GuildQuality

GuildQuality will join Southern Living magazine to kick-off the 19th year of the Southern Living Custom Builder Program on February 24th and 25th at Wild Dunes Resort, just outside of Charleston, South Carolina.

The Southern Living Custom Builder Program is a network of the South’s top custom home builders brought together by the magazine. Members of this one-of-a-kind program enjoy the benefits of being connected to the Southern Living brand, exclusive territory rights, Showcase Home opportunities, and much, much more.

Southern Living is actively looking for new members to attend the conference, please contact Kristen Bryan at 205-445-5076 or kristen_bryan@timeinc.com by February 3rd for more information.

We are looking for a friendly and organized individual to join our GuildQuality support staff as a Member Services Representative.

The position will be focused on providing support to our existing Guildmembers. The right candidate will reply to inbound support requests via email and phone and conduct occasional training sessions via phone and web conference. Excellent organization and time management skills are required.

The position will report to the Member Services Director. All candidates must reside full-time in Atlanta.

In addition to being a strong cultural fit, candidates should have the following skills and experience:

- great communication skills, verbal and written;

- proficiency with MS Outlook and MS Excel; and

- experience in customer service is a plus, but not required.

Our company culture is results-oriented, and we are highly-focused on creating value for our members. Read more about what it’s like to work at GuildQuality.

If you know someone who would be a fit for this position, please have them send their resumé and cover letter to careers@guildquality.com.

We’re thinking a lot about maps and geographical relevance these days. While our release of GQ Maps may have attracted all of the attention, I’d like to point out a tiny little change that may be harder to notice:

We just added to your profile pages a list of the cities and states (and Canadian provinces or territories) in which we’ve surveyed customers. For many of you, this would have turned into an impenetrable list of a zillion locations. As such, we pared it down to show only the 10 cities in which most of your surveying has occurred.

To the right is an image showing how that looks on GuildQuality’s own personal profile page. Unless your clients are all over North America, your profile page probably won’t list as many locations.

The addition of the city text serves two related purposes: First, it helps your profile’s visitors see where you’re active (just like GQ Maps). This gives people more context, and helps them to better understand what all this means. Second, it helps search engines have a better idea of where you’re active. Over time, I expect this to help the little web scouring robots to return your profile pages more frequently in search results for relevant phrases like, “remodeler madison, wi”.

At Harth Builders, company culture is focused on what they declare as the “three C’s of remodeling,” (at least phonetically): communication, quality and cleanliness. The company has found that if they do these three things really well, they win clients for life. With over 90% of Harth’s clients likely to recommend the company, and over 70% of their work stemming from repeat clients, I’d say they have the “three C’s of remodeling” down to a science.

“GuildQuality’s Scorecard tool has proven to be especially valuable to our company,” said Greg Harth CR, CAPS, President of Harth Builders. “I’m able to customize reports and track each project manager and lead carpenter’s performance. We’ve even structured an incentive plan based on the percentage of each customer’s survey responses.”

GuildQuality’s customer survey feedback acts as a source of motivation for Harth employees, encouraging them to strive for achieving quality work with every project.

“All of our employees aim to be on time, on budget and produce a happy home owner. GuildQuality’s Scorecard provides our clients with a very conscientious staff working on their projects,” Greg said.

Harth Builders has exceeded the national average in customer satisfaction, and was even named Guildmaster for five consecutive years.

The company’s affiliation with GuildQuality is present throughout their website and they post all of their client comments directly to their company Facebook page.

“We take pride in our GuildQuality reviews and customer feedback summary, they give us a wonderful advantage when marketing to new prospects. Our sales team recently introduced iPads into their client meetings; they use them to show prospective customers our company’s GuildQuality Member Profile.”

In addition to their relationship with GuildQuality, the Harth Builders team is a Wellborn Authorized Contractor, a proud member of Remodeler’s Advantage and a Certified Remodeler and Certified Kitchen and Bath Remodeler member of NARI.

