Smartphones are the fastest adopted technology in the world ’ s history and already billions of people around the world use them . This hasn ’ t just changed the life of teenagers , now it ’ s impacting businesses , opening up new opportunities . Benjamin Dyer , CEO of Powered Now , shows how you can make life easier in your installer business using an app .

Pretty much every commercial sector in the UK has become heavily computerised in the last thirty years . But the trade is an exception . I think that this is for two reasons .

The first is that installers are mobile . If they are not doing a job they are driving to the next appointment or getting some materials . The second is that being good at installing and fixing things often means that people are less good ( and infinitely less interested ) in administration and paperwork . That means that they don ’ t even want to explore the options for computerisation . Yet across industry sectors , computers have done a fantastic job in reducing paperwork and administration .

Now that powerful and mobile smartphones with great connectivity have arrived , things are starting to change in the trade too . Smartphones are both mobile and much simpler to use than traditional computers . That ’ s why if you want to drive your business forward or even just have an easier life , you should look at what business apps are available .

The rest of the article looks at the benefits that you should get along with what you should think about in selecting an app .

Keep everything in one place

The first big benefit of an app is to keep everything in one place . As we all know , running your own business also comes with the pain

of raising invoices and dealing with HMRC etc . As you grow , it gets worse with much more paperwork and administration . Over time it becomes a nightmare with bits of paper all over the place .

In contrast , if you have everything in a system – customers , notes , quotes , invoices , payments , expenses and appointments – then it ’ s easy to find things and they won ’ t go astray . That ’ s why it ’ s important to have an app that handles everything in one place . That beats separate diaries , invoicing apps , certificate apps etc .

Grab all the benefits

You need to make sure that whatever app you use , it really delivers the benefits . Here is a list of some of the benefits you should experience . Also , there are some notes on how your app can deliver them .

You should increase your sales . Here is how :

• Produce highly professional quotes without needing to be great at graphic design .

• Generate quotes quickly . When they are simple , straight from the customer ’ s site . Waiting for quotes is a major irritation for the average homeowners . Quoting faster translates straight into additional sales .

• Send quotes both by email and text . That ’ s the quickest way and the most likely to get your prospects ’ attention .

• Always Know the status of your quotes . You should know whether they have been delivered by email , whether they have been opened and your prospect should be able to accept or reject them from their phone . If your quote is ever rejected you can phone up and find out why , giving you another chance to turn things around .

You should save lots of time . This is how :

• You should never have to enter anything into your app that it could find out for itself . Examples are getting names , numbers and emails straight from your address book ; looking up information from companies house ; and looking up addresses using the postcode .

• Everything you put in like descriptions or prices should be saved . That way , the next time you start putting them in , the app can finish them off , just like Google does .

• When the invoice will mirror the quote , that should only take a single click to produce it .

• Every calculation should be done by the app , including VAT and discounts .

• Unpaid invoices should be automatically tracked .

It should help you run your team :

• A shared diary means everyone knows what everyone else is doing .

• You should be able to track all team members on a map .

• A company chat facility should mean that everyone stays in touch .

Insist your app works when there ’ s no signal

Obviously , installers are always moving around . Unfortunately , from time to time there ’ s no signal available for your mobile . This is when it ’ s vital to have an app that works even when the signal isn ’ t there .

The reason is that any business app is designed to save time . If the app is unavailable , you must have a paper based fall-back method . Then after you get back to base you must input stuff from paper .

It ’ s easy to forget , not get around to it etc . This undermines the whole point . It ’ s critical because many apps that claim to “ work on mobile ” don ’ t when you are out of range .

Use your Mac , PC , iPhone , iPad or Android

Smartphones are great , but sometimes their limited screen size can make things hard . Apple devices are also great , but expensive . If you have a team , many of them probably use Android phones . A PC or Mac needs to be used if you have a fiddly and complicated quote to do or need to send information to your accountant .

That ’ s why whatever app you choose , it needs to work across whatever PC , Mac , smartphone and tablet that you and your team use . All the information should be available on every device with no “ backing up ”, “ uploading ” or “ saving ”. Everything should be automatic . This is 2018 .

Don ’ t go with free apps

This might seem self-serving but please bear with me . There ’ s a saying that there is no such

thing as a free lunch . That applies to business related apps , but the explanation takes a bit of thinking about .

We ’ ve all got used to free services on the Internet in recent years , particularly from Facebook and Google . Both are consumer services and serve billions of users . These guys make their money from advertising . In contrast , business apps can ’ t do that for several reasons :

• They only have hundreds or maybe thousands of users and making a fraction of a penny for each ad displayed doesn ’ t raise anything like enough cash .

• People conducting business on an app aren ’ t as open to ads anyway – they are working !

• Business users need support from real people which costs a lot more than just providing a technology service . In fact , it far exceeds what you can make from advertising .

Therefore , you don ’ t see many if any real business apps which use advertising as their revenue source . Instead , there are two cat-