Since 1960, Sonitrol has been committed to reducing false alarms and increasing criminal apprehensions. Whether a K-12 school, retail storefront, commercial business office or warehouse, Sonitrol has spent the last six decades delivering on that commitment. By integrating access control, video surveillance, fire alarm systems, gunshot detection and other state-of-the-art systems, Sonitrol franchises custom tailor each of their solutions to meet every deployment’s exact needs.
One such franchisee, Sonitrol Security of Delaware Valley (ranked No. 85 on this year’s SDM 100 (link to the SDM 100 article) watched security technologies evolve over the years, but realized that both its site survey and system design processes needed to match pace. It’s been proven that by failing to modernize their workflows, integrators lose two out of every three proposals that take up to 20 hours each, according to Fidelio Works Consulting.
To address this need, Sonitrol Security partnered with System Surveyor, whose intuitive and accessible system design platform is designed to help integrators like Sonitrol transition its work on paper to a digital format, increasing sales conversions and improving profit margins across the board.
As a mobile, SaaS-based platform, System Surveyor is built to enable everyone involved in system design, installation and maintenance to collaborate on an unprecedented scale. Equipped with System Surveyor on an iPad or Android-based tablet in the field, Sonitrol’s technicians were able to completely revolutionize their approach to site surveys and system designs.
For most salespeople, every hour using a paper floor plan in the field translates to two or three hours at the office, translating hand-written notes into a professional system design and proposal. Because System Surveyor equips users to take photos, visualize device attributes and drag-and-drop hardware directly onto a digital floor plan, making edits with their customers in real time while automating a bill of materials in the background, Sonitrol was able to cut the time it took to conduct site surveys and submit proposals in half.
Designed for effortless collaboration, System Surveyor also allowed Sonitrol team members to share survey photos, product specifications, digital as-builts and other vital details using an intuitive and secure cloud-based platform, ensuring everyone involved in the design and delivery process is on the same page. By deploying a solution that allowed them to share projects and designs with subcontractors, engineers and customers, in addition to their entire team, System Surveyor streamlined collaboration between all parties involved in Sonitrol’s workflows. The results speak for themselves.
“The System Surveyor team and app have worked wonders for the Sonitrol team by streamlining the entire system design process,” said Joe Allen, vice president and owner of Sonitrol Security, Delaware Valley.
With a minimal learning curve, Sonitrol Security discovered the benefits of working with System Surveyor immediately. Projects that normally required multi-day site visits were completed in 30 minutes, allowing Sonitrol to close deals quicker and deliver solutions in record time.
“System Surveyor’s easy-to-use platform eliminates the cumbersome chore of carrying around pencils and notebooks by efficiently integrating everything into a single program,” Allen continued. “It’s a product that feels like it was made for us.”
In the end, the partnership significantly improved Sonitrol Security of Delaware Valley’s customer engagement capabilities. It also circumvented the age-old problem of inaccurate proposals by empowering Sonitrol’s site survey teams to conduct accurate mobile site surveys and record detailed analysis of the company’s customer’s specific needs the first time, digitizing and centralizing all of Sonitrol’s site survey and system design tools.
