“There’s an app for that™,” mentioned one of many world’s largest tech corporations. And garden care is not any exception.
When you’re spending extra time managing workers than tending lawns you then might need an issue.
And whereas apps can’t do garden look after you, they may help in some ways, from simplifying scheduling to calculating prices and sharing nice opinions.
Right here’s an inventory of our prime 10 beneficial apps in your garden care enterprise.
And, as a result of we all know small companies depend on nice folks, we’ve began with our personal app, Homebase, which makes a speciality of scheduling, time monitoring, and workforce communication, even throughout a number of areas.
So you possibly can spend much less time worrying about logistics, and extra time really constructing what you are promoting.
7 methods apps may help you handle your garden care enterprise
Listed here are some nice ways in which apps may help what you are promoting run extra effectively and save hours of time and stress — so you may get on with the garden care.
- Schedule workers members — Create simple, quick, and correct schedules in your garden care workers with apps like Homebase, so everybody is aware of the place they should be and when.
- Simplify time monitoring — Simply document working hours, even for distant and distributed groups, to regulate labor prices and keep away from time theft. Homebase and Harvest excel on this.
- Enhance buyer communication — Giving shoppers an excellent first impression is essential, and it’s best to all the time reply helpfully and promptly from the primary inquiry to the ultimate assessment. Jobber is a good choice right here.
- Estimate materials prices — Guaranteeing your garden care enterprise is worthwhile means appropriately estimating which supplies you want. Apps like Space Quantity Calculator and Turf Remedy may help calculate house measurement, and purchase the correct amount of product.
- Determine pricing and revenue — Value your companies appropriately to make sure revenue with apps like Revenue Margin Calculator. Tweak labor prices, overheads, and bills for greatest outcomes.
- Establish various kinds of vegetation and their situation — Even specialists can use some assist typically, and apps like LeafSnap and FieldScout allow you to use your cellphone to investigate the well being of lawns and vegetation, so you possibly can determine the subsequent steps.
- Share nice opinions and drum up word-of-mouth enterprise — Don’t let your garden care enterprise be the neighborhood’s best-kept secret. Apps like CamCompany allow you to take and share photographs and movies of your work. Whereas NiceJob collects and shares constructive opinions for word-of-mouth referrals and on-line bookings.
The shortlist: The ten greatest garden care enterprise apps
- Homebase: For scheduling, distant time monitoring, and workforce communication
- Jobber: For buyer communication
- Harvest: For time monitoring and invoicing
- Revenue Margin Calculator: For easy revenue calculations
- Space Quantity Calculator: For straightforward quantity calculations
- LeafSnap: For fast plant identification and care
- Turf Remedy: For easy fertilizer calculations
- FieldScout: For soil and plant diagnostics
- NiceJob: For buyer opinions and referrals
- CompanyCam: For discipline job monitoring through photographs and video
Homebase: For scheduling, distant time monitoring, and workforce communication
Homebase is an all-in-one app designed for small enterprise homeowners who handle a workforce of hourly-based workers. It makes folks administration a lot simpler, so you possibly can schedule and monitor your garden care jobs, pay your workforce members precisely, and management labor prices.
How does it profit garden care companies?
Homebase is a one-stop store for all workforce administration points of your small garden care enterprise. In contrast to some, its cell app affords practically all the similar performance as its desktop model, so you should utilize it even when within the discipline (or yard) on a job.
The stand-out options embody:
- Scheduling app for automated and straightforward shift creation, so you possibly can schedule workers with out clashes, on the go
- Time clock and timesheets for correct hourly monitoring, compliant working hours, much less workers burnout, much less time theft, and managed labor prices
- Payroll for fast and straightforward funds that take timesheets and create correct wages mechanically. There’s no want for a separate software, and it’s all carried out on the identical platform.
- Hiring and onboarding together with pre-written job templates, jobs board posting, job promotion, and applicant monitoring.
- Workforce communication to empower workers to share helpful job suggestions and hand over notes between shifts, for a greater group, improved working situations, and better productiveness — even when workers aren’t working in the identical location
- Worker happiness together with shout-outs for a job properly carried out, which boosts motivation, and the choice for employees to money out wages early if wanted
- HR & compliance with federal, state, and native legal guidelines, and the flexibility to handle HR documentation and delicate information in a single place
- Integrations with main instruments like QuickBooks and Toast, so you possibly can stay productive together with your current enterprise instruments
How a lot is it?
