| name | contractor-trades |
| description | - You run a skilled trades business — plumbing, HVAC, electrical, landscaping, painting, roofing, general contracting, handyman services |
Contractor and Trades Operations
When to activate
- You run a skilled trades business — plumbing, HVAC, electrical, landscaping, painting, roofing, general contracting, handyman services
- Quote turnaround is taking too long and you're losing leads to competitors who quote within hours
- AR aging is creeping into 60-90+ days and your weekly chase isn't getting it done
- Customer follow-up after job completion is inconsistent — you're missing the natural ask-for-a-review window
- You're growing the team and need to write quotes, schedule comms, and customer follow-up consistently across techs
When NOT to use
- You're a single-truck operator under 50 jobs per month — at that volume, every job is touched personally and the workflow scaffolding feels like overkill
- You run a legacy commercial trades business with formal procurement processes (sealed bids, prevailing wage, complex compliance) where each quote is a 40-hour engineering exercise
- Your dispatch and quoting are fully automated inside ServiceTitan, Housecall Pro, or Jobber to your satisfaction — adding another layer is friction, not value
Instructions
Step 1: Set up your business context
Say:
"I run a [trade — plumbing, HVAC, electrical, etc.] business in [service area]. We have [N] techs and run an average of [Y] jobs per week. Our typical ticket is [$X]. Our brand voice is [warm-and-trustworthy / straight-shooter-direct / premium-craft]. Our biggest service category by revenue is [name]. Our biggest competitor is [name] and we differentiate on [specific reason — response time, quality, pricing, warranty, etc.]."
Step 2: Quote drafting
Most trades businesses lose deals because quotes go out 24-72 hours after the site visit. The lead with the active leak hires whichever plumber called back first with a quote.
Say:
"Here's a job — [property type, location, scope: what the customer said + what the tech observed]. Materials likely needed: [list]. Labor estimate: [hours]. Draft: (1) the customer-facing quote with line items, plain-language explanations of why each line matters, total, and a clear next step, (2) a separate tech-facing job notes summary, (3) an internal pricing breakdown for the owner's review."
You get all three within 60 seconds of the site visit. Tech reviews, owner approves, customer gets the quote on their phone before the tech leaves the property.
Step 3: Customer comms — pre-job
The day before a scheduled job:
Say:
"Tomorrow's job is [scope] at [address] arriving at [time], tech is [name]. Draft a confirmation message that: (1) confirms the appointment time, (2) names the tech and provides their photo/profile link if we have it, (3) lists what the customer should prepare (move cars, secure pets, clear the work area), (4) provides the office number for changes."
This is the message that drives showed-up-and-scheduled-as-promised completion rates from 75% to 92%+.
Step 4: Post-job follow-up and review request
Within 24-48 hours of job completion:
Say:
"We just completed [scope] for [customer] at [address] on [date]. Tech was [name]. The job involved [any notable detail — explanation of an issue we found, work we recommended for later, etc.]. Draft: (1) a thank-you message that references the specific work and the tech who did it, (2) a soft review request with the direct Google review link, (3) a 'while you're at it' follow-up about [the recommended future work, if any]."
The review request gets 3-5x the response rate when it references the specific tech and the specific work. Generic "please review us" gets ignored.
Step 5: AR follow-up by aging bucket
See Invoice Chaser for the dedicated workflow. For trades-specific AR work:
Say:
"Here's our AR aging report from QuickBooks. Draft escalating follow-up messages for: (1) 7-30 days overdue — warm, assume the customer forgot, (2) 31-60 days overdue — direct, propose payment plan if needed, (3) 61-90 days overdue — formal, name the next-step consequence (lien, collections, payment plan)."
Trades AR ages faster than most categories. The structured escalation matters.
Step 6: Hiring techs
When you're hiring:
Say:
"We're hiring a [journeyman / apprentice / lead tech / dispatcher]. Required: [licenses / certifications / years]. Compensation: [range]. Schedule: [hours, on-call]. Draft: (1) the job posting for Indeed, Craigslist, and our website, (2) a 5-question phone screen, (3) a structured ride-along checklist for the working interview."
Trades hiring has high application volume and low show-rate at interviews. The structured workflow filters before you waste a senior tech's day on a no-show.
Step 7: Seasonal campaigns
For trades with seasonal patterns (HVAC tune-ups in spring/fall, plumbing winterization, electrical generator checks before storm season):
Say:
"It's [season]. We want to push [service]. Our existing customer list has [N] households. Draft: (1) the seasonal email campaign, (2) a referral incentive offer, (3) social posts that reference the seasonal driver (heat wave coming, hurricane forecast, cold snap), (4) a script for the office team to use on inbound calls."
Example
You run a 6-tech HVAC business in a Sun Belt city. Average ticket is $1,100. You quote about 80 jobs a month and convert 60% — you're losing 32 jobs per month, most of them to faster competitors. At your average ticket, that's $35K/month in lost revenue.
You set up the quote drafting workflow. A typical Tuesday afternoon: your tech finishes a diagnosis at a customer's house. The customer's compressor is failing. Replacement: $4,200. The tech sits in the truck, types 3 sentences of notes into Claude, and within 90 seconds has a quote ready to send.
The quote arrives on the customer's phone before the tech pulls out of the driveway. Plain-language explanation of why the compressor failure is what they're seeing, line items for the work, total, financing options, and "we can be back to install Thursday at 8am if you approve by 6pm tonight."
You used to send this quote the following morning, often after the customer had already called a competitor. Now it lands while the diagnosis is fresh.
Conversion on field-diagnosed jobs moves from 60% to 72% over 90 days. That's 10 extra jobs per month at $1,100 average — $11K/month, $132K annualized.
You add the post-job review request workflow. Google reviews grow from 240 to 410 over six months. The Google Business Profile star rating moves from 4.4 to 4.7. Inbound calls increase because you're appearing more prominently in the local pack.
Combined: roughly $200K in incremental annual revenue from two operational workflow changes. Total Claude cost: $240/year.
