IT solutions are commonplace, and are a necessary evil for many businesses. Choosing the one right for your business however can be difficult, and rather costly if you get it wrong.
We know we need them, but how much can a software solution really help your business? What is it exactly that it helps with? How do you identify what you need?
Rather than talk about the details of our software, we thought we’d share a real life example from one of our customers about how integrate has enabled his business to flourish – Nathan Smith, Wandsworth Sash Windows
Who are you, what is your company and what do you do?
I’m Nathan Smith, Operations Manager for Sanford Group Limited t/a Wandsworth Sash Windows. We carry out the manufacture and installation of timber windows & doors across London and the home counties.
Tell us what was happening (or not happening) within your company that meant you were looking for a software solution?
We had a very hodgepodge system for dealing with our company operations. We had previously used a couple of different window-industry specific software solutions, which solved some problems like pricing and producing quotes, but were not good enough for other areas, like order management, CRM, sales, keeping track of customer information, user-friendliness, cloud based etc.
Before we found integrate we were combining one of these softwares with an online cloud based CRM. This really limited what we could do and how much we could grow. For the software we only had it on a single PC as licenses were very expensive, so we had to have one person on one PC producing all quotes in the software, then exporting them to PDF to upload to our CRM system. It felt disjointed.
Had you heard of EndtoEnd IT Ltd, or integrate as a software solution?
We knew Gareth, EndtoEnd IT Ltd’s Director from a previous company he worked for, but hadn’t heard of End to End or integrate before.
Did you have any preconceptions or concerns us and/or our software integrate?
We were hesitant to change because we knew how much of an upheaval it would be, but we came to a realisation that the main thing holding us back from growing was proper software. We had considered and tried making our own software, and we also tried a load of other options but none were suitable.
Our only concerns were that it wouldn’t be what we needed, because we had tried so many different options before!
What were you hoping new software could offer your business?
What we really wanted was a way to have the business operations conducted in a single platform. This was key because we were primed for growth, but having multiple software platforms meant bringing on new staff in the office or surveying was incredibly difficult.
Why did you settle on integrate?
The Drawing Board was the main thing that sold me on it. It was so much better than anything else I had seen before!
You’re a few years into using it now, how has it been going?
Fantastic. We have grown from having all surveys and quotes done by myself, and my brother doing all the office work, to having four sales surveyors, a sales manager, two sales admin staff and a team of four on installations. None of that growth would have been possible without integrate.
It’s difficult to directly attribute growth to integrate, but we know we would not have gone from £1.2m a year in orders to £4.5m a year without it.
Are there any benefits you hadn’t expected? If so what are they?
The installer interface. When we took the software on, we were looking for a sales solution. However, the installer interface has massively simplified the way we allocate work to our fitting teams, allowing us to grow from 4 teams to 14 teams.
If you had one piece of advice for someone seeking new software solutions in the window and door business what would it be?
Do your research. We spent hours trying out new systems, deciding on one, setting it up for hours/weeks, and then realising it couldn’t do what we needed. Spend your time looking into the options before diving into one, or you will be back to square one in no time.
And finally – would you recommend integrate as a software solution for other businesses in the industry? Why?
Yes, highly. Simply put, I don’t think there is any software out there for timber window and door manufacturers that comes close to it.