For more information on Harth Builders, visit their GuildQuality Member Profile.

We just received this email from the account manager representing our accounting software. I believe he’s trying to tell us that he’s raising our prices, though his writing style doesn’t make that obvious.

A price increase should always be a tough thing to request — especially of a low maintenance client who has been with you for six years. Were I this guy, I’d try to deliver that message with a little more professionalism.

A portion of my soul dies every time I read an egregious writing error, and if I happen to catch errors of my own after I hit send, I betcha whole weeks of my future life evaporate into the ether. Still, can there be any excuse for this sort of incomprehensibility — especially given that he’s asking us for more money?!

If you ever receive anything from GuildQuality that even remotely resembles this, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE let me know.

This morning, daily5Remodel shared what we’ve been up to with GuildQuality Maps. Check out Leah’s post, as well as all the other wonderful stuff that’s being discussed in her community of remodelers.

GQ Maps is a product of a whole lot of sharing — sharing between me and the rest of our team, sharing between Chris Turner (a talented web developer we engaged to help us with this project) and us, and sharing between the GuildQuality application and Google Maps (via the Google Maps API).

Sharing is important, and unfortunately, we’re facing a whole lot less of it if some in Congress and the corporations that support them get their way. I had been wondering how to share my concern over the pending SOPA/PIPA legislation, and the d5R article finally got my juices flowing.

Please note that if SOPA passes, website owners will have to think long and hard before linking to another site or allowing their visitors to share content, as every outbound link and every user comment will become a liability.

Below, I’m reposting a portion of the comment that I added at the end of Leah’s post, along with some minor tweaks and links to relevant sources:

If you’re not in the technology space, it might be hard to appreciate how powerful APIs are. With the Google Maps API (GuildQuality has one as well, btw), Google grants secure, limited access to the guts of their mapping tools, so that authorized folks can roll up their sleeves and do magical things that even Google’s most innovative engineers had never considered. Google Maps’ API enabled us to create GuildQuality Maps. Similarly, the APIs of Twitter and Facebook enable GuildQuality to integrate with those services, as well.

APIs are one of the more powerful ways that internet companies share information. But there are plenty of simpler, and more broadly used methods, as well. Two basic ones include linking from one website to another and allowing users to contribute their own content to a web page (as I am doing now, and as you’ll do if you add your own comment to this post). In a way, APIs and their cousins do for the internet what information and best practice sharing does for the remodeling profession (thank you d5R!).

It’s worth noting that all of this sharing is probably the single most important contributor to the advances made by both of our professions — internet and remodeling. Unfortunately, there are very real movements afoot to limit sharing, restrict participation, and reserve access to markets, information, and best practices to only the most established players.

When seeking to limit the flow of information and access to markets, our lawmakers always express noble intentions. However, the end results of their work always serve the interests of stagnant, established constituents who have lost the ability to innovate, and then it’s the innovators and the public who suffer. When this happens, as it has in healthcare, music, real estate development, architecture, and many other professions (including remodeling), it becomes harder and harder for innovators to push their profession forward.

I encourage all of your readers to consider how powerful sharing is, how important access is, and how dreadful our world will become if those things become crimes. Learn more about SOPA here, and please reflect on the similarities between SOPA and other pending legislation, as well as legislation long-since passed, in other industries, including remodeling.

Thanks again, Leah, for sharing. And keep up the great work.

From the SOPA Wikipedia entry:

Opponents have warned that SOPA would have a negative impact on online communities. Journalist Rebecca MacKinnon argued in an op-ed that making companies liable for users’ actions could have a chilling effect on user-generated sites such as YouTube. “The intention is not the same as China’s Great Firewall, a nationwide system of Web censorship, but the practical effect could be similar,” she says. The Electronic Freedom Foundation (EFF) warned that websites Etsy, Flickr and Vimeo all seemed likely to shut down if the bill becomes law. Policy analysts for New America Foundation say this legislation would enable law enforcement to take down an entire domain due to something posted on a single blog, arguing, “an entire largely innocent online community could be punished for the actions of a tiny minority.”

