Scaling Smart: How RealGreen Helped Catapult Yard Dawgs Customer Base Into Growth With RealGreen
The Company:
Owner James Szojka started Yard Dawgs as a way to make some extra money as a college student. Ten years later, the Calgary-based company specializes in fertilization, weed control, and aeration, operating on a unique subscription model. They have been a RealGreen customer for five years.
The Challenge: Struggling with inadequate software
“Five years into our company, we were doing anything a customer would ask us to do,” says Szojka. “But the problem was that we were becoming jacks of all trades and masters of none.” The company had to figure out how best to focus its efforts to ensure growth, ultimately determining that making lawns green, healthy, and weed-free was their best option.
However, their software wasn’t doing them any favors. At the time, the CRM they were using—their fourth in as many years—wasn’t specifically designed for their business. Explains Szojka, “We were doing what a lot of people in that situation do, which was using a CRM and trying to adjust it to us. However, it got very complex, and the result was that we had to do a lot of manual tasks and work until 10 or 11 PM every night, just trying to make everything work. We were having a really hard time growing at that point.”
The Solution: Finding software that helps them scale
The Yard Dawgs team found the solution they had been searching for in RealGreen. According to Szojka, their industry mentors all echoed the same advice: A strong foundation, including a robust CRM, is crucial for long-term success. For Yard Dawgs, RealGreen was that foundation. “Our mentors at large companies told us, ‘You can look at this other software, but RealGreen will be elemental to your growth,’” says Szojka. “It was a non-negotiable. It was the foundation. So we just decided to go for it.”
Szojka notes that at the time, getting RealGreen was a stretch, both financially and skills-wise, “but we wanted to do it right. So, we took the time to do things properly and saw it as an investment in our business. With RealGreen, you already have everything you need built-in, so you do not have to do workarounds, twists and knots along the way. It’s already made for you.”
The Results: Growth. And the promise of more growth.
Yard Dawgs’ customer base saw a significant surge with the adoption of RealGreen. Starting with 200 customers, they quickly scaled to 3,000 in the second year and now, in their fifth year, boast a customer count of 5,000—with further growth on the horizon. Szojka envisions a fivefold increase in the next five years.
With RealGreen, Yard Dawgs is confident in their ability to expand. “I’m very excited about this expansion because it won’t cause many headaches when it comes to our CRM. Why? Say a customer calls in from another city; all it takes is a salesperson selecting the different branch of our company, and everything else is the same. The programs are the same, the way we sell is the same, and the way we charge credit cards is the same; it’s just going to a different branch.
“Operation-wise, nothing needs to change. It’s all on RealGreen.”
For companies considering switching software but hesitating because they’re afraid it’s too disruptive to their business, Szjoka says, “You’ve gotta rip off the band-aid.” While it’s tempting to stick with “the devil you know,” there can be a long-term cost to that kind of inertia. “The constraints you face using an inferior product will cost you more than the monthly cost of the proper tool. For example, a screwdriver is definitely cheaper than a power drill. But the second you have to drill a thousand screws a day, it is worth paying the difference in cost. RealGreen is the exact same thing.
“You’re going to be able to route more jobs. You can have credit cards charged automatically and renewed automatically. Automated pre- and post-service notifications. All of these things and more are automated, and you can customize them in any way you see fit. In our experience, just using condition codes correctly pays for our RealGreen subscription—and that’s not an option that was available with our previous CRM.”
Finally, Szjoka says that using RealGreen has empowered his team to provide elite, headache-free, frictionless customer service. Because the team can immediately answer customer questions, solve problems without a hitch, and work with professionalism and speed, they can charge a premium over the competition. “We are the most expensive lawn care company in our city. Everybody else has to lowball prices because they don’t have their data together and can’t provide the same level of service we can. RealGreen enables us to do that.”
