Thumbtack, the modern home management platform, today announced the launch of its latest offering for local professionals: Front Desk. This new concierge service is personalized to help small businesses turn even more potential customers into confirmed jobs. Now, hundreds of thousands of small business owners can optimize their operations to be more efficient and more profitable.
“Today, our Front Desk team responds to inquiries in 2 minutes, which means customers are finding help faster than ever and pros are growing their businesses more sustainably. We’re helping pros spend less time in the office or on the phone — and more time on the job. In the future, we envision Front Desk helping independent business owners manage more of their growth factors on Thumbtack. Chat is just the beginning.”
Jeff Grant, COO at Thumbtack
The labor shortage has severely impacted the home improvement, repair, and maintenance industries with 52 percent of home pros reporting difficulty hiring in our recent Economic Sentiment Survey. Despite the shortage of available qualified workers, home pros are busier than ever – 73 percent expect their company's financial situation to be the same or better in the next quarter. And, they're seeking help to keep up with demand — with more than one third (36 percent) attempting to fill full or part-time positions last quarter. Our new Front Desk offering helps pros minimize the effects of the labor shortage by giving them peace of mind that their customers are getting near instant, effective, and high-quality support while allowing them to focus on their craft.
“The Front Desk team has been phenomenal. Customers reach out to us at all times of the day, including at night,” said Michele Bottone, owner of Lazy B Fencing and Staining. “Prior to using Front Desk, we wouldn’t see the messages until the next day because we are out in the field or at home with family. Now it doesn’t matter when customers reach out because they get responded to right away and it’s helped us engage them more efficiently. The customers also enjoy the quick response from our team. It’s been great!”
To start, Thumbtack’s Front Desk team conducts an onboarding call with each pro to understand their business goals and preferences in order to set up personalized responses for future customers – much like a personal assistant. From there, based on the package that best fits each pro’s needs, the Front Desk team handles messaging with customers on behalf of the pro (days, evenings, even weekends) and books jobs for them based on their availability and any other personal preferences. Customers get a personalized experience depending on the independent pro they’ve reached out to.
During initial testing of Front Desk, local service professionals saw, on average, 20 percent higher job conversion, and 28 percent higher customer satisfaction ratings. To learn more about Thumbtack, download the app (available on iOS and Android).
About Thumbtack
Thumbtack is a technology leader building the modern home management platform. Through the Thumbtack app, homeowners can effortlessly manage their homes — confidently knowing what to do, when to do it, and who to hire. Bringing the $500 billion home services industry online, Thumbtack empowers millions of homeowners to fix, maintain, and improve their most valuable asset. Hundreds of thousands of local service professionals, from painters and plumbers to photographers and math tutors, use the Thumbtack platform to grow their business each year.