Opportunity and Estimating Process Overview

Overview

Estimating is the process of calculating the cost of labor, materials, and equipment needed to complete a service. Estimating is one of the most important revenue-driving functions in your business. It's also one of the biggest concepts to learn in Aspire. You won't find a dedicated Estimating module in the side menu in Aspire Cloud. Instead, the estimating workflow lives inside the Opportunities module, which is tied directly to properties.

This article explains how estimating works in Aspire. By the end, you'll understand how properties and opportunities drive the estimating process, how an opportunity moves through statuses from start to finish, and key terms used in estimating.

Things to know

• Aspire is a property-centric system. All opportunities are created at the property level, not from the Opportunities module directly.

• Each opportunity is tied to one contract or agreement. Each new project for a customer requires a new opportunity.

• Opportunity statuses change automatically based on actions you take during the estimating process.

• You can also create opportunities to track internal employee time — such as vacation, sick time, or meetings. These are called Indirect Opportunities.

Watch the video below or keep reading to learn more.

Video

How it works

Step 1: Create an opportunity

After you add the customer’s property to Aspire, create an opportunity from the property record. An opportunity represents potential work your company could perform for a customer. When you create the opportunity, its status is set to New.

Note:

There are two opportunity types and seven invoice types. Picking the right combination for the work to be done is critical for correct billing and accounting. Read our article about opportunity types and invoice types to learn more.

Step 2: Build the estimate

Next, build an estimate for the opportunity. The estimate outlines the work to be done and calculates the total cost using services, items, and kits. While you're building the estimate, the opportunity status is Bidding.

Step 3: Complete the estimate

When you finish the estimate, mark it as “Complete”. The opportunity status changes to Pending Approval if your company has set up approval workflows.

Note:

Approval is an optional internal review step that gives your team a chance to check services and pricing before the estimate goes to the customer. Learn more in our article about approval workflows.

Step 4 (Optional): Approve the estimate

If there’s an approval workflow set up, the designated approver must approve the estimate. The status changes to Approved.

Step 5: Send the proposal

When the estimate is complete and approved, either email or print and mail the proposal to the customer. When you email or print, the opportunity status changes to Delivered.

Step 6: Win or lose the opportunity

The customer reviews the estimate and responds:

• If the customer accepts, mark the opportunity as Won. When an opportunity is won, Aspire automatically creates work tickets for each service on the estimate. Work tickets tell your crew what work to do, where, and when.

• If the customer rejects the estimate, mark the opportunity as Lost. Optionally, you can reset the opportunity back to Bidding status so you can make adjustments to the estimate and then re-send the proposal to the customer.

Step 7: Complete the job

Once the work is underway, the opportunity status changes to In Process. When the last work ticket on the opportunity is completed, the status changes to Complete. If the job is cancelled after being won, the opportunity status changes to Cancelled.

Opportunity status reference