It may be May (no pun intended), but that doesn’t mean you can stop thinking about snow. Most of you out there are busy with your lawn business — (by the way, CrewTracker Software now has lawn reports)! So, I thought I would share with you what some of our biggest snow clients are doing to stay ahead.
Now that winter is over, everyone is recuperating from the crazy snow season that was full of blizzards. I have found that there are a few similar things our top snow clients are doing right now whether or not they have a lawn businesses too.
They are:
- Reviewing their estimated costs for each property versus the actual costs to make sure they are writing their contracts correctly.
- Analyzes how efficient their routes were and where any problems occurred.
- Updating, training, and running practice tests of new snow software they are implementing next snow season.
#3 is one of the most important things a snow company can do right now. A lot of you out there get so busy with lawn that you figure you’ll start thinking about snow operations come September or October. Well, that’s simply too late!
The top companies stay on top because they plan ahead. By analyzing last year’s snow season now, you have time to come up with the most efficient ways of doing things.
An example of this that a lot of our clients are doing practice snow events using our IVR system. They act as if it was an actual snow event: All the crews are called out to their properties and they have to call in using our IVR system, real-time reports are being analyzed, adjustments to routes are being made, and example invoices are being processed. By planning ahead you save money on snow materials, office equipment, man hours, and gasoline.
When you give yourself the time to prepare, it eliminates the negative chaos, the unknowns, and everyone works as a team better because everyone actually understands the correct process to follow.