Having worked within construction and restoration businesses for 30 years, Keith Sproles understands the industries like the back of his hand. So when he speaks, we listen.
Keith, with Construction Concepts, has always been vocal about his support for CompanyCam. His appreciation and support for the CoCam app even inspired him to represent CompanyCam at a tradeshow! What a trooper.
CompanyCam is versatile in all types of industries: roofing, construction, painting, landscaping, restoration, maintenance, HVAC, you name it! Follow along below as Keith Sproles shares tips & tricks he has used to maximize his team’s use of the CompanyCam app within their industry.
Tell us about Construction Concepts.
We started Construction Concepts about 30 years ago. Now we have a company called Restoration Concepts, which is newer. For the past 20 years, we have been in the restoration business. It’s been a recent change to market that part of our business separately from our construction company.
We are a smaller company. We just have six employees. Originally we were a larger company, but I got into a bad motorcycle accident and decided I should maybe scale everything back a bit.
We are a growing company. Two weeks ago I had 3 bids on my book, and today I have 27!
What were common restoration industry problems that CompanyCam solved for you?
My company is based in a town of 130,000. People in our area aren’t real good about being involved in trade organizations. A lot of times we’re on our own.
I’m huge on photo documentation, particularly in the restoration industry and CompanyCam has helped with that a lot.
The ease of CompanyCam has meant I’m pushing my teams to take photos all the time. “Don’t forget to take photos and send them to me!” And for us, the ease of taking photos has changed a lot for us.
Today one of my guys misplaced a login for CompanyCam, and he said, “Damn, I need to get my login! I need to get into CompanyCam.” If my crew members ever forget a login for one of the accounts or whatever, they realize how important it is to be in CompanyCam.
“CompanyCam just makes me look a hell of a lot more professional.”
CompanyCam sets my business apart. For my customers, CompanyCam makes me look a hell of a lot more professional.
For example, when I send somebody a bid, I attach a photo report that provides all the photo documentation & information. It’d say, “Hey, this is what we’re doing in this kind of area. We’re replacing all of this rotted wood over here.”
I’ve had customers say to me, “I appreciated having a visual of what you were going to do.”
I’m not the cheapest guy in town; I want to be the most expensive guy. So I need ways to validate that. And CompanyCam has done that for me.
What was your photo process before CompanyCam?
Take a picture. Text it to me. Beg them to text it to me! I’d wait for pictures. To answer your question, there wasn’t much of a system.
People often believe their phone has the same abilities CompanyCam has, without our app. What would you say in response to that?
Oh, I’m sure you could if you’re spending all day setting up the systems! So no. I’m being facetious.
Earlier today a guy said to me, “Hey Keith, I’m not sure about this.” And I said, “Put it on CompanyCam and then I’ll go right there and look.”
He took a picture, used the pointer annotation feature to indicate what he’s talking about. I looked at it and was able to identify the problem. CompanyCam makes these interactions easy because you can have that conversation anywhere.
And even if you can do everything on your phone, there is no central place to store everything.
Back in the day I had to figure out who had which photos on their phones. I would scroll through all my text messages trying to figure out where the needed pictures were. Now I go to CompanyCam, and boom, boom, boom!
My process is smoother now. Whenever I get to any job site, I pull up, open CompanyCam, click New Project, then select my location (through CompanyCam’s GPS), and press create.
I do this with every one of my customers. Now when I walk in, I’m already set up and ready to go. I can call my foreman and say, “Hey, what’s this crazy crap I just saw at a house?” And he can go on CompanyCam, look, and make comments on it immediately.
What makes you such a big CompanyCam advocate?
It’s because all my people love CompanyCam.
I’m a hard guy to work with. I strive for perfection and don’t accept less than that. Back in the day, when my crews would call me to verify how they’re going to do something, and I’d say, “I’ll be over there in a minute.”
There were a lot more steps to staying up-to-date with my team. Now, my people love CompanyCam because it keeps me out of their hair.
