The Roofers' Playbook - Utilizing Software to Transform Roof Deficiency Detection - PODCAST TRANSCRIPT

Editor's note: The following is the transcript of a live interview with Greenwood Industries Executive Vice President Joe Jolicoeur, Best Roofing Senior Forensic Roof Specialist Jordan Litt and Jobba Trade Technologies Senior Account Executive Zach Carpenter. You can read the interview below, listen to the podcast or watch the recording.

Intro: Hello, everyone and welcome to another Read, Listen, Watch, RLW, from RoofersCoffeeShop. My name's Karen Edwards and I'm really excited that you're here with us today, because this topic is so important, I think, for so many contractors around the country. We're going to be talking about using software to transform roof deficiency detection. Think of this as your playbook, right? We've brought together some of the experts in the industry, Joe from Greenwood Industries, Jordan from Best Roofing and Zach from Java Trade Technologies, to talk about how they are using software and technology in their businesses to find success. Before we get started though, just a little bit of housekeeping.

The chat is open. Feel free to say hello, where you're watching from. We always love to see where you're from. Then, if you have questions throughout, go ahead and either use the Q&A or use the chat and we will have a little bit of time at the end, where we will go through and answer your questions, but we have so much good information to share with you, that we're going to hold those questions until the end. Also, this is being recorded and it will be available on RoofersCoffeeshop.com, usually within one to two days. So if you are wanting to share this with colleagues or just re-watch, because there's going to be so much great information, it will be available out there very shortly. All right, so let's get started. We'll start with introductions. First is Joe Jolicoeur. Joe, please tell us about yourself.

Joe Jolicoeur: Thank you. So I'm Joe Jolicoeur. I'm vice president of Greenwood Building Envelope Services. We're a division of Greenwood Industries. We're the professional service division for Greenwood. I've been in the industry for 15 years. We're currently in the Boston Massachusetts market, but our entirety, we're in the Northeast market. Greenwood has 11 locations up here in the Northeast, and today our service division is a $25 million company.

Karen Edwards: Wow.

Zach Carpenter: Impressive.

Karen Edwards: Impressive, for sure.

Joe Jolicoeur: Thank you.

Karen Edwards: Okay. Jordan, tell us about you.

Jordan Litt: All right. My name is Jordan Litt. Originally from Atlanta, down here in sunny south Florida. I've spent about eight years in the roofing industry, kind of started at the bottom here at Best Roofing, worked my way up through the construction and operations side of the business as a construction manager, site supervisor, moved over to the sales department and now I am the senior forensic roof specialist and manage the sales side of the service department. We are roughly about a $16, $17 million business and manage about six different guys who go out every day and provide these reports just like we're going to talk about a little bit with the FCS.

Karen Edwards: One of the things, neither of you, Joe, you did mention you're $25 million and Jordan, you're at $16, $17 million, but you guys have seen these divisions grow significantly during-

Zach Carpenter: Yeah. You guys started a lot lower.

Karen Edwards: Yeah.

Joe Jolicoeur: I mean, Greenwood, collectively, we're probably around a $300 million company, but as a service-driven, division four Greenwood, I mean, we started this eight years ago and we started doing a little over $1 million worth of business in year one and eight years later the systems and processes that we put into place, we're closing in on $25 million this year.

Karen Edwards: And Jordan, what's your experience with the growth?

Jordan Litt: Absolutely. We've seen year-over-year growth on our side, and we are actually one of the larger service departments in the South Florida market now because of that and we've seen so much of the service work that we've done actually help move those clients from a service relationship into a construction and full roof replacement, which is really what I think the complimentary side of what the service work does, is we kind of shepherd you towards that replacement phase and then we're able to hand you over to our construction department who's going to actually replace the roof, so it's a great model that we have in place.

Karen Edwards: Yeah. I'm so glad you guys are here because this is information that a lot of contractors out there are looking for. How did you do it? What tools did you use? What technology did you use? That's where, thank you to Java Trade Technologies for being our sponsor of today's webinar. Zach Carpenter is here from Java. Please tell us about your background, Zach.

Zach Carpenter: Yes, yes. Thank you, Karen. So Java Trade Technologies, we have a few different roofing softwares available, but we're the company that owns FCS that is pretty well known throughout the industry. I've been in the commercial roofing software space for about 16 years now. I was one of the founding members of FCS back around 2008, 2009, so I've had the unique opportunity to be able to work directly with contractors that are trying to run these kinds of models and implement these kinds of systems to find the success that these guys and their companies have been able to achieve, so I'm just happy to be able to be here today and help spread some positive information for everyone.

Karen Edwards: Didn't you grow up around roofing?

Zach Carpenter: Yeah, yeah. My stepdad owned a roofing company, and I just, myself, during the end of high school, I'd go in and help with doing AutoCAD drawings and sending coordinating tickets at that time with their service crews, so I've been around it for a long time, but actually doing anything or working in the industry legitimately is about 2008, 2009.

Karen Edwards: Yeah. You can't ever get away. You can't ever get away.

Zach Carpenter: Nope, nope, nope.

Karen Edwards: All right, so let's start by talking about deficiencies and what they are. Joe, why don't you start us out?

