What is a Complex Roof? 

A complex roof could be anything that differs from your average flat roof, mansard roof, hipped roof, or gabled roof. Often, the larger or more expensive the home is, the more complicated the roof tends to be, especially if it was designed by an architect with a great eye for the overall aesthetics of the property.  

Complex roofs tend to have tons of different roof sections and slopes, with features such as dormers and skylights, chimneys, towers, or overhangs. All of which makes getting accurate measurements both time-consuming and often dangerous for the roofing contractor tasked with the job.  

Complex roof measurements are often very involved, have many opportunities for errors, and could pose to be an overall challenge for even the most seasoned roofing contractor. On the upside, though, due to the complicated nature of the job, complex roofs can be very profitable roofing jobs and should never be passed on.  

Roof Measurement Software and Complicated Roofs 

Roofing software is the key to measuring even the most complex, multi-sloped roofs without ever having to drive out to the property and climb a ladder. Not only can you get your roof report generated in minutes rather than in the time it takes to measure the roof yourself, but you don’t even need to wait for a roof report order to be returned to you in your inbox as you would if you were ordering your reports from a third-party service.  

Quickly get the roof pitch, identify roof line types such as hips and valleys, and get your squares for any roof type from the comfort of your desk, saving you the headache of manually measuring out each part of the roof, and leaving you extra time in your day to spend growing your business.   

Choose from measuring off of HD aerial imagery, satellite imagery, drone photos, or blueprints to make sure that you get the best possible view of the home, and therefore the most accurate roof measurements possible.   

You can also use roof measurement software at the site to impress your clients with the speed at which you can generate an accurate roofing proposal for their property, getting them the numbers they need to make a decision much faster than your competitors.   

In Conclusion 

Measuring complex roofs doesn’t have to be as difficult as it has been in the past. With the use of a good roof measurement software like Roofgraf, you can get your measurements done for any roof in a matter of minutes, shaving hours off of your workday which is time you can easily reallocate to making more sales and growing your roofing business. 

Have a complicated roof in your sales pipeline today? Start your free trial of Roofgraf to learn more about all our other features such as SmartQuote and FastQuote templates, proposals with Good, Better, Best options, automatic e-signature capabilities, and let our software show you how quick and easy the job can actually be.  

Add a personal flair

With today’s technology, customization and personalization are great tools any roofer can use in their roofing estimates to stand out from the competition. Include your company’s logo, and use your own images in your roofing proposal template to make sure that your estimate is easily identifiable and stands out amongst the others. 

With Roofgraf’s roofing proposal software, roofers can easily upload their logo to their company account so that it’s front and center on the quote, as well as select from tons of background images or even upload their own to really take control of the look and feel of the estimate. The proposal generated will come out looking clean and professional. 

Offer multiple options and make sure you can edit on the fly

The best way to win any roofing job is to set yourself up as your own competition by offering up multiple different options and roofing material/pricing structures for every roof project you quote. A homeowner is less likely to continue to shop around if your roofing business offers an option for various price points/budgets on a single proposal. If they can click through a few Good, Better, Best options, they are more likely to select one of the three, rather than seek out one of your competitors for a second opinion.  

Additionally, one of the biggest advantages of living in a digital world is that all the work you do can be easily edited, undone, and redone at the click of a button, no erasers or fresh sheets of paper needed! Working in a roofing proposal software like Roofgraf allows you to not only offer up Good, Better, Best options on each quote, but further edit and change items in real-time in front of the customer, or on the phone, based on their feedback and needs. 

Why use a drone for roof inspections?

If you’re using a roof measurement software like Roofgraf, chances are that you understand that you don’t necessarily need to climb the ladder to take your initial measurements, saving you tons of time. 

That said, using satellite or aerial imagery alone isn’t always the best way to get a full view of what needs to be done in terms of roof repair or replacement. Adding a drone for your roof inspections can help you save time as well as lower the risk associated with climbing the ladder for anything besides finishing up the roofing job for the client. 

In an industry where the fatality rate is 52 per 100,000 workers, anything that can keep a roofer off of a roof and away from hazards is something that many contractors welcome. 

How to Include Drone Imagery in Your Roofing Proposal

Roofgraf’s roof measurement software offers users the ability to add any files they’d like as attachments to their roofing proposals, giving their client’s a better idea of what work needs to be done on their home and why. Using this feature, you can upload your drone images or 3D models generated from any roof inspection software included with your drone right onto your quote for the homeowner to browse or save to their device. 

Roofgraf’s measurement tool also has the ability to measure directly off of drone imagery, rather than a satellite or aerial image, giving you the option to display the best view of the client’s own home on the quote instead of a simple top-down view. 

This feature is also incredibly useful if the house is a newer build that doesn’t yet have any imagery available for it, or if it’s in a rural area where the image might not be as clear as a home located in an urban center. 

To measure off of drone imagery with Roofgraf, all you need to do is select the “upload my own imagery” option after entering the property’s address and use one single roof measurement to set the scale for the rest of the roof lines. Then, trace out the roof as usual and let the roof measurement software handle the rest!

What is FastQuote?

FastQuote templates were designed to help roofers generate a quote within the roofing software from their measurements quickly and easily, with the least amount of prep and required information possible. To create a FastQuote template, all you need to input is:

• The name of your new template
• A per-square selling price
• A shingle option 
• A default Statement of Work

Using a FastQuote Template means that you are now able to create a roofing proposal for your client in less than 3 minutes. All you need is some basic measurements and a template set up in your account to get started.  

What is SmartQuote?

SmartQuote templates, on the other hand, are designed to fully automate the roof measurement and job creation process so you can have control over your pricing while maintaining full visibility on your projected costs for the project, according to the measurement data and the product lines that you offer to the potential customer. 