Homebase’s app, and scheduling and timesheet software, are utterly free to make use of. Nevertheless, if you wish to maximize effectivity and get probably the most out of your entire software program, we provide the next worth choices.
- Primary: Free for one location and as much as 20 workers. It contains fundamental scheduling and time monitoring, worker administration instruments like Messaging, point-of-sale integrations, and entry to electronic mail assist.
- Necessities: $24.95 monthly per location. Every part in Primary, plus payroll integrations, workforce communication, efficiency monitoring, superior time monitoring and scheduling, and entry to reside assist.
- Plus: $59.95 monthly per location. Every part in Necessities, plus hiring instruments, retention and efficiency monitoring, time without work controls, and departments and permissions.
- All-in-one: $99.95 monthly per location. Every part in Plus, with HR and compliance, new rent onboarding, labor price controls, and enterprise insights.
Customers may save 20% on their total price once they join an annual plan.
Obtainable on iOS and Android.
2. Jobber: For buyer communication
Jobber goals to enhance customer support and communication, from preliminary inquiry to remaining cost. You may ship quotes by textual content and electronic mail, comply with up simply, and save hours on invoicing.
How does it profit garden care companies?
Jobber has all kinds of options throughout shopper messaging, invoicing, and communication.
- Cell app designed to work on the go when within the discipline
- On-line quote requests and jobs bookings for shoppers
- Automated garden care job scheduling to assist plan your day and embody breaks
- Job reminders and appointment notifications for employees and prospects
- Skilled quotes despatched by textual content message and emails
- Job monitoring to watch bills and ongoing notes
- Card reader and on-line cost system
- Consumer information storage and full shopper historical past
- Automated follow-ups to shut jobs or remind shoppers to pay
- Batch invoicing for quick billing
How a lot is it?
Jobber has 4 ranges of paid plan.
- Lite: $19 monthly for one person. Limitless shopper messaging, quotes and invoices, and on-line funds.
- Core: $56 monthly for one person. Every part in Lite, plus job scheduling and administration, reporting, and on-line request kind.
- Join: $19 monthly for one to 5 customers. Every part in Core, plus automated reminders and funds, customized types and schedules, and integration with accounting and automation instruments.
- Develop: $280 monthly for one to fifteen customers. Every part in Join, plus quote add-ons, automated quote follow-ups, two-way textual content message, and lead administration.
You can even attempt it free for 14 days. Obtainable on iOS and Android.
3. Harvest: For time monitoring and invoicing
Launched in NYC in 2006, Harvest was one of many first mobile-friendly time trackers. It nonetheless makes a speciality of time monitoring (and says it leads to 80% much less admin), however now it additionally allows you to ship invoices, create reviews, and monitor budgets. Harvest additionally has a rising vary of integrations and a forever-free plan.
How does it profit garden care companies?
Harvest’s options are cut up throughout three fundamental classes: time monitoring, reviews, and invoicing.
- Cell, desktop, and browser time monitoring wherever you and your workforce are
- Instrument integration for seamless time clocking and integration
- Automated reminders for employees to assist guarantee correct monitoring and breaks
- Finances updates and price monitoring to maintain initiatives on monitor
- Workforce capability monitoring to make sure no-one’s over- or under-worked
- Time evaluation to see which initiatives are impacting prices probably the most
- Detailed filters that can assist you make data-driven selections
- Invoices created precisely with time monitoring
- On-line funds and easy accounting with integrations like PayPal, Stripe, and QuickBooks
How a lot is it?
There are two choices.
- Free: $0. Consists of “one seat” (or person), and two initiatives. All options.
- Professional: $12. Consists of limitless “seats” and limitless initiatives. All options.
Harvest additionally affords a 30-day free trial. Obtainable on iOS and Android.
4. Revenue Margin Calculator: For easy revenue calculations
Revenue Margin Calculator helps service companies with hourly workers to calculate their internet revenue margin. Not strictly an app, however a web-based software from communication platform Jobber, it really works on telephones, tablets, and desktops.
How does it profit garden care companies?
Revenue Margin Calculator allows you to enter 4 totally different figures after which offers you your revenue and markup. This implies you possibly can add up prices, labor, and overheads, and see the place you’re overspending or not charging sufficient. Relying in your trade, your internet revenue margin is probably going about 10-20%.
