Good, Better, Best-style Estimates, Do They Work?

Consumers love having options. When starting a new home improvement project, homeowners will often shop around to compare estimates from several companies. But what if they got a few different estimates from one company, your company specifically? In this week’s blog, we’re tackling why offering “Good, Better, Best” estimates to potential customers is a win for your business.

"Good, Better, Best" Estimates, Do They Work?

Anchor Your Prices

Before we get into price anchoring, let’s quickly define what “Good, Better, Best” estimating is. When you offer your customer three options, with increasing levels of value and price, that’s a “Good, Better, Best” estimate. RoofSnap’s software allows you to present up to five estimates for side-by-side comparison, but we’ll get to that later.

A sample of RoofSnap's Comparison Estimate.

Apart from offering prospective clients more choices, adopting this estimating style to your roofing business will increase the average sale price for your company. If you’re asking,“How will it do that? Part of the reason is that you’ll be using a well-researched psychological tool in your sales process: price anchoring. With price anchoring, you’re utilizing different pricing tiers to establish relative value in the consumer’s mind.

In different studies, price anchoring has been shown to guide purchasers to a “safe” pricing tier and boost their willingness to purchase in general. Use this to your advantage by offering homeowners adequate to premium options, allowing them to choose which one works best for their budget. If your company is loyal to a single brand of products, you can use this opportunity to offer their higher tier shingles or warranty levels.

Show More Value

However you like to build and differentiate your estimates, “Good, Better, Best” estimating is about more than driving your customers to premium products, it’s also about expressing the value they’ll receive from your company.

If a homeowner mentions that they were thinking about doing a roof repair over a replacement, it would be wise to build an estimate comparing the costs of each project. This way, the difference in price is transparent, but you can also pitch the value of a roof replacement with an accompanying warranty covering potential repair costs.

A homeowner compares shingles.

If you use RoofSnap to put together your estimate comparisons, you control what details appear to your customers. Choose to display item descriptions, or use the space to add information on warranty coverages, product life expectancy, and detailed service descriptions. However, you choose to format your estimates, ensuring the customer understands where their money is going will guide them to a better purchasing decision.

Guide Your Customers

Guiding your customers might sound like a heavy-handed sales tactic, but in the world of home repair and remodeling, not everyone knows what they want. Giving your customer options helps them decide for themselves what they’re willing to buy. Even if a total roof replacement isn’t in their budget right now, they’ll appreciate having the option.

Need another reason to offer multiple estimates? Because the average homeowner doesn’t have a clear idea of how much roofing services cost, shopping around for bids may expose them to low-ball offers that make average prices seem inflated. In offering multiple estimates to your customers, you may reduce the need to browse the competition all while providing insight on what quality work costs. In that case, you’re not just serving your customer’s needs; you’re helping the industry as a whole.

A homeowner and contractor compare estimates.

If you’re not using RoofSnap to put together side-by-side estimates in seconds, you should probably schedule a demo and let our sales team show you the ropes. Without a streamlined estimation software like RoofSnap, constructing multiple-bids might take too much time, but our software makes it easy.

Thanks for reading and as always:

Happy Snapping!

(Need more general estimating information? Check out our How to Estimate/Bid a Roofing Job post.)