Managing field teams is a logistic mess. From coordinating the customers-employees to streamlining the entire process to optimizing the proficiency for higher customer satisfaction—it’s too much to handle. Depending on your business size and scalability, you might have to employ hundreds of individuals just at the backend. And even then, proofing the operational and time efficiency would be virtually impossible.
For this simple reason, Field Service Management (FSM) solutions have gained massive popularity in recent times. Packing just about the right features and facilities, including seamless automation, they are already empowering thousands and thousands of start-ups around the world. Be it Uber or UrbanClap—their operational end is based on a centralized FSM ecosystem. More and more companies, for additional efficacy, less complex and higher returns, are taking up this tech-powered solution. No wonder, by 2019, the global field service management market is estimated to reach the $3.52 billion mark.
So, if your business model, too, has similar roots wherein the employees get hired on-field, it’s important that you leverage on a good field service management software. But the question comes—how to find a good solution in the first place? While they aren’t completely fool-proof, here are 5 simple tips to help you do that:
1. Identify your distinct requirements
This is a general rule of thumb. You cannot invest in or purchase something unless you know your exact needs and requirements. So, factor your business type, model, size, future plans and so forth to effectively identify the kind of facilities you would want from your solution. That being said though, irrespective of your needs, there are few features that are must-haves. It includes automatic job assignment, geo-location, job analysis, and localization configuration.
2. Talking about the “must-haves”
There are more than a handful of features and functionalities that are basically essential for anyone. And these are also the offerings that identify and separate a good solution provider from the bad ones. Here are some of the key features you definitely want in your field service software:
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Job management- Keep a tab of all the customer requests with the entire order summary on a single interface. All the little details of the request and delivery just a click away.
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Automatic job assignment- Assign jobs to the right employee/technician easily, based on job type, skills, and geo-location among other factors.
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Service configuration- Configure and manage all your services, across devices, from a simplified dashboard with no hassle.
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Customer invoicing- No more creating invoices manually. Once the job is over, let the solution automatically generates an invoice that’s easily shareable on social channels.
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Express service- Never say “no” to your customer, even when their requests are super-urgent. Let them place express service request that gets the immediate attention of the serviceman.
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Localization configuration- Location-based job assignment and management made super easy with seamless localization configuration.
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Job analysis- Analyse all of your services, requests, and jobs comprehensively to pave way for improvements and growth.
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Intensive Reporting- More on this in tip #5.
These are features that make up for a good field service management system. And these are also those that are must-have for anyone. So, when choosing a software, make sure it has all of these.
3. Does it fit your budget?
Of course, how much will it cost you is an important consideration. However, many business owners make a mistake of over-prioritizing this aspect. When thinking about the budget, the foremost thing you need to think is the future prospect—and NOT where your business is right now. You can’t let a shortage in budget push you to settle for a poor-quality solution that, in the future, limits your business growth. To supplement scalability, you need more features. And this may mean that you spend adequately right in the early stage to get features that you might not necessarily find handy initially.
The simple solution here is to know where exactly you want to take your business. Understand its growth prospect and then settle on a budget accordingly. Avoid settling for fewer features or unknown, ‘average-Joe’ field service management software.
4. User-friendly dashboard
This is of utmost importance. Be it for the admin, operator, customer or technician/customer, it’s crucial that the interface is friendly to everyone. You don’t want to end up with a dashboard that’s, first, unattractive, and second, have a long learning curve. The simple the dashboard for every party, the higher their convenience, and satisfaction level will be.
5. Extensive in-build reporting option
Quality can never be “perfect”. It needs to be improved and shaped, according to consumers’ needs, over time. This is where analytics and reporting come to play a critical role. You need hard data to identify how your business is performing and how you can improve it. Your FSM software must be adept with built-in reporting option to sort, systemize and serve you the important metrics to facilitate your decision-making. So, before you settle for any solution, make sure it has a robust reporting interface that offers you all the important project-based and collective KPIs, including job requests and project status.
These are 5 simple tips that will help you find a good field service management software. Again, they don’t guarantee to fool-proof your decision. So, you need to be cautious when choosing a solution for yourself. Just know your needs, spend some time in research and read about the features, and you’ll be fine.
Take Hands of Serpentcs
Here at Serpentcs, our field service management system packs all the above-mentioned features and much more to fit in the distinct needs and requirements of on-field servicemen, customers, and operators. Coming with plenty of added benefits, take hands of Serpentcs and give your business idea a flight of success. For more information and customization on top of our FSM software get in touch.