Joe Jolicoeur: Sure. So we wanted to come up with some deficiencies, and categorize what deficiencies are and different types of scenarios. First thing we're going to discuss is installation errors. Installation errors, you could come across from basically the first 24 months of the roof's life cycle. Those are different things that can happen. Such as cold welds, edge metal issues, penetration issues. Sometimes there's DLAM in certain membranes and stuff if they're not adhered correctly. Those are different types of installation issues that, if you take proactive preventative measures and you correctly, basically, put preventative measures in place, you can catch these ahead of time and keep minimal damage on your roof, especially if it's a new roof's system.

Then, you get into environmental damage. Environmental damage can come in various ways. It comes naturally. It comes over time. Sometimes it could be sporadic. Sometimes it can be unknown. If you're dealing with clients, and they don't regularly get up on their roof, they don't routinely check their roof, they don't identify these issues ahead of time, that type of damage can become major issues. This all is compiled into the reasoning why we want to do inspections, why inspections are so detrimental to a building owner, a facility management team and ultimately, the proactive measures versus a reactive measure is kind of essential in that whole scenario. Staying ahead of things, getting on roofs, getting eyes on roofs, routinely taking preventative measures to find these type of damages, errors, punctures, rips, tears, you name it. Finding these things ahead of time.

These can be simple repairs that can be managed, that if they were overlooked, if we didn't get in front of them, get the documentation, notice these ahead of time, they could have been costly or more detrimental repairs if they went unnoticed for a long period of time, so realistically, that's the proactive approach versus the reactive approach. Reactive is reacting to a leak that finally came through the roof system. It's been lingering for a while. It's been undetected. There's little to no visible signs up on the roof, or somebody just has neglected the roof system. They think everything is all right until all of a sudden it's dripping on their desk, so we want to take the reactionary discretion out of our client's hands and honestly, the proactive approach would be the inspection approach. It would be getting eyes on a system before things transpire to take place.

Karen Edwards: Joe, thank you. Jordan, I know when we talked briefly before, you had said that this is something you see on a daily basis and you're a big proponent of the proactive versus reactive. Could you talk a little bit about that?

Jordan Litt: Absolutely, Karen. I love using FCS for this very specific reason. Really, everything that you mentioned on this slide. Installation errors, we see this quite frequently with the, I would say, lack of detail with some of the contractors down here in south Florida, so utilizing this product is a great way to be able to show even a roof layman what wasn't done correctly without them actually having to get up on the roof, right? Environmental damage. We're in south Florida, so we see that type of stuff all the time. Distressed membrane due to ponding water. It rains all the time. Wind damage, things like that.

We see that stuff all the time, so being able to document that up on the roof and provide that to the client, it really paints a picture of how some of these very common elements can actually deteriorate the roof at an exponential rate if they're not taken care of, which leads me into the proactive versus reactive side. We deal with clients on both sides of that, right? The FCS report is just a great way to be able to show them, "Look, this is what you need to do to be proactive. Now, if you don't want to fix any of this, that's fine. We've documented it here for you, but it might cost you a little bit more if you'd rather be reactive versus proactive." Having that report and documented when you actually gave that to them versus when an issue happened, that saves you right there.

The common areas for deficiencies, once again, we have a list of deficiencies and I love to break it up in our custom program based on the type of material that we're using. It's, once again, just a great way to highlight, for a roof layman, where the issues are, what's very common. You're going to see probably some of the same issues, over and over again, based on that existing condition. It's just a great way to highlight what those problems are and break it down for the client in a way that they can understand the gravity or the importance of what it is that they're looking at.

Karen Edwards: Yeah, so I want to go over to how and why to track and you mentioned a couple of those things in your answer, but Zach, why don't you start us off and talk about the contracts, the documentation and the reporting.

Zach Carpenter: Of course. So I have a unique take when it comes to these deficiencies, right? So if we go back and think to when we were opening this webinar up, Joe and Jordan were both talking about the revenue within their service business as if it was a completely standalone department in a roofing company and it is. The best thing that I've seen in the most successful contractors throughout my career are people that treat their service department as such. I say that to say that if the business is service, then the product is repairs. As we go through all this and start talking about the importance of why we need to do inspections, why we need to have these good reports, it's great for the client, it's great for you, but beyond that, your business is selling roof repairs. Every time you step on a roof or have an opportunity to be invited on a roof, you need to stock the shelves with your product, which are these deficiencies.

They come through in the form of inspections or additional repair proposals during a leak ticket or a service call, and the benefits obviously grow the business, sell the repairs and the why is to create better relationships and provide better service with your clients, being able to bring these things to their attention in a proactive manner. We've talked a lot about proactive and reactive, and commonly that's going to be an approach your business takes in terms of maintenance agreement options you're going to offer. Is your customer on a proactive agreement, where it's encouraged to go stock the shelves or is it in a reactive environment? Even if you don't have a designated maintenance agreement in place, there's still that relationship with the client. Are they only using you in a reactive manner? If so, try and identify that, push past it and get to a proactive position, but that was the big takeaway I wanted to implement for why we track the deficiencies and it's stock your shelves.

Karen Edwards: Yeah, yeah. Thank you, Zach. Joe, let's talk about the importance of moving away from paper in a service business.

