MANAGE / ORGANIZE YOUR BIDS
One of the quickest ways to get in trouble is to loose your bids and or mismanage your customers information. For this reason it is important to have a plan in place. At the moment, JellyFish Lighting does not offer a management system or integrated management system. However, if you wanted to use the same system we use, we are happy to point you in their direction.
At a minimum you want the most basic information available to each person who needs to know (Sales Team, Install Team, Accounting, Warehouse, Etc). One way to do this with without buying an management system is to manage customer in Google Docs.
- Create a Google Docs folder to manage your customers
- Create a File for each customer
- Add a map of the job
- Add photos of the job (house and soffit color)
- Add a worksheet that details the aspects of the job (see sample below)
MEASURING A HOME
You can:
- Bid off contractor plans in drafting software
- Measure with a tape measure or roller
- Measure with a laser
BID OFF CONTRACTOR PLANS – DRAFTING SOFTWARE
There are many types of drafting software. We use one called Planswift, we are able to do the following:
- Create save individual jobs
- Measure each roof line
- Measure each side separately (different color)
- Export Screen Shots to share with the customer
NOTE: It is really important to check the scale before measuring. There are times when customers are give a compressed version of the plans. These will not measure correctly. This happens maybe 10 to 20% of the time. Select the scale of the document, and measure a measurement on the plans. If it says something like 7′ and you measure 7′, your plans are to scale.
MEASURE THE SOFFIT TILES
Soffit tiles are an easy way to measure the home. They are typically in a fixed pattern on the home and all a consistent size. To do this, measure the width of 1 tile. Count the number of tiles and multiply:
MEASURING WITH A TAPE or ROLLER
It is best to have a tape measure or roller on hand to grab the measurements.
- Role around the base of the house to get
- Determine the pitch of the roof or height of the center of each peak to determine the length of the slope on each peak
DRAW A MAP
Draw a map of the full roof line. Double check the map and measurements to make sure you don’t miss anything. Measure each side individually and round the number up. This will help you account for a little waste on the job.
The bidding and mapping process should be used to identify a few things:
- Accurately measure the house
- Identify the placement of the control box
- Talk to the homeowner about power (a plug) for the control box
- Identify how you get from the control box to each starting point
- What type of track is needed?
- What is the color track needed? (Soffit Color)
- Do you need blank track?
- Are there special conditions?
- Is there attic access?
- Can all the wires be hidden?
- Will you need a transmitter and receiver?
- Will they need a WiFi extender?
TRANSMITTERS AND RECEIVERS
When you look at the control box and starting points on a home, you will be able to determine if a transmitter a receiver or both. It all depends on the length between the control box and starting point, or between light to light. Visit our ONLINE MANUAL for more info.
WIFI EXTENDER
A WiFi Extender, often called a Signal Extender is used to increase the range between the control box and the home router. There are numerous types of WiFi Extenders on the market. You can offer them or they can buy on themselves. A good rule, is that if there is more than 50 feet between the Router and Control Box, you ought to be informing the customer that one may be needed. Show up with one just in case. If the control box will not connect to the Router, this is the first thing to consider when troubleshooting. Visit our ONLINE MANUAL for an example.
