As the owner of a foreclosure cleanup business, you should create a call intake form (or caller log) for your business. This is a simple form that you or your receptionist should use when they answer your business phone.
Invaluable Insight
The foreclosure cleanup call intake form may seem like it's not necessary; but it is. The caller log can provide valuable insight about your business, the estimates given out, trends in the geographical location of business that ultimately pans out, effectiveness of advertising and public relations in certain seasons, and on and on.
This one simple form can ultimately help you manage and grow your foreclosure cleanup business for years to come.
How to Setup Your Caller Log Sheet
Create a call intake form for your business from the day you open your doors and put it to use immediately. Your caller log should include, at minimum, the following information:
--Date of Call
--Time of Day of Call
--Caller's Name
--Caller's Company Name
--Caller's Phone Number
--Location of Foreclosure Cleanup Job
--Scope of Job
--Job Deadline
--When Caller is Available to Meet for Estimate
--How Caller Heard About Your Company
--Permission to Add Caller to Marketing Database
--Comments
How the Foreclosure Cleanup Caller Intake Form Can Help Grow Your Business
This one little form will do the following:
It will allow you to capture basic information from the potential client in a formalized manner.
The caller log will provide you with a phone answering script (for you or whomever you hire to answer your phones) so you're not stumbling when you start to get calls. Your company will sound more professional and poised when the calls start coming in.
The caller log will ensure you get all the necessary details from the potential client so you are better equipped to give them an estimate when you get to the foreclosure cleaning job site. You won't have to keep calling the client back to ask questions about items they want included in the estimate.
Call Patterns that Will Guide Your Decision-making
As the weeks pass, you'll see a pattern in the times you receive calls. You'll notice whether most of the calls are coming in the early evening, mid-day, or morning. The intake form will also reveal whether most of your call activity is happening at the end of the week or the beginning of the week, mid-month or end of month, etc.
Phone Activity vs. Actual Jobs
As your business grows, you will see which months you received the most phone activity versus actual jobs. Certain times of the month, you may be an "estimate machine," but when you compare your call sheet to the actual foreclosure cleaning estimates you will have given out (and you compare them to the estimates that have ultimately panned out), you'll notice a pattern that will guide your decision-making when it comes choosing which estimates to actually handle.
For example, after a while you'll be able to forecast by saying with some certainty that in this month we will receive so many calls, which will lend to approximately this many estimates, which will lend to this percentage of closed contracts.
You'll be able to flip back through these intake sheets and see if your foreclosure cleanup calls spiked as a result of a certain advertisement you placed or a certain public relations piece that got picked up.
You'll be able to see where most of your calls are coming from, versus where most of the actual subject properties you're working on are located.
How'd They Hear About You?
The line near the bottom of the call intake sheet is my favorite: How did you hear about us? It will guide you in placing ads, canceling ads, spending more dollars in certain areas, etc. You may not get through all of the questions on your call log with a caller, but do everything in your power to get that one question answered: "How'd you hear about us?"
Create Your Form and Use It from Day One
So if you don't have a call intake sheet, or caller log, create one, or copy the one outlined above and use it in your business. No matter who you hire as your receptionist (can be family, friends, formal or informal administrative help), call in and test them to see if they are asking the questions on the form. (Some calls may not lend to a full intake, but most will.)
Priceless Tool
This one little seemingly unimportant form, the foreclosure cleanup business caller log, can provide valuable trend information that can ultimately help you grow your foreclosure cleanup business successfully for years to come.
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