Think your business needs its own mobile app? Check out these 8 reasons you may actually need to get a mobile app for your service business.

With the rapid digitization of every sector, adopting mobile-friendly working software is inevitable.

Many industries, including field service companies, will have to move towards paperless operations to manage field technicians better.

Mobile technology is here to stay, and its dominance in the service business will eventually become the new industry standard.

If you are on the fence on the need for a mobile app for your service business, here are some reasons to take advantage of this technology now:

To streamline route planning

By shifting to service scheduling apps on mobile, you can organize service appointments properly with customer and technician locations along with travel times.

Managing these aspects beforehand ends up saving high amounts of fuel and maintenance costs for the vehicles.

Infield service requests may come in unexpectedly, or emergencies can occur anytime, and you should be prepared for any of such occurrences using mobile apps.

Some applications also allow technicians to schedule their service appointments, find nearby jobs during breaks, and finish a job faster than expected. 

Obtain access to real-time data & data accuracy:

Real-time data is an excellent add-on to work towards customer satisfaction.

Once the technicians get access to updated data anytime, they are prepared with the necessary equipment and finish the work faster than expected.

You must be aware that manually maintaining and recording the data is immensely difficult, inefficient, and inaccurate.

Hence using mobiles to note the information and retrieve it later saves up time for managers and technicians. 

Maintain communication

Field service tracking software beneficially improves communication between on-field staff and office managers.

Mobiles are an excellent way for the teams to coordinate better by communicating their work and immediate needs.

Maintaining interactions is essential to improve field service operations. It can even extend beyond professional needs to deliver employee satisfaction as well.

Streamlined operations

From scheduling a technician according to customer requests, providing the necessary equipment and logistical requirements, to billing and updating the work undertaken, everything becomes efficient with mobile technology.

The apps will inform your staff regarding the whereabouts of on-field technicians for availability and proximity.

Additionally, you can modify information and schedules easily in real-time.

Gain access to the cloud

Cloud-based data updating and maintenance have gained significant momentum in recent years.

Once your company uses field service automation software on mobile, storing and sharing information becomes extraordinarily straightforward.

These easy-to-use apps on mobile via cloud-stored data will enable your technicians to get easy access to all the information that they need for the job.

You won’t have to worry about the space for information storage. 

All service calls get billed

Inappropriate billing and service call recording are challenging issues for field service companies operating manually.

Taking on emergency repairs for crucial clients by planning to send the invoice later usually ends up forgotten or misplaced.

Each of these makes a significant difference in accounting. You can rely on mobile apps with dispatch and scheduling software to store all the information in real-time for accurate billing and invoicing of all the jobs undertaken. 

To maintain employee performance, in the long run, it is essential to continuously monitor and analyze key performance indicators like productivity, profitability, etc.

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They will also help identify the strengths and weaknesses of the company in terms of geography, technicians, equipment procurement and use, customer service and support, etc.

Once the managers recognize the areas of improvement, they can efficiently come up with programs to optimize service operations. 

Improved Customer Experience

Mobile apps simplify the work of the technicians that eventually guide customer satisfaction when their expectations are met.

A Forrester study even showed that 80% of businesses that use mobile apps in the field observed an increase in overall customer satisfaction.

By sharing real-time text updates to the customers regarding upcoming appointments or rescheduling maintains a healthy relationship with them by keeping them in the loop. 

 Perception is everything.

You might not realize it right away, but your customers are going to shift their perspective about your field service operations once you begin using the latest technology. Your company will be seen as innovative and progressive.

Arming your technicians with the latest features and advantages of the rapidly evolving mobile technology will build more credibility and trust for your company among customers.

Author Bio

Akhil Rajan is a Customer Success Specialist at Zuper, an intelligent workforce management platform for service-oriented businesses.

Working with customers on a daily basis, he has a deep understanding of their needs and pain points and so he is able to contribute to the marketing strategies for Zuper with the content he writes.

He writes on topics like how to increase workforce utilization, how to reduce the service turnaround time and increase workforce efficiency, customer adoption, cost reduction strategies, etc – to name a few. He is often found buried in books or playing chess in his free time.”