The calculator:
- Allows you to add labor, materials, and overhead prices
- Components within the service worth you cost your shoppers
- Exhibits you ways a lot revenue you’re incomes on accomplished jobs
How a lot is it?
It’s free. Jobber additionally affords a free bill template you could full and ship to shoppers, when you’ve labored out your prices and the way a lot revenue you wish to make.
5. Space Quantity Calculator: For straightforward quantity calculations
With one other clear title, this app works on smartphones and tablets, and helps you calculate the world quantity of a 3D form. That is excellent in case your newest garden care or landscaping job requires you to clear or fill an area. It additionally calculates by space (2D) or quantity (3D), utilizing presets. And it’s free.
How does it profit garden care companies?
The software is straightforward to make use of and works like a calculator. You sort in your dimensions, and it offers you the consequence.
Options embody:
- The power to enter depth, top, and width dimensions
- 170+ preset shapes like cylinder or dice, plus subshapes like parallelepiped (3D parallelogram)
- Swipe by way of classes and shapes to pick out or sort to look straight
- Calculation strategies for partial measurements, e.g. for those who solely have the radius measurement
- Materials selector that features 1,500 supplies, equivalent to metals, wooden, soil, or liquids
- Calculations in metric and inches, from millimeters to miles
- Illustrations of the shapes and clearly labels dimensions to assist understanding
How a lot is it?
Free to obtain and use. Obtainable on iOS and Android.
6. LeafSnap: For fast plant identification and care
Leafsnap is an intuitive app that turns your smartphone digicam into an analytical lens. Snap a photograph of a plant and the app identifies it, and provides you a step-by-step information on maintain it. Plus, LeafSnap is aesthetically pleasing and addresses its customers as “plant lovers,” which is a pleasant contact.
How does it profit garden care companies?
LeafSnap is an easy however highly effective strategy to establish vegetation and know what you’re coping with in a backyard. Options embody:
- A database of 32,000 varieties of vegetation from the world over
- Reminders in your every day plant-care duties
- Recommendation on one of the simplest ways to {photograph} your vegetation
- Step-by-step care guides for every plant
How a lot is it?
There are two methods to make use of LeafSnap.
- Professional: Free to obtain and use. Consists of adverts and limits on plant identification and care guides.
- Premium: $5 monthly or $26 per 12 months. Removes adverts. No limits on plant identification or step-by-step care guides. Entry to the complete plant database, and superior identification.
Obtainable on iOS and Android.
7. Turf Remedy: For easy fertilizer calculations
Determining fertilizer is essential for a garden care specialist, since getting it unsuitable might be costly and harmful. This app lets you calculate the granular and liquid fertilizer software charges of nitrogen (N), phosphorus (P), and potassium (Ok), and goals to assist garden care companies prepare workers and calculate quotes. Because the app’s creator says: “Say goodbye to lengthy, drawn out, mind-numbing math!”
How does it profit garden care companies?
The app has a number of highly-focused options, together with:
- Granular or liquid calculation charge choices
- A “remedy journal” to watch the merchandise utilized
- A value calculator to maintain initiatives on monitor
How a lot is it?
The app prices $0.99 to obtain, for all options. Obtainable on iOS and Android.
8. FieldScout: For soil and plant diagnostics
FieldScout, or FieldScout GreenIndex+ Turf to present it its full identify, could sound sophisticated however its intention is easy. It gauges turf well being by measuring its relative “greenness” (or chlorophyll content material.) The app makes use of what it calls the DGCI (Darkish Inexperienced Coloration Index) and, by way of your cellphone’s digicam, helps you identify your turf’s well being, so you possibly can resolve your subsequent steps when caring for a turf garden.
How does it profit garden care companies?
The app is comparatively easy to make use of, with options together with:
- A white stability lock in your cellphone’s digicam, to assist create the proper coloration reference
- Timestamp and GPS log info (if Location Providers are enabled), to be used with different packages if you want
- The power to mix a number of samples right into a single computation
- Picture pairing for comparability of various sections of turf
How a lot is it?
The app prices $49.99 to obtain and use, for all options. Obtainable on iOS.
