The latest news from GuildQuality.

Stacey Freed, Senior Editor of Remodeling Magazine, has put together a three-part series on how remodelers can “engineer the customer experience”. This series asks remodelers to ponder the question “What do clients really need and how can I make my world work best for them?”. She guides remodelers through the customer experience in three stages; sales, production and post-project warranty work (June 2008).

Her latest installment “Productive Production” (part two) focuses in on production; “what makes and keeps clients happy as their homes and lives are turned upside down during a remodel”. Stacey Freed talks with GuildQuality President and Founder Geoffrey Graham about, among other things, the correlation between the overall customer experience and high rankings in scheduling, punch list and communication.

“The most important thing for homeowners is schedule,” says Graham, “followed by punch list and communication.” “There might be delays,” he says, “but if a remodeler communicates [about those delays] in a way that a customer appreciates and understands, overwhelmingly the customer is happy”. And those happy customers will recommend their remodeler. … “If a remodeling company regularly struggles in those areas, they aren’t as profitable as those people who have those things down pat.”

This is an excellent series and we recommend it to any quality-minded remodeler looking for ways to fortify or improve on their delivery of an exceptional customer experience.

Strobel Design Build enjoyed a nice feature in this month’s Remodeling Magazine. Don Strobel discusses some of the marketing strategies he employs now (targeted and strategically timed direct mail campaigns, website design, web analytics tracking) as well as the things he has planned for the website (password-assigned client pages and customer testimonials).

The Charlotte Observer reported today about the progress at Morningside Village, a mixed use redevelopment project near the heart of the Queen City.

Post Properties has contracted to purchase two of the project’s 10 blocks.

The Charlotte Business Journal talked about the plans for this project in September of 2007. This is a significant project for the Charlotte community, and it’s nice to see those plans becoming a reality.

The Morningside Village development team is led by my father Tom Graham (pictured to the right, researching playground equipment for another development).

My brother Vince, our father Tom, and I are partners in the development of I’On in Mount Pleasant, SC. I’ve referenced I’On a few times in this blog. Both Vince and Tom are also GuildQuality shareholders.

The Seattle Times recently described the discipline of “the No. 2 homebuilder nationally in gross margin, sixth by pretax earnings and 15th in closing volume and revenue.” (Here’s the link to a web-based version at HousingZone.com and here’s the original pdf.)

Some notable excerpts: “Quadrant’s goal was to begin the permitting and building process only when the house had been sold, and to move quickly to complete it…Quadrant began with a 63-day timetable. Now it takes 54 working days to complete a house. Ten years ago, Quadrant started one house per day; now it starts seven, a number unchanged by the national downturn.”

Quadrant’s acumen radiates beyond the construction process. Quadrant was recently recognized by the Puget Sound Business Journal as one of 2007’s best Washington workplaces.

Click here to read more about Quadrant’s values (as described in the image above).

Fred Reichheld, author of two seminal works on customer satisfaction surveying and the correlation between service excellence and profitability (the shorter one: The One Number You Need to Grow; the longer one: The Ultimate Question), has a great blog about Net Promoter Scores, Surveying, and Customer Satisfaction.

This morning, I came across a discussion on survey response rates. Since our inception five years ago, we’ve promoted the need to achieve a high response rate. My logic (and this came from my days as a homebuilder and developer rather than any experience as a statistician) was that if you could get feedback from just about every customer, you could use it to tangibly and immediately improve the experience of every one of those respondents. We called that actionable feedback. A 20% response rate meant that you had no actionable feedback from 80% of your customers.

Also, from our personal experiences as respondents and surveyors, we knew that unhappy customers were less likely to respond to a mail or email survey than were happy ones. That meant low survey response rates were the equivalent of rose-colored glasses.

I’ve been very pleased to see the increased awareness and successful implementation of Fred Reichheld’s strategies, as it reaffirms a great deal of our underlying surveying and information reporting philosophy: A high response rate is important; Real-time feedback is critical; Information must get in front of all the right people; and GuildQuality must report it a manner that makes it easy to understand how well the business and its various employees/teams/divisions are performing.

With regard to survey response rates, Reichheld writes

[Though I would have once suggested that] response rates between 30% and 60% seem like a reasonable goal for a well-designed relationship survey. Now, I am convinced that these targets (which many consider radically aggressive) are actually far too low.