Joe Jolicoeur: Yeah. I mean, so we've moved away from paper for a long time now. It's all about accountability, and with accountability, you take a uniform approach, but you also educate and you train your employees to do everything the right way, routinely, so you can keep enhancing and building your inspection programs, your inspection platform. I mean, with that comes, basically, with the uniform proposals and the inspections, you're basically taking the pen and paper out of their hands and you're making them do everything that we need them to do while they're out on the roof and you're capturing all of that data. You're creating a data library, essentially, for your clients. Like Zach said, that in return is a revenue driver for you.

You're not only driving revenue for the service company. You're driving revenue for the entire company on the production side or whatever you get into. For us, it's the entire building on the low side, where you're creating opportunities. You're giving your clients a resource by digitizing everything. Especially with FCS, we give our clients capabilities to access a portal where they can access all of their documentation. They can access their invoices. If I have field technicians up on a roof, or if I have our inspector up on a roof and they find issues outside of whatever they're doing, if they're up there doing a repair or if they're up there doing inspections, we have a recommended action program that then, from a digital standpoint or a cloud-based standpoint, we can quickly get those actions that we want to take care of in a live scenario to the client so that they can make a decision on the spot.

There's all types of reasons why we want to digitize and we want to create that cloud that's easy to access. It takes the unknowns out of what we're doing up there. Our client wants to trust that we're doing the right thing. You're providing them a resource. You're providing them the documentation that they want, that they've paid you to do to essentially give them proof that you are the go-to person for their roof. You're the one that's essentially their management team. You're their management platform. You're pulling that pain away from them, and you're simplifying the process by digitizing inspections and documentation.

Zach Carpenter: We used to say a lot too, that when you position yourself like that, you become the way that they're managing their roofs, right? But you're offering them this portal, this platform. They make their decisions through doing business with you, and I think that drives a lot.

Karen Edwards: So Jordan, you had a lot to say about how turnover, this digitization, has really helped you. Can you give some examples?

Jordan Litt: Absolutely. I wanted to touch on something Joe had mentioned, and one thing that I think and also what Zach had said is, to me, what we're truly selling is the client experience. We all can use the same material to physically repair a roof, but it's the client experience and the lens through which the repairs and the maintenance and the service is given, what separates you from other people. When we talk about pen and paper, and trying to get away from that, let's talk about the other side of pen and paper and the instance in which certain proposals that are given to clients are literally written on pen and paper.

When you bring an FCS report with these beautiful photos, these deficiencies listed out with quantities, what's wrong, how it's going to be repaired and a cost associated with that, along with all the other information in there, that's a competitive advantage that completely separates you from your competition. So to me, it's just a great tool that you can really put some distance between you and the pack and I've seen property managers with handwritten proposals on their desk. When I email over my digital, full comprehensive roof audit and I just know that we're in a different league than them.

Zach Carpenter: Oh, and I hear stories like that. I love hearing the success stories, but I hear all the time from, it's mostly new people that sign up and start working with us, where when they deliver that first report, the customer is just blown away. Now they have five buildings they're going to let me work for them. It ultimately comes down to someone else was doing that roof before, and you came in and you impressed them and you took it, so it gets in that position where this stuff, if you want to be in this kind of space, it's non-negotiable anymore and not everyone's ready to have a whole platform, which makes sense, but my advice on that is, if you're not in a position where you're able to adopt a whole system, just the reports themselves, try and build it the best you can. Just sending over a bunch of text, it's not going to get you far.

Karen Edwards: Okay. So Jordan, I still want you to comment on buildings get sold, right?

Jordan Litt: Oh, absolutely.

Karen Edwards: New people own the building, new boards come in. How has having this data easily attainable helped you?

Jordan Litt: Well, we have so often, especially down here in south Florida where there's turnover at these buildings, whether that's boards that disintegrate and a new one comes into place, new property managers and not all that information always is like a seamless transition from one to the other. It's usually quite the opposite. So what, more often than not, happens is a way that we end up ingratiating ourselves with a new property manager at a building that we've consistently been doing work at, is when they call us up and say, "Hey, by the way, can you tell me what you guys have been doing here? How long have you been working here? Generally, what have we spent over the last couple of years?"

I can say, "Don't worry. I can send you every piece of documentation that we've done on that property," and it makes them look like a superstar, because they can get right back on track. They understand where they're at, what they've spent and any of those invoices, any of those past repairs, anything that they need, we have basically a digital encyclopedia of all that information and we're just kind of the kings of documentation when it comes to that. FCS is a great tool where, when someone calls me on the phone and just asks a general question, I can open that up in the program and I can give them their answers right there over the phone. It really helps me not have to bounce it around to different departments. They call one person, they get the information they need and I can send it over via email in less than a couple of minutes.

Karen Edwards: And that goes back to that customer experience, right?

Zach Carpenter: It does.

Karen Edwards: Whether it's, no matter what, from start to finish. It's all about the customer experience. Okay, so this sounds great, right? Everyone wants it, we love it, but how do we implement it? Joe, start us off here.