“What you think your clients are thinking is not the case,” Todd Jackson, CEO of award winning San Diego design build remodeling firm Jackson Design and Remodeling, explained to me. “GuildQuality allows our clients to give us a thorough, honest evaluation of work. The feedback gathered helps us to ensure we are consistently meeting the expectations of our clients by hearing the truth.”

Jackson Design and Remodeling has served the San Diego area since 1989 with multiple award-winning design build remodeling projects for over 2,000 satisfied clients. GuildQuality members since 2006, the company consistently achieves a 96% likely to recommend rate. It is these high satisfaction rates that have earned Jackson Design Remodeling a Guildmaster with Highest Distinction award in 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011.

Jackson Design and Remodeling is a three-time recipient of the BBB’s prestigious Torch Award, and Todd Jackson has also been a finalist for the Fred Case Remodeling Entrepreneur of the Year Award.

“We leverage our affiliation with GuildQuality by emphasizing the importance of customer service to us in our sales calls, website, social media and other marketing collateral. We value our commitment to delivering exceptional customer service and GuildQuality empowers us to convey that,” Todd said. “Jackson Design and Remodeling recently was honored with our third Better Business Bureau Torch Award for Marketplace Ethics. The award highlights companies that have demonstrated a commitment to ethical business practices, both in operations and in terms of being ethical, reliable and responsive to employees, vendors and customers. A considerable qualifier for the award is whether or not your company has a  high client satisfaction rate determined by GuildQuality, which just shows you how highly regarded quality truly is.”

Jackson Design and Remodeling makes their association with GuildQuality known through the numerous references and links directing prospective clients to their GQ Member Profile Page. Through the company’s use of GuildQuality they have witnessed the treasure of word of mouth marketing and have even decided to pay it forward with their very own Remodeler Locator page.

On the company’s Remodeler Locator page, a map displays companies who are members of GuildQuality and/or Remodelers Advantage. The page encourages clients to utilize the locator as one of the tools in the interview and selection process for a remodeler.

For more on Jackson Design and Remodeling visit their GuildQuality Member Profile Page.

This afternoon, we launched GuildQuality Maps. You can now opt-in to displaying the location of all of your projects (as well as the comments and reviews you’ve received in your survey feedback) on a map on your member profile page. Check out GuildQuality’s own map here.

Activate your map: To activate your map, visit the marketing section of your account. You’ll find more detailed instructions about turning it on at the end of this post.

Here’s how it works: For our members who’ve activated their map, visitors to their member profile page will see a cool little map in the sidebar:

Time frame displayed: This little sidebar map shows all the reviews and comments published on your profile page. So if you’ve set your profile page to display everything from all-time, visitors will see a little marker for each of those comments going back to your start with GuildQuality, but if you’re profile page is set to display only the most recent year of data, the map will show only the most recent year of markets.

Seeing reviews and published comments: Visitors can click on any marker to see the review or comment that’s associated with that project, or if there are more than one associated with that location, they can scroll through all of them.

Zooming in: Visitors can enter their zip code (postal codes work for Canada) to zoom in to whatever location they like. And if they click “Enlarge Map”, then an image like that at the top of this post pops up. When viewing the larger map, visitors can toggle between showing markers for ALL of your projects in the system, or only those with comments or reviews. Projects without reviews or published comments show up in gray, published comments show up in blue, and reviews show up in blue with a shiny gold star.

Obfuscation of locations: We don’t display customer contact info with the markers (in the case of reviews, we include initials or first name and last initial), but if you’d like to add to the privacy we afford your customers, you can choose to show only an approximate location of their project. In your map settings, if you select “Display approximate locations,” we’ll round the longitude and latitude of your locations to the third decimal, thereby making the marker locations +/- about 350 feet, rather than exact.

How to activate your map: Ready to turn yours on? It’s easy! Log into your account and go to the Marketing Admin, then the Customer Report tab. You’ll see the map settings on the right in the sidebar.