CompanyCam saves me money daily. By that I mean it saves me labor. I’m not just trying to make a living — I am running my business like a business.
We track costs. We look at productivity. CompanyCam saves me money. And CompanyCam is saving me time. It’s saving time on the job site.
Here’s another thing. We use it as a punch list thing. I give my customer a link to their website or check out their websites.
When I’m done, I tell them “Here’s CompanyCam, take a picture and point at what you’re not happy with.”
They go in and point out everything that I need to have for a punch list, and then my guy rolls up on the job. Nobody’s had to sit down and make out some punch list. He has it all on CompanyCam.
Back in the day, we’d go, “What the hell is our customer even talking about? I don’t see it.” But now we know exactly where they’re looking. And so they just take the picture in CompanyCam and we don’t even interact.
We can do punch lists without even interacting with the customer. They put the picture on there, my guy does whatever needs to be done, uses the Before and After to document the progress, then tells my customer, “We’re done.”
“CompanyCam saves my team and me a lot of time. That’s what makes me an advocate.”
And this works well in property solutions, where we’re flipping houses or we’re doing rental things. People can now see what we did without going into the house themselves. It’s clear that we’ve done what we said we were going to do.
For me, that’s the biggest thing I like about it because it makes my job easier. It makes my customers more at ease because they can sit in their home, they don’t have to worry about finding time to check all the work. Whether it’s new construction or not. They can see it right on their phones and know we’re done.
Especially during this social distancing time, it’s even more convenient. You’re not even supposed to be interacting with your customers, so it just works out perfectly.
Exactly — that’s it. Talking about COVID-19, it encouraged me to look at a different way of doing business. I don’t have to interact with clients face-to-face as often if that’s a concern for me/them.
Your website has a lot of great photos using our Before and After feature. Of all CompanyCam features, which do you think is most beneficial for construction companies?
I love the Before and After filter because it is exact. I used to print out the before picture and then take it over to the site. Then I’d try to frame my camera as best as I could to match the first image. So the CompanyCam Before and After filter has changed a lot for us.
Let me put it this way, from a marketing perspective, the Before and After feature is my favorite. From an operations perspective, being able to take real-time pictures is my favorite because it saves me lots of trips. I can only imagine somebody in a bigger market – they would love CompanyCam.
What would you say to companies that are on the fence about using CompanyCam?
Here’s the deal. If you’re not willing to spend a few bucks a month on this app, then you will continue to live like you are today. Put it this way: you don’t deserve to have CompanyCam. Really.
I’m all about technology, so when technology fails it ticks me off. But that’s the thing – I try things and push our company to grow and adapt. I do demos and try new things out. CompanyCam is so reasonably priced, you’re a fool if you don’t at least try it.
Finish this statement: “CompanyCam is…”
Industry changing.
It really is. It gives us a whole new, better way to do business.
CompanyCam is industry-changing because it changes the way I interact with my employees, interact with my customers, and bid my jobs! It’s all about documentation. CompanyCam changed my documentation process.
And for me, CompanyCam is a communication tool. It clarifies communication across the board and makes communicating easier.
My guys used to be calling or texting me all day trying to communicate issues and questions with me. They’d text photos saying “Do you see what I’m talking about?” And I’d, “No, where?”
And now with CompanyCam it’s like, boom, it’s right there in real-time, geo-tagged, and time-stamped. I can even enhance the image and view it more clearly where my guy places the circles. So, for me, it’s an instantaneous communication tool really.
Thanks to Keith Sproles and Constructions Concepts for sharing your thoughts. We’re glad CompanyCam is one of your favorite restoration apps.
Construction Concepts is a construction and restoration company based out of Abilene, TX. To Construction Concepts, any occupied and fully operational job sites are never a problem. And they can also plan, manage, and build multi-phase jobs.
They offer a beginning-to-end client experience that includes seamless communication, budgeting, staffing, on-site organization, and solid, quality handiwork every time. They make your fire or water damage restoration or your planned home improvement an enjoyable experience.
Learn more at their website.