Joe Jolicoeur: How do we implement it? Honestly, it starts with a system and process and it's not just a system that you can throw together overnight. It starts with some organization. It starts with trying to build a business plan and a business model around the CRMs that you have in place, and then training those members on your team to initiate, implement and execute these systems and processes. So the CRMs, the service CRMs and the platforms such as FCS, those are basically the foundation to building out your service process. Everything from entering in a service call or entering in an inspection request to then scheduling it to then executing it on site, utilizing the field apps with the guys out on site, to then putting it into dispatch approvals, coming back to the office, checking everything with your service coordinator, making sure that all the documentation is correct, the deficiencies are in there, the corrective actions are in there and then getting it ready for the invoicing process.

It's a cycle. It's a process. You implement it by training your staff, training your team and then standardizing the process, standardizing the documentation process, making it routine, implementing all of the systems into everything you do and then in return, getting your clients educated on the offerings that you're providing them. So all the information that you've gathered, everything that you do on a day-to-day process for them. You, then, have to educate your clients and provide them the portals and the resources that they need. Sorry. Phone's blowing up already.

So you're basically educating your clients on the portals and everything that you're providing them as a resource in return, and that's basically, on a simple form, how we get it done here.

Karen Edwards: Okay. Zach, you had some thoughts on this topic, about the, "Want fries with that?"

Zach Carpenter: Yeah, yeah. Exactly. I'm the big proponent of that concept, of going out when you're just on a lead call, even turning a reactive approach or a reactive visit into a proactive approach. So you go out, like in our system, it's a thing called quick bids, where during the lead call, the technician in the field can identify any additional problems. By having a system that's predefined, having your libraries, your pricing, the guys in the field, the technicians can just identify the issue. Where it goes from there varies company by company. If you have the kind of relationship with your customer where the tech could do a minor upsell with them, you can do it right there on site. Most of the time, I see those, again, quick bid or service reports go back to a service manager or service coordinator and then they work with the customer or a salesperson, but I am curious, Joe, Jordan. What do you guys find in those kinds of scenarios? Do you have your techs doing the, "Do you want fries with that upsell model?" and then where's that data go?

Jordan Litt: I'm looking right now, and it's funny you mentioned that. I received seven emails from different properties from my service manager. We call a hot cheat, which is exactly what you're talking about and that was just today.

Zach Carpenter: That's awesome.

Jordan Litt: So, it's a great opportunity. I also, the do you want fries with that and what you had said about a lead call, I try to take every opportunity, no matter why I am on property, to turn a leak inspection into a complete full roof audit. Of course, I will give you the price for whatever the issue is that you called me out for, but why not let me look at the rest of your roof? Why not let me call anything out that I think is something that you need to know about right now? Now, I'll fall under those emergency categories, right? But then there's also the remedial side, so what else do I see up there that maybe you should be aware about and maybe it's something you should chew on and we should talk about it and follow up on a couple of weeks or a couple of months? So I try to take every opportunity to switch something from just maybe a basic short scope over to a FCS roof audit, and use that opportunity to show the value that we can provide with these reports.

Zach Carpenter: Right. That's awesome, man. You're stocking the shelves. Stocking the shelves.

Joe Jolicoeur: We train all of our head personnel, all of our lead techs to basically get their partner or whoever they're working with up on the job going. Once they do the investigative process, they've sourced the leak, they start doing their prep work, then it's on the lead guide to then go into quick, big mode and carry out a further due diligence on the roof system to come up with action items. When they do come up with action items, it comes back to the office. Just like you said, it comes back to a service coordinator.

We're able to review it. If it's a little more intricate, we'll get it to a sales guy. If it's something basic and we can turn it around while we're on site, we'll turn it around on site. It's really about, like you said, taking the proactive approach and even though you're upselling and you're not out there for the original reason why you're out there, you're creating trust and you're instilling value in your visit, not only for you as the contractor but your client as well. You're catching things that aren't a factor, that are going to be a factor.

Zach Carpenter: And how big of a role do you think that that model played in both of your successes?

Joe Jolicoeur: I mean, you got to think about it this way. I just had my inspector out on a routine inspection, okay? Literally, he got up on the roof. It was a roof that was rarely monitored. They pay for one inspection a year, so we're up there annually. We had some crazy storms last winter and last spring with high winds, and he got up on that roof. It was leaking. They didn't understand why it was leaking. We finally got in there, and come to find out the entire roof was de-lammed, basically blowing up and down like a trampoline. Now I have it in emergency mode, where I have my estimator team on it right now, developing out a full scope for a roof replacement.

Zach Carpenter: Right.

Joe Jolicoeur: I mean, but if they didn't take that proactive approach, if they neglected it until the roof actually physically blew off, that would've not only caused not only leaks. All of those assets and everything that is a priority in that building would've been compromised due to water infiltration. So it is a big process, and you need to educate your clients on the severity of what could happen if you don't take these proactive measures. I mean, you're almost scared. It's the scare factor, but it isn't the scare factor.

Zach Carpenter: That's the truth. Yeah, it's education. Yeah.

Joe Jolicoeur: Yeah.

Karen Edwards: Okay, so now the next step is, how do you make sure that everyone stays consistent, that we abide by the process? And maybe Zach, you want to get us started here?

