It’s fair to say that budgeting is not the most fun you can have as a business owner. Subcontractors and manufacturers not only impose strict budgets on themselves, but regularly jump through the hoops of their clients’ financial needs without missing a beat. Careful consideration of where the lost time and money goes doesn’t always occur, as long as profits and margins continue on an upward trend.
This fiscal year end, take the time to evaluate your current estimating and engineering tools.
Review the number of software programs it takes to deliver one complete estimate. Does it feel clunky, dated, limited, or difficult to explain to new team members? The more serious losses could be occurring in morale, commitment to outcomes, and longevity of your talented leaders – due to their fatigue from using outdated systems and software.
Don’t wait until you’re in the middle of delivering an exceptional project to lose the primary role to a competitor with better infrastructure. It happens every day in our industry – the hours, travel, and site visits are already a challenge. Adding slow, ineffective programs to the estimating and engineering process can make a solid career opportunity more difficult to enjoy. Construction already has labor challenges that span the decades.
Save your people, save your time, save your money.
A construction industry software that has everything you need in one place – CRM, estimating, bidding, engineering, project management, and finance all rolled into one – has been a game-changer for manufacturers like Carrier, Johnson Controls, Siral Valves, and ABB. They all trust Bidtracer as their all-in-one construction software.
Serving the entire globe with their products and services, these award-winning manufacturers took the time to assess their current processes and compare the benefits of using an all-in-one software. You can take the same steps they did to prepare a solid case for the switch.
Here is an outline of what their approach to budgeting and review looked like:
Define Requirements
Understand what your specific needs are. Consider aspects like project management, scheduling, estimating, accounting, and document management. Can your current CRM do it all?
Research Software Options
Explore different solutions that align with your requirements. Look at factors such as features, user reviews, customer support, and pricing models (e.g., subscription-based, one-time purchase). Bidtracer onboards new users in less than 24 hours, and provides a complete CRM in tandem with project tools that have generated over 11 million bid invites. Small business? A firm only needs 2 users to begin. Bidtracer is the top solution to consider for construction software, and it should be the standard for your comparison.
Calculate Costs
Determine the costs associated with each software option. This includes initial setup fees, subscription costs (if applicable), training fees, and any potential customization costs.
Consider Integration
If you already use other software tools (e.g., accounting software), check compatibility and integration capabilities with the new construction software. Factor in any additional costs for integrations.
Plan for Training and Support
Allocate budget for training your team to use the new software effectively. Some software providers offer training as part of the package, while others charge extra. Bidtracer onboards and trains new users at no additional cost, provides training modules for all tools as well as U.S. based, free live chat support.
Evaluate ROI
Estimate the return on investment (ROI) from implementing the software. Consider potential savings in time, improved efficiency, reduced errors, and better project management capabilities. Imagine being able to add a new client, fully estimate a project, send bid invitations, and manage the project through construction, all from your phone or tablet while on the go. Do engineers need to come to an office to use your network of machines with license keys and secure file access? Or could they securely work from a location that they fully pay for, such as their home office? These are all important questions to ask when reviewing your FYE budgets and action plan.
Consultation with IT
At the scale that you are growing, you may already have IT support on-call or in-house. They may have all the information filed away for expiration of current licenses, security access settings, and challenges that have presented themselves in the past for your unique product or service. Bidtracer works with your IT pros to ensure a smooth integration of features, no matter where in the world they are.
Budget Presentation
Typically it takes a team to prepare budget considerations and outline costs that are then presented to leadership to consider. This approach leaves key decision makers out of the research, discovery and experience phases. You may be left convincing a decision maker who doesn’t know what you’re excited about to just go with it. Bidtracer provides detailed, step-by-step stakeholder demonstrations of the software so that all relevant parties can become familiar with the benefits, experience the speed and efficiency for themselves, and make a timely decision during your FYE budget review. Don’t make the mistake as a leader of doing all the research and consideration yourself, and carrying in the heavy load of explanation to your leadership team. Let Bidtracer show the team how it works in real time, so you can make a decision that could completely change the way you win.
Get a quote from Bidtracer
After all, you are researching better construction software. Isn’t that why you read this blog post? Going into 2025, you want to do the best work in the most efficient way. Bidtracer has been crafting our estimating and engineering CRM for 20 years, which pre-dates the CM@R process. When we began developing the ultimate connectivity solution for contractors around the world, the invention of WiFi was only 5 years old. Trust the industry pioneer in this space, Bidtracer, as your all-in-one construction CRM.