We go to great lengths to create a positive surveying experience for our members’ customers. Our philosophy is that we’d like to survey our customers in the way we’d like to be surveyed. So we give them lots of options to respond (email, phone, and survey mailers), and our telephone surveyors are super-nice people that work out of our Eatonton, GA office. Their primary goal is to positively represent our members.

That strategy is working for us and our members. While we aren’t yet at a 90% average response rate for everyone (Reichheld suggests that number as a great target), many of our members enjoy response rates well above 90%, very few are below 50%, and our overall average is slightly better than 70%.

You may have noticed some changes on our website. Two weeks ago, we went live with our latest redesign; an attempt to consolidate our messaging, simplify our navigation and yes… add a little bit of sparkle.

In the previous redesign (left top), we went for a simpler look; one that made access to relevent information easy.

In this redesign, we aimed at further simplifying the navigation and the messaging. We decided to consolidate all of our messaging and remove the “I am a…” aspect of the navigation. This dramatically simplified things. We also wanted to give our website a little more “umph”; that is to say, “umph” without sacrificing simplicity. Whenever we embark upon new functionality in our Customer Satisfaction applications, we expend a generous amount of time talking about how our users spend their time with us. In this case, it was no different. We added a little sparkle, but concentrated primarily on simplicity.

Some notable changes were also made to our Qlist and Guildmaster pages. We were after better “balance” on those pages. We moved a few things around, but nothing terribly dramatic as far as layout is concerned.

All in all, we are pleased with the improvements and hope that you all enjoy the changes.

Congratulations to Normandy Builders of Hinsdale, Illinois: Professional Remodeler’s 2007 Remodeler of the Year. The good folks at Professional Remodeler selected Normandy Builders because of their successful execution of a growth rebound strategy. After a 20% decline in sales from 2005 to 2006, the team huddled up and crafted a new growth strategy. They’ve not only made up their lost ground, but they’re on track to outperform their best year ever by nearly 20%.

I was very pleased to read that a key component of Normandy’s strategy involved GuildQuality’s customer satisfaction surveying. They originally came to us seeking to verify that their lost ground was not a product of diminished service. Their 95% recommendation rate from 200 surveys gave them some solid reassurance. But they got a lot more than affirmation from the surveying. Reg Marzec, who co-founded the company in 1979 elaborates:

But it’s not just about whether we’ve got happy customers. It’s also about finding out if we’re doing something wrong and having the chance and the ability to correct what we might be doing wrong. If we have a weak link, we should try to do something about it. And that has been a real side benefit that I never really thought of.

After getting a handle on the strength of their service, and identifying who were among their most passionate customers, Normandy took the extra step to develop a “Referral Rewards Program” that leveraged “the relationship they had developed with hundreds of satisfied past clients over the years.” The referral program contributed to a whopping 25% increase in leads.

According to their Marketing Director, Laurie Camp, their 2007 strategy is “more of a rifle shot approach than a shotgun approach in targeting potential clients. We’ve actually spent less on marketing than in the past, but we’ve increased our marketing effectiveness.”

I’ve just touched on the customer satisfaction components of their successful strategy. Visit Professional Remodeler to read the entire article.

Congratulations again to all the people at Normandy Builders for their well-deserved recognition, and best wishes for an equally successful 2008.

P.S. If you’re interested in more of Normandy Builders’ stats, they publish their summary Customer Report, and link to it from their website.

Congratulations to the team at Renaissance Exteriors for their prominent coverage in the September/October issue of Replacement Contractor.

The cover article discusses the sales and marketing challenges facing the “Replacement 100,” and how those have changed in recent history. Replacement Contractor uses Renaissance Exteriors as the goto contractor for insight into how the largest 100 replacement contractors are jumping those hurdles.

Worth noting: customer satisfaction remains critical to these businesses that are leading the pack. According to a summary of the Replacement 100’s lead sources:

• 94% rely on referrals as a lead source,
• 86% rely on repeat business, and
• 79% rely on their company’s reputation and word of mouth.

Congratulations to the Renaissance Exteriors team for their prominent coverage and tremendous company growth.