Zach Carpenter: Yeah, sure. A big part, I know we keep making reference to having a system, but systems, processes, more than just software, are all very important to this. When you do look at staying consistent, the reason you would implement a program is you do want your reports always looking similar, having a similar look and feel. You want to have those digital deficiency libraries. So when you describe an issue to one client or to one person, it's the same across the board across all their buildings. You can't have these descriptions vary by what the tech defines every time he's out there. You want to have that level of consistency.

So the deficiency libraries, again, calling things the same names, having documents that are formatted the same way. It's got to be good representation of your brand as well. The benefits of doing that, the consistency is obviously important, but being able to then have a easy to understand and easy to review history. We kind of talked about this a little bit earlier, of the importance of keeping the history of these buildings. I always make a joke during my calls, and it doesn't always land, but that you're making the roof fax instead of the car fax and you really are, in the way that you can portray this information to your clients. So yeah, staying consistent, I think, is half the battle.

Karen Edwards: Okay. Thanks, Zach. Joe, what does this look like in your company?

Joe Jolicoeur: From our perspective, it all has to do with training. It has to do with training. It has to do with training. Everybody has a hat to wear. There's a place and a time for everyone to integrate themselves and their role into the process, and I think that is how we keep the consistency and we cross train as well so that everybody can wear multiple hats if, say, one of your team members is out for a significant part of time, but it's the continuous training. It's evolving with the system that you have in place. It's staying ahead of industry trends.

It's, basically, knowledge is key in this scenario and you want to stay ahead of the curve. You don't want to wait for somebody else to implement the system. You want to stay ahead of it. You want to be able to implement these processes. You want to be on the forefront of it so that you're the one that's providing the most innovative solutions out there to complement and basically enhance the proactive measures that you're providing your client in the end of the day, so that's pretty much it in a nutshell. We have a game plan in place. We write this down on paper, and everybody sees where everybody's role fits into the process and we keep it consistent across the board.

Karen Edwards: Yeah. I think that last bullet point up there, about providing info to all techs that work on the roof. Not every tech is going to work on the same roof every time, right? What does that look like, and what's been the feedback from your roof techs?

Joe Jolicoeur: Yeah, so you're able to develop and identify certain trends with certain trucks. You're able to track trucks. You're able to see, basically, where certain tech teams excel, where they don't excel, where they need to improve. You're able to track all that data in the CRM. You're able to track a truck's revenue in the CRM, and this is through FCS. All that documentation can be utilized as another internal proactive measure to figure out, "Okay. Who works good on leaks, and who works good on contract jobs and who works good with subcontractors?? Then, you start to find ways to be really good in different sectors of service, by tracking that data and utilizing it as an internal resource to strategically place certain crews on certain jobs, so that you get them done to the best of your ability.

Karen Edwards: Yeah. That data is so powerful, when you have information and you can make good decisions. Jordan, you agree. Can you share a little bit about how that's helped you?

Jordan Litt: Absolutely. Joe had mentioned when someone's out, and maybe you have to have a different tech go and cover that roof or have a different inspection done, what about staying consistent with your pricing, right? So you might have a big client that, based on the other proposals that were given, have specific pricing tiers or something like that. You're able to go back through FCS, see how it was priced, how the other tech would've done it and make sure that you're staying consistent with them.

So it's just a great tool to be able to go back and look at the history of what you've done there, and making sure that you're staying consistent and not under overpricing something based on what's required to be done. Furthermore, what you guys both were mentioning, I always say you can sprinkle your own personal seasoning of your personality when you're out there meeting with the client, but when I'm training you, I want that report to be regimented and I want it to look like as if anyone that I selected to do it, they all came out the same and there's some form of standardization that's coming from Best Roofing and you know that that's a Best Roofing product when it gets to you.

Karen Edwards: Right, because they're representing your brand and your company out there, so my marketing side comes out. Consistency is really important, and that customer experience is really important, so it should be the same from time to time. Zach, you agree. I can tell.

Zach Carpenter: I do. I do. Yeah. No, no. Everything's spot on.

Karen Edwards: Yeah, awesome.

Zach Carpenter: It just segues so perfectly into the next slide.

Karen Edwards: It really does, almost as if we had planned this.

Zach Carpenter: Who would've thought?

Karen Edwards: Yeah. Let's talk about the capabilities of deficiency libraries. Do you want to start us off, Zach?

Zach Carpenter: Yeah, yeah. No problem. I mean, Jordan mentioned it a couple of times throughout the discussion so far, is the preset pricing. I mean, one, the consistency is obviously very important, but two, being able to eliminate guesswork, being able to eliminate time of having to be put into these, which can just be routine process. I know with Jordan at Best, they custom-built a feature that allows them to break out what the labor and the materials are going to be required for each individual repair.

When you do a quick bid or an inspection and you identify the issue, it's going to tell you right there, "Here's how much materials you need. Here's everything you need." Ultimately, what that does is end up calculating a unit price that's the base version of the way our deficiency library works, but I just find that those deficiencies, those libraries and getting the preset pricing is just so important to all of this. Whether you're working with a consultant that helps you price it together or you got someone in the organization that can figure out a way to do it, there's just so much value behind it, in my opinion. For Joe and Jordan, what do you guys find are some of the biggest value drivers of having those predefined libraries?

