HO/Contractor Bridge

HepaCore

Hi all,
I was approached by a company that delivers an online community for home owners/contractors. Not sure if you are familiar with "myspace" but it had the same feel to it. The HO builds a home profile, post previous work and current work done with pictures of completed projects. Also, the HO list the contractor(s), rates their quality and shows price of total job completed. For example: The HO's can find neighbors who had flooring done in the past 3 months and sees the quality of work completed (pics), contractor, price, and can even speak with the home owner.

It looks to allow for greator word of mouth traffic through residential community and allow home owners discuss project ideas. (that of course leads to referals). It even offers a little b2b business between contractors.

They also provide other cool bells and whistles for both contractor and HO. Like - HO notify contractors in real time for request for proposals and Bids (similiar to the SouthWest airlines "DINGs")

It's free for HOs and first 3 months is free to us. After that there were packages from 1,500 to 5k a month for contractors. I wont mention the company or site. However, I wanted to get everyone elses feel.

- HC

Peladu

Yea right .... like I would want the price that I gave to Customer A be known and reviewed by Customer B to Z and also Competitor A-Z.

All in all I think the idea is crap. Why would a HO do this for a simple floor replacement project, or if they were just going to remodel one bathroom? Yea, you're right, they wouldn't. They may keep track of the project with pictures and whatnot for their own records, but to take the time to input/upload this to a website? Sorry, don't see it...who benefits? Would the HO get compensated for going through the pain of it? Because for sure it's not going to be done for simple neighborly generosity. But, someone's gotta be getting paid and I see there being a charge back to the contractors for leads from this 'service'.

Another reason it's crap is because (for me) my customers known way in advance if they want or need work done. Neighbors will walk right up to me and ask me to stop by when I have time.

Crap, I tell ya, crap....

RobertCDF

I think it is a dumb idea as well... HOs dont understand that prices are not the same all the time. They will just think you are trying to rip them off when the price is 10-20% higher than their neighbors job. Little do they understand that the job may be bigger or have a differant waste factor. As well as access may be harder and thus raise the price. As well as material cost can go up on a daily basis. Stupid idea.

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mahlere

I'd have a hard time finding any contractors (other than guys who sell strictly on price) wanting their pricing information on there. Just my $0.02

HepaCore

Yea, I had the same concerns about price listing - not really comparable job to job. I think this site is same as Angieslist.com where pricing is detailed. This other site just show pricing as a range ("Cha-ching Expensive", "Moderate", "What a Deal")

Regarding the HO being compensated, I believe the contractors would begin treating these customers as "VIPs" since they know they will be scoring and telling neighbors (via web) about the quality.

Peladu

Thanks mahlere I completely read over that part ...

Peladu

Now you went and spammed this site ..... which is very very not nice.

Why, why would you hurt me like you did?

You promise not to spam, and then BOOM ..... you spam.

Take your product and spam elsewhere....

Peladu

You are sneaky .... did I ever tell what I think of sneaky people?

HepaCore

Not my product...Not sure what you are getting at?

HepaCore

Oh You mean Angieslist.com... Sorry, thats not what I meant to do. I was just using it as a reference point to show what's available to HO today.

I am in no way affiliated with that website.

HepaCore

I really appreciate more feedback on this topic. Possibly not pertaining to cost/price posting. Do any other contractors feel such a tool linking HO w/ contractor would be beneficial? Again, not selling a product - another vendor is selling to me. Like to hear more feedback before I make decision.

Peladu

You will not have enough HO participation to render such a service viable.

If you are the buyer of such a product, then my vote is to not buy.

HepaCore

People do like to share their minds and pictures. If the company markets correctly, it could get enough participation where contractors will offer deals to HO who use the site. I think I would use that to draw my customers to it.

Hammatime

I don't like Spam!

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Peladu's responses are refreshing after a long day at work. If votes count, I vote to give him a little space to practice his art. This space can be in a dark basement so long as he has access to the internet. - Dougchips

HepaCore

Ha, love it. Also love the "Christmas Story" pic.. We all can deal with less Spam in our diet.

Thewoodman

IMO thier are way to many people on the internet and off that love to take your money and tell you how it will make you a ton of money. They have everything to gain and you have everything to lose.

I had a marketing company tell me that if I would buget $1,000 per month for them to "Work With" That my business would be booming and I would be very rich.. Bull puckey!!! The thing is they have nothing to lose if I doesn't work for me. They just go on to the next guy and sell the same bull

If you want to grow your company get out and hit the pavement, talk to people, go to home shows, print up flyers. This stuff does not cost much, but it works.

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