In the latest episode of ADDcast, Tom Clark, Senior Implementation Specialist, shares his top tips for clients, emphasizing the importance of empowering and rewarding employees, incentivizing customer referrals, and optimizing software features for efficiency. He outlines best practices for digital customer communication and the value of ADD Systems’ user forums. Tom also discusses his career and retirement after many years with ADD Systems.
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Brian Cohen: Welcome to ADDcast. I’m ADD Systems’ Multimedia Specialist, Brian Cohen. Joining me today is Tom Clark, Senior Implementation Specialist, who’s retiring after a long career as an implementer at ADD Systems. Tom, thank you so much for joining me today.
Tom Clark: Thank you very much. It’s a great honor to be involved with this.
Brian: And before we get into the meat of the discussion today, Tom, can you talk a little bit about your experience over your career here at ADD Systems?
Tom: Yes, I came to ADD Systems with having had 18 years of experience in the fuel oil industry, so I came on board with some expertise in the industry itself. Then when I started at ADD Systems, I started working with a couple of our now-retired employees. I worked with Mitch Braudie and John Deakyne, and they brought me up to speed on the ADD Systems software, where we were still in the all SuperJobber environments. Now, over time, when it went to the precursor to E3 was called Energy, then to E3 and now to E360. I’ve had exposure to all the products. The first time I went on the road working for Roger Keyser, I went and installed our payroll package. That was my first trip with ADD Systems. Since then, during my 27 years, I’ve been to 194 of our customers, multiple offices for those customers, and have been in 30 states and three Canadian provinces. So I’ve been able to be in all four corners of the US for work. I’ve been up to Seattle, to LA, to Fort, Kent Maine, to Stuart, Florida, as well as crisscrossing everywhere else in the country, including a few states in the Midwest. I’ve been to Iowa, been to work in Illinois. So I have had a good chance to cover a lot of the country, as well as be exposed to the differences within the industry. It’s the same industry, but it’s run very differently based on what area of the country and how the competition is in those areas.
Brian: Amazing. Well, today, I’m looking to pick your brain for some top tips and words of wisdom as you’ve spent your career helping clients be the best users of ADD software as they could be. So to start things off, I know you personally feel strongly about how important it is for our clients to invest in, empower, and reward employees, especially when it comes to helping market that company’s services. Could you maybe provide some examples about how companies can go about that?
Tom: The best thing to do is to invest in your employees, as they’re the ones dealing directly with your customers. So one of the ideas that I’ve seen in several companies I’ve gone to is when they have a customer on the phone and the CSR happens to notice the customer is not under a budget program, and they don’t have an equipment contract on their heating equipment, or they’re not involved with automatic delivery. If you can offer some sort of an incentive, if the CSR could have them add each of those features onto their account because I know studies in the industry have shown that if someone’s on automatic delivery, they have a service contract and they’re on a budget program, you have a good chance of keeping that customer for life. Another plus on your budget program, the ADD Systems software has the ability to reward the customer with interest when they have a credit balance, and that might be a great tool to add into your marketing program also.
Brian: You also feel strongly about clients investing and rewarding their current customers as no-sales pitch is better than one that comes straight from a customer’s mouth. Can you maybe provide your thoughts on this area?
Tom: There’s a great opportunity with your customers to offer them incentives, to recommend a friend, a neighbor, a relative, to become a customer of the same energy company. There are several of our customers that offer a new customer incentive. Say it’s $100 for each count they refer. Fact, my own oil company actually did this, so I recommended my neighbors. I actually got $100 gift certificate for recommending my neighbor that did heat with heating oil. So that’s a great way to do it. There is also where you could offer them an incentive towards purchasing new equipment, as technicians have visited the customer’s home and made recommendations to upgrade their equipment.
Brian: As with everyone on the ADD Implementation team, efficiency is always top of mind when we’re working with clients. Could you maybe share some of your top suggestions in terms of being more efficient?