Jordan Litt: Let's talk about one thing real quick-

Zach Carpenter: Sure.

Jordan Litt: ... And that's how many opportunities you're getting, and typically, it's how quick you can turn that report around, right?

Zach Carpenter: Yeah, yeah.

Jordan Litt: Especially when it's something like a leak, where time is of the essence and usually the first person that gets back to that client might be getting that job. How about efficiency? So the fact that I can have, let's say, maybe 10 different deficiencies on a roof and I can put a proposal, a full FCS report together in 20, 30 minutes, pre-set, understanding what I'm going to need from each deficiency, that goes a long way in allowing me to get to more inspections per day and put more opportunities out on the street and put the ball back in the customer's court. To me, it's all about maximizing the efficiency of my guys to make sure that, like I always say, I just want to get the ball back in their court as quickly as possible.

Zach Carpenter: Sure.

Karen Edwards: Joe, how about you?

Joe Jolicoeur: It's simple, and Jordan's spot on and to take it to the next level. It simplifies the process coming in, so all that data comes in preloaded. It has already been predetermined, preloaded out in the field, so really, all it is just editing or fine-tuning, whatever you need to do to get it ready for invoicing. For us, it's all about turning revenue over, so we're only as good as the invoice is going out, so I would say Jordan's spot on for all the action items and everything that makes it a simplified process to upselling while you're out in the field.

It's just as critical to have these deficiency libraries for everything that comes in internally so that you can effectively get that invoice to your customer and turn it around, almost instantaneously, to get that thing out the door so that you can turn revenue on each project, especially for us. I mean, we turn high volumes of tickets yearly, monthly. We monitor how many tickets we do monthly, quarterly, yearly. These are all things that help us kind of forecast our years, help us budget, but the simple thing is they come in and they go out and we got to be as accurate as possible on that.

Jordan Litt: Yeah. Imagine yourself as a client, where roofer picks up the phone call, is able to get out there the same day and then, within 24 hours, turn around and provide you an FCS report like that. It builds so much value and following through with doing what you said you were going to do. You've already separated yourself from a large percentage of the competition. So it really makes a difference and, like I said, it provides a competitive advantage that simplifies it and breaks it down in a way that they're able to understand without having to be so technically proficient in the industry, so that's what I love about it.

Joe Jolicoeur: Yeah. There's another building that we just finished a full inspection on. We utilized drone technology. We put everything in the FCS report, and I was able to educate the client on the emergency deficiencies that are in place right now. We're jumping on those emergencies right now. Meanwhile, the immediate deficiencies that we identified was the roof itself. Literally, I was able to paint the picture like, "Hey, we'll get on site now. We'll do the proactive things to get you dry. We'll make sure that we start this job, and if you want to finish the job with the repairs, that's fine." She has me at a point right now where we're getting up on site, we're going to mobilize and I'm quoting them out on a full roof replacement at the same time that could have eventually started with a simple repair, started with the inspection, a simple repair that might carry over until full roof inspection or a full roof replacement. Sorry.

Zach Carpenter: Beautiful.

Karen Edwards: One thing that's on here is tracking product performance. Has this system and this library helped you see, "We used to use this for this kind of repairs, but we see we've been called back twice or three times, so maybe we're going to shift the type of solutions that we're using"? Have you seen that at all?

Zach Carpenter: Oh, yeah. Sorry.

Karen Edwards: Yeah, no. Joe or Jordan?

Jordan Litt: Yeah. Typically, if there's an issue back on the roof, we're going to send a service manager out there to go take a look at it. But yeah, we pivot away from the way that we might put something together based on what the field conditions require, so if it's not working one way, then we can pivot and do something another way that's at the same cost to make sure that what we end up doing and what the main focus is, is to solve the problem and make sure that that customer has the best experience possible, so absolutely.

Karen Edwards: It goes back to customer experience, right?

Joe Jolicoeur: We can utilize this to our advantage by, obviously, you have on record who the original team was that you put out there. Say, you sent them out there more than once, they're still not catching the leak, sometimes it's nice to get a fresh set of eyes on something or see the way somebody else would look at it, other than that same team looking at it repeatedly over and over again, so I think that's another way we utilize it. We can see the history, who we've sent out there, what type of deficiencies they're capturing, what corrective measures they're taking and then maybe send another team out there that has a different perspective, might take it a different angle. Maybe they water test, or maybe we initiate a water test, rather than trying to go source the next puncture, rip or tear to find the source, so it's always your information is king, and maybe you got to get another set of eyes on it and that's another way we try to look at it from an outside perspective looking in.

Karen Edwards: Excellent. Thank you. That's a great way to transition into this slide, about leveraging the data that we have. Access to these libraries in the field, the training for inspectors, the regular database reviews. How have you seen this really be to your benefit, especially for those in the field?

Joe Jolicoeur: I would say the deficiency libraries in the field, leveraging them makes it very easy for our tech teams to develop a scope of work while on site, where everything's preloaded, pre-determined. They're able to educate the client, whether it's a facility guy on site, kind of show them, "Here's the problem," automatically preloaded is the solution and if they get the okay, it's just a simple sign-off and the deficiency in the corrective action are already in place. Training for inspectors, that's just continuous training, so there's all different types of ways that we can continuously train our inspectors to get more the deficiencies, to find more deficiencies out on a roof, to hold them accountable, to see things that aren't commonly there.

