Research shows that a staggering 38% of businesses underestimate the importance of a proper customer relationship strategy. The same study shows that 65% of customers have switched to a different service because of poor customer service.
Another study shows that just 29% of companies engage with existing customers beyond the initial purchase.
That’s a massive missed opportunity - and a huge competitive advantage for contractors who are organized and systematic about keeping their names in front of their happy customers.
Whether you're running a big or small business, the right customer relationship management (CRM) system can help improve your sales and customer retention management process. Where a great financing program can help make it easy for customers to say “yes,” CRM programs help with better data management, marketing automation, sales pipeline management, and general client relationship capabilities.
But not all commercially available CRM platforms are alike. They vary widely in pricing, features, ease-of-use, compatibility with other systems, and scalability.
Here are the 6 best CRM for contractors on the market today that can help any home improvement contractor improve sales, improve customer retention, and keep your business growing.
HubSpot CRM
Price: $50 per user per month with premium
Free Trial: Yes
Although HubSpot CRM isn’t designed specifically for home improvement contractors, its clean design and polished features make it one of the best CRM solutions for contractors in any industry. Its outstanding free version comes loaded with features, and makes a great entry-level solution for small contractors just getting started.
Some contractors might even find that HubSpot CRM free trial can work better than other CRM paid versions.
HubSpot CRM helps your sales team log activity, capture leads, and manage the sales pipeline. Blogging, SEO, and email marketing tools are all available with the paid upgrade.
This makes HubSpot CRM a great system to test out before going deep and investing money in a paid program.
HubSpot CRM software is very scalable and gives you the ability to easily migrate to another CRM solution if HubSpot CRM doesn't end up to your liking.
Top CRM Features:
- Fantastic free plan. HubSpot offers the best free plan in the business. For startups and businesses that are just progressing beyond manual processes, integrating an excellent CRM costs nothing. Your sales teams can get started improving your sales pipeline management right away.
- Intuitive & user-friendly. Even home improvement and construction professionals who are not computer whizzes will find HubSpot CRM software easy to use and understand. This is primarily thanks to the HubSpot drag-and-drop system.
- Scalability potential. HubSpot features modules for marketing, sales, customer service, and operations in addition to its own CMS. HubSpot also offers a market-in-one approach to cover lead management features under one roof.
Builder Prime Construction CRM Software
Price: Starts at $79 per month
Free Trial: Yes
Where HubSpot is a general solution that’s not industry-specific, Builder Prime was built specifically for construction and home improvement contracting business from the ground up. This cloud-based construction CRM makes project management and customer relations easy and it has key features specifically tailored for home improvement and construction project management businesses.
Builder Prime's construction management software solution can massively reduce your workload compared to manual processes and legacy systems. By reducing your workload, the CRM provides you and your team the time to focus on more productive tasks: Actually calling leads, setting appointments, closing sales, and serving customers.
Overall, Builder Prime is a great solution for both a big and small business looking to create new leads and maintain the old ones without getting overwhelmed.
Builder Prime also features excellent support for mobile devices, so your team can easily use the program on the go.
Builder Prime’s monthly price point is higher than HubSpot’s. But for construction and home improvement contractors, the additional construction-specific functionality is more than worth the investment.
Top CRM Features:
- Effective automation. Builder Prime does a great job at automating most of the workload. So your team can focus on working with customers, not fighting your software.
- Contact management & billing. Builder Prime makes it easy for a business to stay in touch with customers and send professional-looking invoices in a snap.
- Insightful reports & data entry. Collect data that helps you make better decisions on future construction projects.
JobNimbus CRM & Project Management
Price: Starts at $25 per user, per month
Free Trial: Yes
JobNimbus is a cloud-based software and project management tool that helps contractors with customer relationships, sales pipeline management, job costing, and invoicing. It contains great project management tools, and includes top-of-the-line sales management tools for construction companies.
But what makes this JobNimbus great is that specialty contractors can easily customize the platform to fit their specific needs. JobNimbus makes it a snap for users to customize most business processes without needing a masters degree in computer science.
The handy templates make it easy to create contracts and even presentations that fit your individual business needs.
The software also offers some excellent integration features, including calendar and email notification tools to help users manage construction projects and personal life matters in one convenient interface.
Top CRM Features:
- Easy contact management system. A great overview of your existing contacts with useful filtering tools.
- Compatible with other platforms. Integrates seamlessly with leading third-party software such as QuickBooks, Google Calendar, Zapier, etc.
- Budget Tracking/Job Costing. Integrates accounting features to help contractors with time tracking, document management, and invoicing.
MarketSharp
Price: Starts at $99 per month
Free Trial: Yes, in the form of a demo
MarketSharp CRM is a potent tool that can help any construction company manage customers, sales pipeline, and job costing. The software also offers tools like invoicing automation and an intuitive dashboard. Hence, managing multiple businesses becomes much easier, which frees up more time for focusing on business development.