Tom: One of the best ways to be efficient is when you initially first get a new account, always make sure once the new accounts been set up, that you’ve either made a delivery as soon as possible, or you have a service technician getting to the customer’s home to take a look at their equipment. By doing this, you’re not going to lose having the fact you set that customer up in the system. Sometimes they just kind of get lost and forgotten about. So to make sure you do it immediately keeps that customer account with you. One of the best ways of using the software is to make sure you are implementing all the features in the delivery section that will make sure that you’re delivering as efficiently as possible to your customers. There are several tools in the ADD Systems software available. One of them is called GENKHW (Generate K-factor and Hot Water Gallons) and DELA (Delivery Analysis), which will address going after automatic accounts, as well as those that are delivered on a day-by-day basis. One item that’s often overlooked is taking a look at customers that have a credit balance that are not on the budget program and do not have a prepaid agreement toward their future product purchases. By doing this, you’re looking at accounts that have a credit balance that may have paid a bad debt that you’ve written off in the years past. There may have been a credit for service applied to an incorrect account. So it always pays to look at non-budget and non-prepaid customers that have a credit balance to potentially get some revenue. Those are a couple of the items that I know are sometimes often overlooked.
Brian: Now, Tom, the software also offers automation opportunities for communicating with the customer. Can you share some details on that?
Tom: Definitely. The software offers the availability of setting up email addresses, multiple email addresses, phone numbers, multiple phone numbers, as well as fax numbers. Fax numbers are fairly old technology, but we still have the availability to store them in the software. But by storing the email address, you can link up any of the forms the customer might be getting in a printed format and send it to them electronically. I went to a customer in Alaska. 100% of their customers get all their forms emailed to them. No one, and I’ll ask if this customer gets snail mail. Nobody. In addition, by having the email addresses on file, you can also have different opportunities for marketing to bring in additional revenue to the company. Also, by having phone numbers in the system, you can text to your customers for anything from when a delivery is being scheduled to when a payment has been received in the system. There are different opportunities for communicating with your customers electronically, instead of relying on phones or paper, so take full advantage of that capability.
Brian: All great tips for both ADD clients and all fuel companies for that matter. How about we turn now to more high-level suggestions for how our user can become the best user possible. With all of your years of experience, what are some of the top actions that people and companies can take?
Tom: I would recommend immediately to invest in your software. Learn and use as much as you can from the initial installation. After that, I would recommend you invest in upgrades. This is software and different features that come into play. You can upgrade, and there’ll be a test database where someone will walk you through it, and then you can test the new features and take as much time as you need before you activate it in your live database. An additional feature in there is the credit cards within the ADD Systems software. Take full advantage of being able to integrate so that your credit cards can be processed right through the software. An additional way, there’s a forum group within ADD Systems where individuals can come in and post questions and/or ideas they have and share it with one another. So sometimes, you may not have to reach out to support, you’re reaching out to your peers within the industry. So that’s one thing I would recommend you take advantage of. And then two additional ways, join the ADD Systems User Group. It’s a group of individuals that get together, and they meet periodically during the year, and they vote on enhancements they want to see in the next version of the ADD Systems software. Then, additionally, anytime we have the BTC (Business Tech Conference) down in Orlando, please, if you have the opportunity to attend, please do. It’s the best opportunity you have to see the new features, as well as meeting with other people within the industry. Then on a final note, E360 is the way of the future. As the features are being rolled out in it, take full advantage of what’s available. It’s the way of the future, and it will operate very well for you.
Brian: Well, Tom, first and foremost, congratulations on your retirement, and thank you for your years of expertise and experience helping ADD clients. I think I’m speaking on behalf of everyone at ADD Systems when I say that you will be greatly missed.
Tom: Thank you very much. I have really enjoyed my 27 years I’ve spent here. I’ve always felt welcome. I’ve always felt that my input has been valuable, and it’s always been like a family member. So I cannot recommend anyone who would consider coming to work for ADD Systems to definitely join the team. Thank you very much for this opportunity.
Brian: To keep up with the latest happenings at ADD Systems, visit addsys.com/blog, or connect with us on social media by following ADD Systems on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram or X. If you have any questions about ADDcast, feel free to reach out to us at addcast@addsys.com. Thanks for listening and have a great day.
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