They're not commonly seen with the naked eye. Maybe they are things that are underlying factors that they can look for, so always trying to educate your inspectors to find more than just what the routine inspector would find on a roof would be another proactive measure to leveraging data that we get back. You're able to capture all that data on a roof, and your inspector can educate themselves on everything that that roof's seen over its lifetime and they can go back in the history and then they know exactly what we've looked for, what repairs we've done, what proactive measures we've done and now they can inspect all those to make sure that they're functioning properly, but then they can go out and find additional items and additional things that might be more proactive measures down the road.

Karen Edwards: Excellent, okay. I am going to keep us moving along here, because we still have some great stuff to talk about and I want to make sure we have a few minutes for questions at the end.

Joe Jolicoeur: Of course.

Karen Edwards: So you mentioned earlier, Zach, about the joke that doesn't always land, the car fax for the roof. Let's talk a little bit about this life cycle model.

Zach Carpenter: Of course. So we've had a lot of mentions of our FCS software here today, and I think part of it is we designed it around what we call the FCS life cycle, but it's this business model that we've been talking about of starting the initial relationship with the client, of going out and doing the roof inspection, working with that customer, providing them budgets, help them make decisions, working in a proactive manner and it's going to migrate into service. You're going to start doing repairs. You're going to start doing leaks, and just like the examples and the stories we've heard today, they turn into roof replacements. If you work with the customer well, provide transparency and good information and ultimately give them a good experience, you're going to get the rest of the business and so I think a lot of what we've talked about here today, the success of the organizations with Joe and Jordan, a lot of the successful companies are running this model already, not because they're using FCS. It's just that works out where it's the best software for people running that approach.

But when you start looking at, because I work with a lot of contractors that have aspirations of wanting to get to this point, our clients, they're running well, they're smooth, but what I would deal with the most is a guy coming from residential, that heard from his peers how important service and maintenance is and what it can do for a commercial division and they start trying to implement this stuff and have a lack of understanding of deficiency documentation, how they describe the repairs they're going to find, the differences between roof systems can be drastic. It's a lot for those people to keep up with, so ultimately this whole lifecycle benefit that we're trying to talk about is helping push contractors in a proven direction into a business model that you've seen work across the industry for years and years and so I think that's a big reason our software, one, resonates with people that run this model. Typically, the more successful businesses and then people that are trying to get up and going and established to adopt it, to have that baseline in terms of process.

Karen Edwards: Yeah. I mean, and Joe and Jordan, you both shared that you see this is happening for both of your businesses.

Joe Jolicoeur: You become a capital planning resource. You become a capital planning solution. You are basically taking this and you're evolving a structured plan for them to go to budget for the funds that they need to complete the lifecycle of the system, starting with their most painful points, which might be their most problematic roofs, to eventually carrying over into the roofs that are fairly new, that maybe you just need to do minor repairs or clean drains or make sure that water entries are ready for the winter up here in the northeast. It's just a resource that not a lot of people know about, and if you educate them the right way, you could become a very vital resource to an end user's experience and alleviate a lot of that pain that kind of over-complicates and can overwhelm, either like a facility manager or somebody of that nature, with their job, which can hinder their performance.

You're giving them all that information that they need, that whoever they're reporting to is expecting of them towards the end of the year and honestly, when you get in front of these things and you're ahead of somebody's capital planning, they're looking at you at the end of the year to utilize whatever money they have left over. If they didn't prioritize it on a roof and they needed to prioritize it on something else, but then they have a little extra money kicking around, they're going to have all this as a resource to come back to you and say, "Hey, Joe. Remember that project that we talked about in the beginning of the year? Can you guys get it done before the end of the year? Because I got that chunk of money now, and we got time to get it done now."

I mean, that's what creates that such a strong year for us, year after year, at the end of every year. It seems like Q4, going into the holidays, you can get into shorter months when you're talking business days, but we have some of our busiest times of the year right now when everybody's in Q4, especially in the contract side, when they got a little extra money kicking around and it's these reports that are gold. That is your selling point at that point. That's what you put in place, that's what your client is understanding and now you're just turning it into money.

Zach Carpenter: Well, and then having that history, that car fax like we talked about, you're able to help them see where to prioritize the funds. "I know you think that building's most important, but when I look at your budget, you might need to do this one," and so it all plays together. It's good.

Joe Jolicoeur: We train our inspectors to not only look at the roof, but to look at other items, maybe safety enhancements, maybe different types of entry points that might need some sort of fall protection around it. There's all different, simple types of work that you can throw in a report that are action items, that they eventually need to get done. They might not have the money set aside for it, but they will have the money set aside for it, because everybody wants to stay up with compliance, code and safety these days as well.

Karen Edwards: Hell, yeah. Yeah. And Jordan, I know you've been nodding this whole time, so you're seeing the same thing, huh?

Joe Jolicoeur: He's ready.