Click “Activate Map” (and if you like, click “Display Approximate Locations”), and then click “Update Settings.” Then check out your map!

What’s next for GuildQuality Maps? In all honesty, this is just Phase 1. We’re presently upgrading the navigation of the marketing section of the GuildQuality reporting application. When we finish, you’ll be able to embed a version of your map on your own website.

Timber Frame Business Council, a nonprofit organization providing information and resources for the timber frame industry, featured GQ and Guildmembers Lancaster County Timber Frames in their weekly update today. Thanks for the mention TFBC!

How is your company using GuildQuality to measure success and customer satisfaction?

Since 2011 Guildmember, M/R Plumbing Mart has relied on GuildQuality’s customer satisfaction surveying to help their team deliver an exceptional customer experience.

Recognized as a Wellborn Authorized Contractor and a member of the Kohler Leading Edge Program, M/R Plumbing Mart is trusted in the Chicago area because of their continued professional service and quality of work. I recently spoke with Kevin Smith, M/R Plumbing Mart owner, about what GuildQuality has meant to his company and how our service plays a part in acquiring his client’s trust.

“Our customers love the third party objectivity GuildQuality offers,” Kevin said. “The reviews especially provide an additional comfort level to our consumer.”

Kevin takes full advantage of the Recent Reviews & Published Comments application displayed on his company’s Member Profile to distinguish his company’s excellence.

“We love to share what our clients say about us and our work, utilizing GuildQuality’s social media integration makes it easy for us to stream all of our comments to both Twitter and Facebook,” Kevin said.

“GuildQuality’s partnership with Kudzu even earned our company business. A client from New York saw a GuildQuality comment streamed to our company Kudzu page and booked us,” Kevin said. “She was looking to install a new kitchen counter with a new sink and faucet, along with two new sillcocks for outside and  have some minor electrical repairs completed for her mother’s home. Her concern was that she was  flying in for one week and wanted to make sure that all the work was finished within that time period as she was to fly home. Based on our reviews, she felt confident we were the best contractor for her mother’s home projects.”

Kevin learned about GuildQuality as a member of the Kohler Leading Edge Program. GuildQuality is the preferred provider of customer satisfaction surveying for members of Kohler’s Leading Edge Program. As part of their Leading Edge benefits, contractors receive 40 complimentary customer satisfaction surveys.

“Our experience with GuildQuality has been a great one so far,” Kevin said. “Their service has been a big part of one of M/R Plumbing Mart’s better years.”

Terry Stamman, Co-Owner of Twin Cities Siding Professionals, recently shared with me his reasoning behind his company’s use of GuildQuality.

Terry and the rest of the Twin Cities Siding Professionals team analyze all customer feedback stemming from GuildQuality’s surveys.

“Reviewing our customer’s feedback affords our team the opportunity to see what we’re doing right and what we may be doing wrong,” Terry said. “GuildQuality gives us the chance to ferret out any unhappiness a customer may have, turn it around and make it right.”

GuildQuality has become a significant component of Twin Cities Siding Professionals company marketing strategy, they actively promote GuildQuality scores and membership in sales presentations.

“I compare GuildQuality to J.D. Power and Associates,” Terry said. “In every sales presentation I spend at least five minutes talking with our prospects about our affiliation with GuildQuality and the James Hardie Preferred Remodeler program, consistently referencing our Customer Feedback Summary and our Recent Reviews & Published Comments. Our customers appreciate that GuildQuality provides unbiased information about our company.”

Social media is another channel Twin Cities Siding Professionals utilizes in marketing their dedication to quality.

“We integrated GuildQuality with our company Facebook and Twitter, so we publish any comment we receive straight to our social media channels,” Terry said.

During our conversation Terry cited many conclusions as to why Twin Cities Siding Professionals has been a Guildmember since 2009, the main one that caught my eye, “GuildQuality validates and verifies to our customers who we are as a company.”

