Does anyone else find that the criteria for the area from your zip code (mileage distance willing to travel from your zip code) is archaic and doesn’t meet your business goals?
I ask this as if I put that I am in zip code 12345, and willing to travel to the distance of towns that are in the proper direction (I am south of Boston, not willing to travel through Boston, but more than willing to travel south… no traffic) I need to put a range of about 30+ miles. This means that I receive a bunch of leads that are beyond Boston, and I find myself declining many leads due to distance.
The alternative is to minimize the area we are willing to drive and miss out on towns that we are willing to serve.
Case in point, Thumbtack offers this broken down by County then by town. They have an option that allows you to only select towns hat you are willing to travel too as well as “willing to receive leads from close proximity” (advanced settings). This is a better solution and will also help us to minimize our leads received to only those towns that we serve.
@katesconstruction - we actually discussed this very thing in early '17 and after conducting some initial user testing, determined that although in theory, it made sense to provide a UI that would allow more granular control in determining where a business operates; in practice, the UI proved to be a power feature that some contractors would apply and it would be better if we could accurately infer where a contractor works by analyzing their work history. So every time a new opportunity is qualified and put into the marketplace, the matching system performs a variety of calculations, including the ‘work range’ that has been input by the contractor.
I’m not saying the manner in which our system considers distance is perfect and we’re constantly working to improve the matching system. I did want to provide you with some added context on this however and assure you it is something we’re constantly examining and looking to improve.
Thanks for letting me know you’ve looked at it and are using intelligence to improve location based on factors related to jobs.
I am for one taking the best ideas and putting it together… one good thing about thumbtack is they break it down by county and for those of who don’t like traveling to certain towns within that county can deselect.
Here in Boston there are choke points for traffic much like in your area. We avoid choke points. I look forward to when BZ figures out that our 30 mile radius means towns south and not North or west (this direction is more based on demographics than choke points).
I would like to add that while my geographic range has been set for the last week and a half to include southern towns we work in, my response rate has gone from great to good as there are a lot of leads north … at this rate, in two weeks my response rate will be poor … looks like I will have to tighten my range so as to not kill one of the ratings …
Just sayin’ … this is my experience and I am sure I am not alone …
@katesconstruction - are you opting-in to the deals first? The only way your responsiveness score would decline would be if you were to opt-in and then not reach out to the client.
Hmm. If I opt in to a project, I reach out 100% of the time. I’ve definitely rejected projects with the reason “too far” many times and I’ve been reminded to reach out on projects after contact has been made (those projects will take much longer to put together).
@katesconstruction - Brian, just to tack-on to the response from @stan.lee, are you saying you are receiving e-mails that remind you to reach out on projects after you state you’re not interested due to the distance?
Regarding your response rate, it seems like you’re still at 100% and have a great rating. In fact your other key stats like bid rate and hire rate look pretty decent too! Keep it up and you’ll make it to the top of our rankings in no time.
If you logon onto buildzoom.com and go to the “Home” section, you’ll see a dashboard which allows you to keep on top of your stats.
We’re also working on a solution that somewhat addresses your geographic range suggestion. Stay tuned!
My bid rate dropped by 5% this week and has affected my overall Buildzoom score. I do know of the dashboard page which highlights these stats.
As Jiyan stated me declining jobs out of the area as they are too far, should not negatively affect a response rate. Perhaps the other component is that I have several projects which will take a long time to follow up and this is affecting my response rate?
I’m about to tighten up the area as that seems to be the factor that is affecting the response rate as It has gone from “great” to “good” and it is either one of the two factors described above.
It is simple to keep your ratings up simply by being professional, yet I am not sure how your “bid rate” is calculated.
