B2B SERVICES
Updated on
PROCESSDIGITALISATIONIN A SERVICES FIRM
Putting a paper form online isn’t enough: the step has to go.
THE ANSWER
I work on one process at a time, starting with the heaviest. The quote that becomes a job, the job sheet that becomes an invoice. And the margin somebody rebuilds by hand at month end. I connect the systems you already run. An automation costs €1,500–€10,000, a dashboard €2,000–€14,000, VAT excluded.
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IN SHORT
Process automation: €1,500–€10,000, VAT excluded.
Dashboards and reporting: €2,000–€14,000, in 2–6 weeks.
No new system: I connect what you run.
I don’t promise enquiries or sales.
THE WORK TODAY
THE WORK MOVES, THE DATA DOESN’T
A B2B services firm lives on jobs. An enquiry becomes a quote, the quote an order, the order work to schedule. The accounts package covers the financial side. But the margin is decided by real hours, materials, travel and return visits. Those arrive by email or on a spreadsheet, the week after the month closes.
WHERE IT GOES
FOUR RECURRING BREAKING POINTS
None of these is a software problem. They are the points where information changes hands. And it degrades as it does.
The job sheet that lags
Whoever is on site fills it in at the end of the day, or the week. Invoicing waits, and the month closes late because of a piece of paper.
The quote that never returns
The quote leaves, then lives in a mailbox. A lost job looks exactly like a job still under consideration.
The renewal that lapses
Service contracts have dates. If the date lives only inside the signed PDF, you remember the renewal when the client rings to cancel.
The margin you learn late
The job costing gets assembled by hand from scattered hours, purchases and travel. By the time it is ready the job is closed.
HOW I WORK
ONE PROCESS AT A TIME
The order binds. Without costing one real job you can’t tell which step is expensive. You end up automating the most visible one instead of the dearest.
I follow one job through
From enquiry to invoice, with real names against every handover. Where it stalls, where a detail already written gets written again. (And how often that happens in a month.)
I number each step
How often it repeats, how long it takes. The choice runs on monthly cost, not on how urgent it feels.
I automate the dearest step
The job sheet that arrives from a phone ready to invoice. The quote that chases itself. The renewal that gives notice.
I show what comes out
One view: job status, quoted work awaiting an answer, margin per job. It updates itself, instead of being rebuilt every Monday.
I hand over the upkeep
Short documentation, accounts in your name, written error rules. And one person inside who knows what to check when something stops.
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THE DELIVERY
WHAT THE FIRM KEEPS
The automated flow
Running on your tools and your accounts. Proved on real jobs, not on a well-built example.
A view of job status
Where each one stands, who owns it, what waits on an answer and what is ready to invoice.
Alerts on commercial dates
Contract renewals, quotes with no reply, work to reschedule. (At the notice period you choose.)
The exception rules, written
What the system does when data is missing or doesn’t add up, and who it hands to. An automation without those rules is a new risk.
Access, code, documentation
Accounts in your name, few declared dependencies, one page explaining how it works. Nothing that needs me to stay alive.
THE TERMS
RANGES, TIMING, STARTING POINT
- Process automation
- €1,500–€10,000, VAT excluded, in 2–6 weeks. (The three levels are on the pricing page.)
- Dashboards and reporting
- €2,000–€14,000, VAT excluded, in 2–6 weeks. For when the problem is seeing, not doing.
- When an app fits
- Once users, roles and states outgrow a spreadsheet. €5,000–€35,000, VAT excluded, 6–16 weeks after the job is defined.
- Definition sprint
- €800–€2,000, VAT excluded. It comes first for projects above €8,000, for internal apps, and wherever sensitive data is involved.
- What I need from you
- One person who knows how jobs actually run and can decide. Access to the tools. (And the willingness to test on live work.)
A badly automated process adds a step instead of removing one.
QUESTIONS
- Do our data and prices stay ours?
- Yes. I work on the tools you already run, under accounts in your name. The system reads only the fields the flow needs. Rate cards and client records don’t leave where they sit. (I keep no copies after handover.)
- Do we have to change systems?
- No. In most cases it stays and the work happens around it. If it offers no way to read or write its data, I say so before we start. (We narrow the job rather than invent a workaround.)
- Our engineers won’t use another app.
- That’s the right objection, and usually a correct one. So the job sheet arrives from where they already are: phone, message, a short form. If filling it in costs more than before, the automation isn’t finished.
- Which process should we start with?
- The one that repeats on every job and costs measurable hours. Usually the job sheet that feeds the invoice. High volume, stable rules, and a precise moment when you see whether it worked.
- There are 12 of us. Worth it?
- Yes. Under 50 people the process is usually more consistent and the exceptions fewer. The question isn’t how many you are, but how often somebody retypes what already exists.
- How do we know it worked?
- You decide that beforehand. Hours saved on that step, days late closing the month, quotes followed up inside your own window. Without a measure picked first, the end of it is about impressions.
Do you only learn what a job really cost once it’s closed? That’s the starting point. Tell me how a piece of work begins today.