Last week, JD Power announced its “2007 Home Builder Satisfaction Ratings.” GuildQuality member John Wieland Homes & Neighborhoods earned top honors in both markets in which the company was ranked: Atlanta and Charlotte.

According to JD Power’s customer satisfaction surveying, John Wieland Homes & Neighborhoods outperformed 21 other Atlanta-area volume homebuilders. In Charlotte, Wieland also outperformed 21 other builders, and shares top honors with Mattamy Homes.

Another Charlotte-based GuildQuality member, Saussy Burbank, earned “among the best” ratings.

According to JD Power, “The study, which ranks builders in 34 separate housing markets across the U.S., is based on responses from 50,399 buyers of newly-built, single-family homes after they’ve lived in their homes from 4-18 months, on average.”

Given the spotlight JD Power has shined on volume homebuilders, the environment is growing more and more competitive (according to the study, overall scores were higher this year than last). Achieving top ratings in this study is a herculean accomplishment.

Congratulations to all the folks at John Wieland Homes & Neighborhoods. Special recognition should go to Wieland’s VP of Customer Relations, Kelly Rulis (that’s her picture at the top of this post). She’s a passionate advocate for quality, and has done an exemplary job at connecting every customer-facing employee with their GuildQuality survey feedback. Also, Kelly and her team appreciate that the goal for their GQ surveying is not to get positive feedback (of course, that’s always nice), but to understand their homeowners, craft strategies for promoting a great customer experience, and take prompt action whenever there’s a misstep.

Though not our largest member, Wieland is among our most active in terms of user authentications. I attribute this to their large number of employees using the system. Their customer-facing employees have immediate access to the customer feedback that’s relevant to them. While we pride ourselves in the quality of our reporting, we know that nothing can more positively impact the service your team delivers than simply sharing with them your customers’ feedback in real-time.

While JD Power’s study is limited to volume homebuilders only, GuildQuality provides customer satisfaction surveying and performance reporting for building professionals of all sizes, be they homebuilders, remodelers, or real estate developers. Our community of quality-minded building professionals includes over 500 companies in over 40 states.

I’ve previously mentioned Toll Brothers as a company that seems to see the forest for the trees. This BusinessWeek article reaffirms my impression.

Considering the challenging environment, Toll Brothers seems to be making all the right moves—but what are they? For one, Toll Brothers is simply doing what homebuilders should do, considering the glut of homes on the market now. “We believe that reducing new-home production until the current oversupply is absorbed is a key step in bringing housing markets back into equilibrium,” Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Robert Toll said in a statement.

Now that doesn’t seem so difficult to me, but given the machine that is a public national homebuilder, cranking back production is apparently a whole lot harder than you would think. BW goes on to point out a few other things working in their favor: Toll Brother’s build to suit strategy (they’ve got contracts before the break ground), and “fewer than 2% of their inventory falls into the subprime category.” Add into the mix an unwillingness to accept loose contracts, and they’re looking pretty good, all things considering.

Dr. Nicholas A. Christakis, a physician and professor of medical sociology at Harvard Medical School, produced a study showing that obesity was contagious. If you gain weight, the people you spend time with are likely to gain some as well.

This was no surprise to me. After all, I definitely followed suit during my wife’s two pregnancies. But I read a suggestion today that it’s not just obesity that’s contagious, but other character traits as well.

It certainly makes sense to me that if you hang around with motivated people, you’ll become more motivated. If you hang around with smart people, you’ll become smarter. If you hang around with exceptional entrepreneurs, you too will take on some of the traits that make them exceptional.

This notion–called Social Contagion–shines a spotlight on the importance of your peers. Your 20 Club or your Remodelers Advantage Roundtable dramatically impacts how you grow your business. The great homebuilders in your community challenge the others to improve. The top performing salespeople help bring out the best in the rest of the team. The project managers who consistently deliver an exceptional customer experience make everyone else bring it up a notch or two.

Who are your peers? Who are your employees’ peers? Are they the kind of people from whom you wouldn’t mind catching a serious case of Proficiency or Genius or Kindness?