Additionally, MarketSharp construction CRM software integrates readily with a wide range of third-party solutions for effective customer feedback collection and data analysis. Not only will you have a transparent overview of your sales pipeline and customer service statuses, but you'll also get a better idea of how to offer client financing solutions.
Finally, MarketSharp’s CRM customer support team is very responsive. They have a great reputation where it counts - among their own customers. If you have a problem, you can expect a response that goes beyond general replies and provides constructive feedback.
That’s unusual these days - and that’s valuable because any CRM downtime can cost your business a lot of money.
Top CRM Features:
- Specialized CRM construction features. MarketSharp has all the necessary features and sales tools for a home improvement or construction management business.
- Great reputation management. Helps create and maintain a solid reputation in the construction industry, leading to profitable referrals.
- Compact database. It's easy to keep data transparent and track profits per month or per user case.
ImproveIt 360
Price: Starts at $150.00 per feature, per month
Free Trial: Yes, in the form of a demo
Improveit 360's construction software focuses on improving data tracking to make better business decisions. Improveit’s CRM has capabilities for scheduling, quoting, project management, and reporting.
Improveit 360 is an excellent choice for growing or established remodelers and larger construction businesses.
It works for remodeling and construction projects because you can also manage teams and streamline communication besides managing customers.
Also, despite being loaded with valuable features for construction and home improvement industry users, Improveit 360 manages to do a great job of simplifying the process for each client.
Users can create personalized dashboards for their sales and marketing teams. And its intuitive collaboration features make it easy to keep everybody in the loop of what's going on with each client.
Top CRM Features:
- Auto activity tracking. You want to know where your leads are in the sales funnel. You can get all of their information electronically and automatically log what they have done. That's easy with ImproveIt 360's lead management tools. This way, it will be easier for you to manage them and make the sale happen more quickly.
- Work scheduling. Tell your team when they need to be at an appointment with a customer. Create notifications and integrate them in your calendar, so your team doesn’t miss a beat.
- Project management. Track your progress with a total overview of all active projects. Track the cost of each project and see how much money you are making from them.
Unanet CRM by Cosential
Price: Full User – $70 per user, per month. Read-Only User – $10 per user, per month
Free Trial: Yes, in the form of a demo
Unanet construction software is another leading CRM tool designed specifically for construction and home improvement contractors. It features tools like lead and project management, email support, and professional-looking, auto-generated proposals. Unanet also has tools for subcontractor management and more. Unanet is a particularly compelling solution if you routinely work with other businesses in the construction, architecture, or engineering fields.
Data collection is efficient, accurate, and fast. Remodeling and construction management can plan budgets and deliver projects in a timely fashion while providing exceptional customer service.
Although a uniform solution, users can customize the interface based on the type of work. Your developer can c so you get the data you need, while your sales and marketing team can stay on top of customers' data without interfering with other departments.
The software integrates well with MS Outlook and most other industry-specific applications that home improvement contractors commonly use.
Top CRM Features:
- Efficient update solution. It's easy for users to keep team members up to date across the board on everything going on with a specific customer.
- Activity management. Unanet makes it easy to track and report progress, so you can keep up to date on everything going on within the firm without having to get your foremen and supervisors on the phone all the time.
- Proposal management. Unanet’s easy-to-use proposal generation function can save hours, allowing your team more time to respond to bid invitations, generate more proposals, focus on customer service, and develop more relationships so you can grow your business.
Close Bigger Sales By Offering Financing
Contractors know that it’s tough and expensive enough to acquire a lead and nurse it all the way to the presentation stage. You don’t want to lose a good customer at that stage because they don’t happen to have the cash on hand to pay for the entire project upfront.
Sure, they could potentially get a personal or home equity loan to cover the cost. But that process can take days or weeks - and it takes the process out of your control. Banks notoriously deny loans to people with fair or poor credit. And you could lose the customer in the time it takes for them to get approved.
Credit cards charge oppressively high interest rates, and typically have very limited available limits that aren’t sufficient to cover the project.
But you might not hear any of that. What you’ll hear on the appointment is “I need to think about it.” Or “I need to talk this over with my wife/dad/uncle/accountant.”
But that’s almost never the real problem. The real problem is they want to continue, but you haven’t bridged the affordability gap by giving them a convenient and affordable way to pay.
Bring them on board by letting them know you offer convenient and affordable financing. Present them with an online app that takes just minutes to complete, and will get a wide range of credit profiles approved on the spot.
Not just people with great credit.
Once they’re approved, say “congratulations,” and close the deal. You get paid as soon as the customer confirms the sale. And you can focus on wowing your new client. This results in increased customer satisfaction.
To start offering a financing solution to your home improvement customers, just fill out this brief online form and tell us a little bit about your business. We’ll get back to you promptly, and begin helping you close more and bigger deals and grow your business.