Jordan Litt: What Zach and Joe have just explained to everyone that's watching and listening here, it's the not so secret sauce of what the roofers in the big leagues are doing and this graphic right here is a perfect example. So regardless of where you come into the fold, and it's replacements, the inspections, budgeting service, this is the type of stuff that you need to do and I've personally seen it done through my time here at Best Roofing, where I did inspections for service work. It, then, turned into a situation where I gave them budgeting. We did some service work, continued and had a great relationship.

The main focus there is that you're building the trust and showing the value of your company to that client, and then guess what? Real shocker. We end up getting the replacement, and then continue servicing that property and any other properties that they may have, so this is the way to get into the big leagues and this is the way that you can leverage this type of service that you can provide at all facets of whatever that client may need and it's so great to have kind of seen it proven and work, time after time, in people that even existing clients, but these new clients that are just blown away sometimes by what we can provide to them as a service.

Karen Edwards: Yeah. Well said. Well said. We are getting near the end here. I just want to share some resources with you for getting started in service for enhancing your service. Of course, Java and FCS. Zach is available. Java has a full directory on rooferscoffeeshop.com with contact information and information about their systems and services, and of course, NRCA, the National Roofing Contractors Association, is always there to provide information and answer questions. I want to move on to questions, because we only have five minutes left and we did get one. Thank you, Chris, for sending this in. He wants to know, how do you handle presenting additional items that are in need of review or repair, that are not roof related? An example, a problem that we see often is a leak caused by something other than the roof and the customer is upset because we didn't mention it. Then, we find it's either our problem to solve or we risk losing a customer. Things can be missed, especially if it's not related to the inspection of the roofing system.

Jordan Litt: So, a lot of this falls into making sure that your people know what they're doing when they get out on the roof and how to identify, not only what could be a roof issue, but what could potentially not be a roof issue and making sure that, one thing that I'll often do, in our observational photo category, is show those deficiencies that are not necessarily roof related, but make sure that it's clearly stated in the proposal, that this could be the location of the active water intrusion and making sure that they know that a contractor within that trade is most likely going to have to come out. And if that also involves us, put a price in there that they could use to understand what their budget might be for that repair, but I try to make anyone that is looking at that report well aware of any other potential water intrusion conditions, other than the roof, as often as possible, because I want them to know also that I'm being as thorough as I can when I'm out on their property.

Karen Edwards: Joe, any additional thoughts?

Joe Jolicoeur: I would say you need to educate your inspector to take the proactive measures to not only look at the roof system, but to give either the client or provide the documentation. If they notice a roof leak or they're identifying roof leaks from the inside out, you want to be able to capture all of that, but then educate them on other scenarios that might bring other trades in, such as HVAC guys.

Maybe there's condensation pens and units that are overflowing, not necessarily the roof, but we have to educate them that those are other routine maintenance things that they have to routinely maintenance, because it could be 90 degrees out and sunny and they're like, "Why is my roof leaking?" And it has nothing to do with the roof system, but if you let them know ahead of time of some additional underlying factors that could be outside of the roof itself, that are common themes or common items that you see that are trending, you can help educate your client better and they can also initiate those maintenance measures with other trades to make sure that they're staying ahead of that too, because it's very common up here.

Jordan Litt: Yeah. Joe makes a great point there too. I love these reports in a way, because it helps me make the sale more consultative and educating the client is one of my favorite things, because I think it also galvanizes a lot of trust and understanding that we're here, we know what we're talking about and we're going to make sure that we identify any of those issues for you and potentially even refer you to someone that might be able to help you out with that in conjunction with what we will also potentially need to do to make sure now that you're watertight.

Joe Jolicoeur: You got to think about it this way too here. We also provide a resource, not only for our clients for inspections, but other trades, so there might be other trades that are up there, doing either solar jobs or maybe doing some electrical updates or something and they'll take the proactive measure to get us out in site, provide a roof inspection in advance so that they have that in hand, so that then they can go do their work and then we do a post inspection and they have their self fully covered, so think about that too. You're not just looking at the end user. You're probably looking at the guy working right next to you as well as a potential upsell candidate too for roof inspections.

Jordan Litt: We do that all the time, actually and it's great that you brought that up. Concrete restoration's coming, or massive cooling towers are being replaced. Let us come out and do a pre-inspection report. We could then potentially save you thousands of dollars of damage to your roof by showing and proving that it wasn't a pre-existing condition. Then, once it's after whatever work has been done, we go in and do another report and usually you can back-charge whatever person was on site or caused that damage, so it's just another tool that we can take out of the bag and helped service our clients.

Karen Edwards: Excellent, and we have reached the top of the hour. Amazing. It went by so fast, so I just want to say thank you. Thank you to Joe, Jordan, Zach, Java Trade Technologies. This was fantastic information, and I really hope that we've been able to help other contractors out there to find success in their commercial roofing. We've gotten some great. Thank you everybody for watching. As I mentioned, this is on demand on Rooferscoffeeshop.com. If you want to get ahold of Java Trade Technologies, visit their directory and the contact information is there. Thank you all for being here, and we hope to see you on a future episode. Take care. Bye-bye, everyone.

Jordan Litt: Thanks, everyone.

Joe Jolicoeur: Thanks, guys.

Outro: Thank you.