SUCCESS STORY
improveit 360 + FOR Energy
Building a Scalable Business: How Better Visibility into Their Operations Helped FOR Energy Make More Informed Business Decisions
Sean McGraw is no stranger to the world of home improvement. At the time Sean was born, his father was running a home improvement business out of Detroit, Michigan, and for that reason the industry became a fundamental part of Sean’s life. As he grew up, Sean would help his father out with the business wherever he could – often lending a hand to sweep the warehouse or unload trucks. And by the time he was 19, Sean was already training to be in sales. Soon though, he made the decision to move across country to attend Arizona State university, where he had a bit of an existential crisis… Sean had the ‘what am I going to do with my life’ moment that so many of us have had before, but then an idea struck. As he was studying sustainability at ASU, he took a huge interest in solar energy as well as home improvement projects that made a positive impact on the environment. So, he decided to marry the two ideas and in 2010, founded Affordable Energy Solutions (now known as FOR Energy), and he’s been committed to growth ever since.
The Challenge
Finding a Business Management Platform They Could Grow With
By 2016, FOR Energy had more than made a name for themselves, but Sean wasn’t happy with the software solutions they’d been using or presented with. He was looking for a business management system that offered more functionality than what they had been using, as well as a better user interface. Most importantly, Sean wanted a platform that was able to grow with FOR Energy, not hold it back. That’s when improveit 360’s industry-specific CRM system came into the picture.
The Solution
Using a System Built with Scalability in Mind
While he couldn’t pinpoint exactly how he came across improveit 360, Sean was drawn to the fact that as an organization, improveit 360 was always working to improve their software. He also loved that improveit 360 was built specifically for home improvement pros and was therefore created to handle what they wanted to accomplish with a software solution. According to Sean, it was only natural for his team to do a demo of improveit 360 and implement the system. The icing on the cake for FOR Energy, though, was that improveit 360 was designed for scalability.
The Results
Gaining the Visibility They Need to Make Better Decisions
FOR Energy – like any company that wants to improve or grow – can’t make effective decisions without transparency over what’s actually happening at their business. But with improveit 360, Sean feels he’s finally gained a tool that gives him and his team the much-needed visibility into their operations. Now, they’re making decisions based on true, reliable data opposed to a gut feeling.
“A huge thing that you guys [improveit 360] have provided with the tool… is data integrity. The data is sometimes surprising for the good, sometimes it’s surprising for the bad, but if we don’t have actual information, our people can’t improve, our leaders can’t lead, and they certainly can’t be better leaders.”
According to Sean, this newfound transparency has made a “tremendous impact across the board” for the company, enabling the team to 1) always know where their business stands and 2) determine the root cause of any bottlenecks so they can continuously improve their operations.
Conclusion
FOR Energy uses improveit 360 for everything – from lead generation to project management and completion – Sean and his team try to use every feature that improveit 360 has to offer. With so much functionality at their fingertips, it’s no wonder that FOR Energy has been able to scale so many areas of their operations, including their communications, and lead and project management, ultimately helping them grow their business.