If you live in Atlanta, chances are you’ve heard or read about plans for Trump’s latest endeavor; Trump Towers Atlanta (left). A joint venture between Trump Inc, Wood Partners LLC (a GuildQuality member) and Dezer Properties Inc, Trump Towers Atlanta is a $260 million, 48 story luxury condo/hotel project located in the Midtown Arts District at 15th and West Peachtree. The towers add to an increasingly impressive Atlanta Midtown skyline. Mark Randall, managing partner of Wood Partners, says this won’t be the last we’ll see from the Trump/Wood duo citing potential plans for additional towers in either Seattle or Los Angeles.

Breaking ground only a couple of city blocks away is One Museum Place (right); a John Wieland Homes & Neighborhoods (a GuildQuality member) and OvertonMurphy Interests LLC venture. Located at 1301 Peachtree Street, One Museum Place will sit in the heart of the Atlanta Midtown Arts District. This 23 story, “condominium only” tower will be the first of it’s type for John Wieland. At a whopping $365 million, he certainly isn’t easing in. The tower will feature 96 luxurious units; each starting at $2 million. He endeavors to make One Museum Place his “architectural statement in Atlanta”.

For world-class architect and designer of One Museum Place David Chipperfield, this project will also be a first. The London based architect has worked on similar residential projects both in Berlin and at home in London, but never in the US. Plans for the second floor of this Atlanta tower feature a 14,000 square foot exhibition space. After 10 years of operation under the Wieland Family Foundation, the space will be offered to the High Museum at a price tag of $1.

It’s wonderful watching our quality-minded members continually deliver service excellence, especially, here in Atlanta. We will watch, in anticipation, as these towers stretch into the Atlanta skyline.

In January, we wrote about Guildmember Oakwood Homes on ABC’s Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. We’re excited to report that another Guildmember, Legend Homes, has been chosen by the Extreme Makeover team to help transform the lives of the Byers family in Corvallis, Oregon. Taping recently wrapped up on the story of the Byers family whose children were at great risk living in a potentially toxic home environment.

Eight-year-old Jenessa “Boey” Byers has a rare form of cancer and requires a sterile environment following chemotherapy treatments. The air-quality in the home is also important to her 12-year-old brother Joe, who suffers from asthma.

Award winning Legend Homes was chosen by ABC, from a pool of dozens, because of their track record as a green-certified builder for over three years.

Thanks to the help of “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition,” Rob and Rachel Byers now have a beautiful, 4,000-square-foot home that is “beyond green certified,” said Mara Woloshin, a spokeswoman for Legend Homes, the Oregon-based homebuilding company that led the project.

Congratulations Legend Homes on this accomplishment. We are proud to have quality-minded builders, such as you, as part of our community.

The July issue of Professional Remodeler includes profiles for 20 of the largest remodelers in 20 top metro areas. I was pleased to see five of our members among the list:

• Case Design/Remodeling, Bethesda, MD
• Crawford Renovation, Houston, TX
• Gardner/Fox Associates, Bryn Mawr, PA
• Marrokal Construction Co, Lakeside, CA
• Normandy Builders, Hinsdale, IL

The article also included an expanded list of 100 leading remodelers. Among those 100 were around 20 Guildmembers. We’re honored that so many of the nation’s leading building professionals rely on GuildQuality for their customer satisfaction surveying.

In June, Remodeler Online published an article titled Remodeling: CSI exploring the hows and whys of project “autopsies”. Leah Thayer’s article talks about how to fix and, ultimately, avoid remodeling projects that suffer from budgeting and scheduling problems. She “autopsies” a project from soup to nuts, identifying “pulse points”; checkpoints in the project where diagnostics should be performed and issues aired out. Advanced Kitchens and Advanced Contractors, interviewed in this article, give GuildQuality the nod as their tool of choice to gather the feedback that they need for their autopsies. Gruesome indeed …

Last week, Remodeler Online again referenced GuildQuality in an article titled “Simple Bonus Systems“. In the article, Tim Faller explains how bonuses “can help field employees achieve quality and profits alike”. He says that evaluation of production teams in the field “requires a good feedback tool”.

Companies such as GuildQuality can help you establish criteria and conduct surveys. You might assign a simple monetary award to “grades” of a certain level — for instance, for every job that gets a top rating in 80% or more categories…

It’s great to hear about how our members are leveraging our tool and, as always, it’s great to hear people saying nice things about us.