Since we understand that every roofer does the job differently, SmartQuotes offer you the ability to fully customize your templates and pricing to exactly match what you and your roofing business offer.  

This means that you can clearly list all of your costs for material and labor, as well as any other costs such as permitting, material delivery, administrative costs, sales commissions, warranties, etc. Each SmartQuote template includes a pricing section to model profit margin, taxes, discounts and define a selling price range. 

The process of setting up a SmartQuote template in our roof measurement software is similar to FastQuote, but you will notice that you can really drill down into your materials and pricing to create a fully dynamic and custom template for your roofing business. 

In Closing

Whether you want to fully tailor a project to a specific person or need, or you just have 3 minutes in front of the client to create a job and generate a price, Roofgraf has your back with our new templates. 

With these new SmartQuote and FastQuote templates, accurate roof measurements, roof reports in seconds, and beautiful proposals with Good, Better, Best options, Roofgraf’s roof measurement software has all you need to close more sales, grow your business, and save valuable time. Give it a try, risk-free today to see why it’s your competitor’s best-kept secret.

Roofing Software Provides You With More Data

Built to “give you the whole world at your hands”, Google Earth is an educational tool created to give people a 3D view of the planet and its sights. In creating their detailed maps and imagery, Google is also able to provide you with a measurement tool that allows you to measure anything between any two points you draw, as well as give you the total number of squares.

While this might be all you need in a quick pinch, if you’re using only this tool for your roofing business, you’re missing out on a lot of other data that you could be gathering in the same amount of clicks. Not only will Roofgraf get you the same information as Google but it can also automatically identify pitch and line types at the same time. This means you’ll be getting a full roof report in the same amount of time, allowing you to create more accurate roof estimates for your clients in one shot.

Google Lacks Roofing CRM/Project Management Capabilities

In a previous blog, we discussed the importance/benefits of having a dedicated roofing tool for your business to make sure that everything that matters to your company, from measurement reports to leads and quotes are all centralized in one place to help keep you and your team organized and save you some time and money in the process.

Since Google Earth is intended for quick one-off measurements, it doesn’t allow you to add any additional information to your roofing jobs besides a name, and everything you do is tied to your own account, leaving no visibility for the rest of your team. An app like Roofgraf, on the other hand, will help you track all your leads/jobs and their project status in a list and on a map so everyone has a bird’s eye view on all the work in progress. You can also use this map to build credibility with your clients. Show off how many jobs you’ve completed to gain trust and help them choose your company to handle the job.

Google Earth Isn’t An All-In-One Solution

The biggest advantage of using software like Roofgraf lies in the fact that it’s the only tool you need to get the job done, from basic measurements to detailed roof reports, and beautiful quotes that your clients can e-sign straight out of their email inbox.

Finally, using a roofing tool like Roofgraf means that you’re not tied into using one source for your imagery. On Google Earth, if the roof you’re trying to measure doesn’t have up-to-date imagery or is covered by clouds or trees, you’re out of luck. Thankfully, Roofgraf has you covered in that respect as well with historical imagery, and three major providers: Google Maps, Bing Maps, and HD aerial imagery from Nearmap.

1) Centralize your work to one digital platform.

Staying organized is nearly impossible when you don’t have a single consistent location for all of your documents and files. Do some documents live in paper format on your desk while others are saved on your hard drive, while more still are saved somewhere in the cloud? When all your documents are scattered around and hard to find, any simple roofing project can become a challenge, especially if things have duplicates or are saved in different locations.

Choose a software that allows you to save all your projects, measurements, roofing materials, templates, contracts, lead and client info, and proposals in one single location that everyone at your company can access if necessary. This ensures that no time is wasted digging around and searching for the right information every time you need to start working on a new roofing job.

2) Automate your workflow wherever possible.

If you’re someone who spends a lot of time per client inputting roof measurements into spreadsheets and then transferring those into your proposal template while calculating your material costs by hand, there’s a better way.

Using roofing software like Roofgraf takes what used to be a tedious process and makes it incredibly fast and easy to put together your roofing quotes and measurements without any extra effort.

Once you set up your account with your templates, materials, and pricing, every single quote becomes a piece of cake to put together. Just outline the roof, let the software measure and identify line types and boom – your roof report, bill of materials, and proposal are ready to go in a click!

Additionally, any extra files you’d like to send your clients along with your proposals can be added to the software and automatically added to your quotes. You can also add tax information and set up the terms and conditions your clients will be agreeing to inside the app so everything is centralized and easy to access for everyone involved in the project.

3) Use a roof measurement software for accuracy

One less-obvious way to reduce the amount of roofing paperwork needed in your day-to-day is to make sure you get your measurements right on the first try. Having to go back and measure the house, whether in person or with software costs you time, but it can also result in extra paperwork. All this extra work can take valuable time away from growing your business and working on other projects. Instead, use software that can guarantee you the right measurements without the extra travel. 

Using a combination of a proprietary algorithm powered by our A.I. assistant, LIZ, and HD Imagery provided by Nearmap, Roofgraf provides the most accurate roof measurements on the market. 

Don’t have the time to measure yourself? We have you covered with our Roof Reports as a Service option where our team will measure for you in one business day or less. Be confident in your roof reports and bills of materials knowing that your roofing costs and measurements are accurate enough that you can get started on your job faster than ever before and with fewer mistakes.  

Conclusion

When it comes to running a business, everything you do should be optimized so you can make the most out of every day with the least amount of effort. Reducing paperwork with the tips above is one of the easiest and most effective ways to get more done while also reducing daily stress. 

Have you made it to the bottom of this article without signing up yet? Give Roofgraf a try risk-free now and let our industry-leading software and customer support show you why we’re the best in the game at helping roofers like you close more sales, grow their businesses and save valuable time.