Photo: CanvasNo one is a fan of paperwork, especially when said paperwork is slowing down your business and causing you to be less efficient.
That’s where Canvas, a mobile platform that allows companies to automate work and streamline daily operations, steps in to help businesses become more productive and paperless.
“Anything that is paper-based can be digitalized,” said James Robins, chief marketing officer for Canvas.
Canvas allows users to create custom forms, where they can access documents like customer satisfaction surveys and work orders from their smartphone. Once the form is filled out, they can email these to customers or co-workers and the data is stored in the cloud.
While companies that use Canvas can opt to use it to only solve one problem, its versatility allows it to be integrated into every process of the business.
“It’s not something that you dip in and out of,” Robins said. “It becomes part of the fabric of the company.”
Garden Grove Landscaping, based in Ontario, Canada, is an example of one company that took every process that it did on paper and turned it into a mobile form on Canvas. It ended up saving $12,000 in paper costs annually and can complete documents such as expense reports and heavy equipment inspections in the app.
“We’re able to complete worksheets in 30 minutes,” said David Lammers, president of Garden Grove Landscaping. “Before it took us three hours. It’s saving us about $1,000 a month in time and paper costs.”
According to Robins, some of the popular forms for Canvas among landscapers include maintenance reports, customer surveys, work orders, vehicle checklists and tree removal estimates. But this isn’t all that the app can do.
Because everything is getting updated in real time, using the Dispatch tool, the user has the ability to dispatch a worker to a particular job, making sure that the right person goes to the right place at the right time.
“We find that one of the key issues that are faced by those in the landscaping category is validating work with clients,” Robins said. “Clients want validation that you’ve done the work before they pay. Canvas allows you to date and time and location stamp jobs and that has improved cash flow by eliminating this to and fro. It confirms working being done in real time.”
Other issues that landscapers may face that Canvas can help remedy is the matter of payroll when working with seasonal employees. As Garden Grove Landscaping discovered when it experienced explosive growth, scaling as a business can prove to be quite the headache.
“Canvas is the aspirin for that headache,” Robins said.
As for pricing, Canvas offers three different monthly subscription plans. The startup plan is $30 per user per month and can be used for up to five users. The business plan is $40 per user per month and requires a minimum of five users. This plan includes the Dispatch feature.
The professional plan costs $50 per user per month and requires five users minimum and includes the Workflow tool and Canvas Business Insights. This allows owners to not only collect their data but analyze it and discover trends.
“The true value is not just the in returns, but the ease of use,” Robins said. “Companies are able to be up and running in 24 hours without an IT team. It’s easy to deploy. What did take three to five hours a day is cut down to 15 minutes of work. The impact is immediate.”
For more information on Canvas, click here.