9. NiceJob: For buyer opinions and referrals
What’s higher than a contented garden care buyer? A cheerful garden care buyer that tells everybody how nice your work is and will get you a number of new enterprise! And this app makes getting and sharing nice opinions even simpler. Designed for native companies that depend on word-of-mouth, it helps you get extra opinions, extra referrals, extra net presence, and extra gross sales.
How does it profit garden care companies?
The NiceJob platform splits its options throughout six classes: opinions, referrals, websites, social proof, insights, and items. These embody:
- The power to share opinions on-line and get excessive rankings on serps
- Automated constructive assessment sharing on social media to drive engagement
- Automated referral invitations for patrons to share suggestions to others
- Evaluation and referral requests through textual content for simple communication
- Microsite net builder designed for small enterprise homeowners to generate extra direct bookings
- Social Proof web site widget to embed constructive opinions by yourself website
- The power to supply items for patrons, together with tokens and thank yous, to construct loyalty
- Employees leaderboards to encourage “pleasant competitors” amongst workers members
How a lot is it?
NiceJob costs its month-to-month packages relying on what number of prospects you’ve got per 12 months. It additionally has a restricted free choice, irrespective of what number of prospects you’ve got.
- Free: $0. Evaluation and referral requests, and exhibits opinions by yourself website. Buyer administration.
- Develop: $75 monthly for as much as 2,500 prospects. Every part included in Free, plus automated opinions and referral requests, automated social sharing, and workers leaderboards.
- Develop + Websites: $75 monthly for as much as 2,500 prospects, plus $399 arrange charge. Every part in Develop, plus a web site, private web site coach, web optimization optimization, and advertising analytics.
NiceJob additionally affords a 14-day free trial. Obtainable on iOS.
10. CompanyCam: For discipline job monitoring through photographs and video
CompanyCam goals to make it simpler to handle and document progress in a discipline job enterprise. As its identify suggests, it focuses on managing photographs, movies, chats, and initiatives below a single digital umbrella, so you possibly can share progress, scan paperwork, and enhance advertising.
How does it profit garden care companies?
CompanyCam makes use of cloud storage to handle each side of its instruments. Options embody:
- Video seize, to point out particulars in 4K
- Picture annotation to take pictures and add textual content, drawings, and useful notes
- Doc scanning to seize PDFs and different useful papers
- Report templates to avoid wasting time on monitoring initiatives
- Offline mode, to maintain initiatives transferring even for those who don’t have a sign
- Venture administration, together with maps, labels, contact particulars, and GPS stamps to remain targeted
- Customized checklists and to-do lists to share challenge progress
- Integrations with instruments together with Jobber and Salesforce for a complete tech stack
- Excessive-res photographs and movies to point out off your outcomes and get extra bookings
How a lot is it?
CompanyCam affords three tiers of pricing.
- Professional: $24 per person monthly. Consists of limitless initiatives and storage. Actual-time photographs, checklists, templates, web site challenge widget, PDF photograph reviews.
- Premium: $34 per person monthly. Every part in Professional, plus brand stickers, 4K movies and high-quality photographs, 10-minute movies, chat, electronic mail, and cellphone assist, plus onboarding assist
- Enterprise: Value on request. For 50+ customers. Every part in Premium, plus quarterly enterprise opinions, locked contract charges, onboarding coaching, success supervisor, and VIP chat, electronic mail, and cellphone assist.
CompanyCam additionally affords a 14-day trial of its Premium plan. Obtainable on iOS and Android.
From Harvest to Homebase: The very best garden care enterprise apps
Once you use apps to automate your garden care enterprise, you possibly can spend extra time specializing in really caring for lawns (and fewer time on admin.)
Relying in your wants, an app like Jobber may help you enhance buyer communication, get on-line quotes, and ship invoices promptly. There’s Harvest for time monitoring and budgeting; LeafSnap for step-by-step guides to stunning vegetation; and Revenue Margin Calculator for, properly, calculating revenue.
Then there’s NiceJob and CompanyCam, which allow you to doc and share your work in the very best gentle, for efficient advertising and glorious on-line opinions.
And for an all-in-one app, you possibly can select Homebase to handle priorities like scheduling, time monitoring, and workforce communication. It additionally offers you must-have instruments like payroll, hiring, HR administration, labor price controls, and compliance, all below the identical digital roof. So you possibly can handle your folks, simply in addition to you handle your vegetation.
As a result of there could also be an app for just about the whole lot, however the fewer you could juggle, the higher.