For more on GuildQuality’s services contact sales@guildquality.com.

Over the last few weeks, many conversations with our Guildmembers have started with a question: “How will your year wrap up?”

I’ve responded by sharing some highlights: 2011′s revenue and net income are both record highs; Guildmember satisfaction is strong and, as a result, our membership churn remains very low; and we added a full 33% more members in 2011 than we did in 2010. Despite the turmoil that’s plagued our market since late 2006, we seem to be firing on all cylinders. It feels good!

People generally react to this answer with something like, “That’s wonderful to hear. There are so many tough stories out there that it’s always encouraging to encounter businesses that are doing well.” And virtually everyone adds, “To what do you attribute it?” There’s no way to give a short answer to that question, so here’s my attempt at a long one.

(more…)

Congratulations to Guildmembers Normandy Remodeling for winning 12 out of 15 NARI Remodeling Excellence Awards.

The 12 awards represent the work of eight different Normandy Designers; Jennifer Runner, Ann Stockard, Leslie Lawrence, Gary Cerek, Stephanie Bryant, Kathryn O’Donovan, John Long and Leslie Lee.

Normandy Remodeling has been providing award winning kitchens, baths, renovations and additions to Chicago area clients for over 30 years. Normandy is known for great service, high ethical standards and exceptional quality of work. Their dedication to their clients has previously earned them the title of Remodeler of the Year by Professional Remodeler Magazine, as well as the distinction of a GuildQuality Guildmaster Award in 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011.

Read more on their win here!

Yesterday, Fox News published a short story highlighting some of the unique aspects of building a software company in the South. The article featured comments from Pardot CEO David Cummings, bigWebApps CEO Patrick Clements, and me. I thought I’d take a moment to elaborate on a subtle point from the article, and what that means for our Guildmembers.

There’s a prevailing sense among Atlanta’s tech entrepreneurs that our businesses should earn a profit by creating value for clients. I suspect that this whacky notion is, at least in part, a product of the lack of a robust venture capital community in the South. By necessity, we have been forced to reject the notion that venture capital will play a roll in the early success of our business.

Around here, there are only a few ways to get your software company off the ground, and all of them require achieving positive net income as soon as possible. For software-as-a-service businesses like ours, net income requires recurring revenue. Recurring revenue requires an excellent offering and happy customers. And those require great people who are focused on creating something special. This chain creates a virtuous cycle that benefits everyone involved.

An interesting (and often unhealthy) dynamic emerges when one attempts to finance the growth of his or her business by some means other than profit. From whence comes the cash, goes the attention. This is the Silicon Valley paradigm, and under it, any person who might facilitate or profit from an investment or acquisition becomes the de facto customer. This is good news for lawyers, bankers, and pretty much anyone who makes a living by seeing businesses bought or sold. Unfortunately, this distraction draws the business’ attention away from the actual customers: you.

When a business focuses on something other than delivering value to actual customers, there are consequences. We’ve experienced what happens in our world of real estate and construction when, instead of focusing on creating livable homes and communities, we focused on facilitating the flip. Remember what happened when all the real estate brokers, appraisers, lenders, legislators, architects, remodelers, builders, and buyers all started thinking that homes were no longer something that you lived in, but instead they became something from which you could earn a fee for facilitating a transaction?

Because that pain is very fresh in our minds, we’re going to stay focused on generating profit by creating value for you — our Guildmembers. Y’all are the good folks who keep our lights on, and we’re grateful for your business!

FastCompany describes the Power of Circles:

As business owners, we’re often living out on our own insular Tahiti. Rarely do we have the opportunity to ask questions of other folks who have walked a mile in our shoes. Small, trusted, intentional networks help temper that challenge.

I circle up with my Entrepreneurs Organization “Forum” every month. I also get together once a quarter with a handful of Atlanta SaaS entrepreneurs. Among our Guildmembers, Remodelers Advantage is extremely popular. As are the NAHB’s 20Clubs.

Are you a member of a “circle”?