“

“If you are a multi-trade company for multiple services—roofing, siding, windows, bathrooms—you want to be able to cross-sell your customers down the road. You want to be able to keep in front of them… if someone signs up as a roofing customer, they could also be a window customer in the future.

Builder Prime offers that functionality to be able to send email marketing directly to your customer base. You can set up the triggers, automations, and email templates to stay in front of customers to maximize the customer base you have… and also all the leads you have in your engine to convert them now and in the future.”

At the end of the day, what are the top features a home improvement contractor should look for in a CRM program?

Feature 1: All-In-One Functionality

Brandon’s Answer Transcribed:

“It breaks down into three core functionalities within a CRM. Number one, you’re going to want to have a one-stop shop to power everything within your business, mitigating your need to have to sign up for multiple software providers or have multiple screens open or multiple tabs on your screen. It just causes confusion. It limits efficiency within the business. Being able to operate out of one ecosystem—for leads in, texts going out, managing your project pipeline—Builder Prime offers all of that within the CRM.

Feature 2: Powerful Reporting

Brandon’s Answer Transcribed:

“The second thing is powerful reporting. You need to know your metrics and numbers to scale your business. When you’re looking at CRMs, some of the reports are going to be ‘what you see is what you get.’ There’s really no customization. If you want to get a little bit deeper into your data and truly go into the individual source, go into [specific] services, or run more powerful, granular reporting, it is very difficult to do that within most traditional CRMs. That goes back to having to download the data, kick it over to a spreadsheet, start digging into the data, and then manually processing it. You want to really eliminate that step from your process, and you want to be more efficient … [to] maximize your time and your return on investment. The reporting is going to be the most critical part because that is going to be the framework that helps you scale your business in the long run.”

Feature 3: Automation

Brandon’s Answer Transcribed:

“The third thing I’ll hit on here is automation. Automation is the key to maximizing your leads that are coming through. As soon as a lead hits your system, they need to be called, texted, and emailed within a matter of minutes as soon as that comes through. By doing that, you’re going to increase your likelihood of being able to engage with that homeowner. By engaging with that homeowner, you’re going to be able to convert more appointments. And by converting more appointments, you’re going to be able to convert more sales.”

How important is it to choose a CRM that is able to accommodate a home improvement company as it grows?

We wanted to feel confident Builder Prime had a system in place for us to be able to partition the client’s leads according to location. Builder Prime showed us…the set-up process for that. The last thing you want to do is get set up in a CRM and have to switch in a couple years because you’ve outgrown it. And so that was one of the things we talked about with Builder Prime up front. One of our customers who’s using Builder Prime is a single-market company right now. But they’re planning to go to multiple states and open up multiple markets. We wanted to feel confident that Builder Prime had a system in place for us to be able to partition the client’s leads according to location. Builder Prime showed us exactly how to facilitate our CRM and the setup process of that. So knowing where we’re going… and that we have the foundation now to set us up for success in the future… that’s really what you need in a CRM. I can’t stress this enough—I have heard horror stories across the years I’ve been in this industry about [contractors] signing up for a CRM and having to switch. It’s such a huge time sink.” (Note: Watch the clip above for a longer answer from Brandon.)

We’ve talked a lot about how Builder Prime’s advanced technology helps contractors. But what about the “human element” – i.e., Builder Prime’s customer service?

Brandon’s Answer Transcribed:

“Builder Prime has incredible customer service. The help that we have received from our account manager—and also the online repository for training materials, walkthroughs, and questions we might have along the way—makes it easy for us to be able to continually modify our CRM as we move down our business venture.”

Last question: What is your advice for home remodelers currently looking for a CRM to run their business?

Brandon’s Answer Transcribed:

With a CRM, the one recommendation I’d make to a remodeling company is just do your homework. Do your due diligence. Hop on calls with the company. Get a feel for who they are as an entire company. You want to feel confident that the team behind the CRM is going to be there for you. I can say confidently that the team at Builder Prime is here for you today. They’re going to be here for you in the future. They’ve been with us the entire time, helping us get off the ground and fully set up.”

Missed Part One Of This Interview?

If you haven’t checked out Part One of our interview with Brandon, here’s the link. And if you’d like to learn more about how Uplevel Digital Services can help your lead-generation efforts, visit their website.

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