Aspire Erfahrungen

Great software!

Kommentare: Overall, the organization is very pleased with all aspects of the Aspire implementation

Vorteile:

User friendly platform, and standardization it creates for our business.

Nachteile:

Mobile functionality, need an app that isn't just through a browser

Love Aspire

Kommentare: I am amazed as to how well Aspire operates. The ability to count for everything and not allow you to forget things as unbilled or uncompleted is amazing. Their scheduling is on another dimension and job costing is amazing. Ther are so many great features but one of the best features they have is their Purchase Order system. It works amazingly well and links well with inventory system that Aspire has built within. I can go on and on talking about it. I simply love it.

Vorteile:

Aspire is a software that grows with you. Since we first signed for Aspire, they have added countless number of features that makes our day-to-day operations a breeze and they keep improving the system tremendously. It is easy to use and understand and the support you get from Aspire team and peers is amazing. You can call any Aspire user and seek help or advise and they are more than happy to help. The culture that Aspire built is unlike anything else you will experience and if you wonder, no I am not getting paid for these comments.

Nachteile:

Just like any system out there, there is always room for improvement. My role within the organization is closing the month and accounting. I would love it if Aspire is little more friendly especially if you have multiple branches within same instance. Little too much scrolling for my liking. I would love it if the revenue variance feature got improved. It works as is however requires some work on users end.

Aspire Review- Unsatisfied

Kommentare: After over a year of using the software and experiencing the same problems over and over we finally told aspire that we could not use their software anymore as it was causing our operations to have too many problems. Well according to aspire we had a 3 year contract and aspire is now suing our company for the remainder of the contract. I find this quite unethical considering all of the problems we faced and their software purely not working due to their servers being too overloaded. In conclusion, I highly do not recommend aspire. If you are going to use aspire the only way I can see you getting by with it is if you only do maintenance and offer no other services. If you do design build, then I could go on and on as to why aspire is not suited for design build companies.

Vorteile:

Aspire's functionality that was presented from the salesman looked like it could definitely help our company. All of the integration, labor tracking, earned income, inventory tracking, etc. really looked great. Unfortunately once we got into implementation we soon realized there was a bit of a bait and switch going on. When we asked the implementation team how to set up certain features they told us, “well that is complicated and you can worry about that after you get through implementation.” At the time I said okay. Well after we got through implementation we then found out, with no prior knowledge, that further training would cost $750 to buy 4 hours of training. I found $187 per hour for a software tech to teach their own software to be a bit outrageous, especially considering the initial salesman said support was included in the roughly 50k per year price. At this point I was dismayed that even after choosing the most expensive software on the market, our firm would now need to spend another 20-30k a year on further training our employees.

Nachteile:

I found a few major cons of Aspire. First, the purpose of software is to provide ease of use to the user and be somewhat intuitive in its navigation, because at the end of the day Aspire is just an excel program that is developed to look pretty and “try” to be functional. Well Aspire definitely missed the mark on this end. I have used many other softwares that did great on ease of use and accessibility, but the developers of the software definitely did not have the end user in mind. I found navigating and learning aspire to be very cumbersome. There was no intuitiveness about the navigation of the software and I would recommend Aspire go back to the drawing board to fix this issue. The second issue I found with aspire was it seemed that they did not have both the man power and processing power to handle their load. Countless times when my team and I would log in to aspire we would get error messages. When reaching out to aspire about this issue they informed us that their servers are overloaded in the morning due to high activity. Well as you can imagine, not being able to access our CRM during the morning time for a landscape company caused our operations problems... Third and possibly the biggest issue with the software was the support. As I mentioned, Aspire was not intuitive at all and learning how to navigate it was very cumbersome. So when we reached out to support, we would have to submit a ticket and wait a few hours for a tech to get back to us. This process consisted of multiple back and forth emails spanning throughout the day, they would then recommend to schedule a zoom call a few days later. Well for many of our employees this caused much headache, as needing one simple answer took days to resolve and in the meantime our operation is suffering by not having the support we need to operate the very costly software we are paying for. In fact the sole purpose of using the software in the first place is to make our operation run smoother. Our employees who, “asked for support too many times”, were also then directed to paid support I mentioned above, costing $187 per hour. Which I found to be ridiculous especially considering that my interactions with support many times left them stumped, communicating to me that they were not sure how to answer or resolve my question and they would have to get their higher up for help… This resulted in multiple days in delay and in some cases just no answer at all…

Aspire Into Our Second Year

Kommentare: There was a big learning curve with the implementation and getting the teams plugged in and operational but once it all came together the benefits were apparent. We're tracking performance much better then in the past and more efficiently as well. The continuing support from the Aspire team has been great as well.

Vorteile:

The two biggest challenges facing landscaping companies I find are 1. managing maintenance labor while delivering quality and 2. creating and tracking billable opportunities with efficiency. Aspire excels in both of these categories. The operational side of the software is excellent and gives the branch teams the tools they need to estimate, schedule and track performance. The estimating, job costing, scheduling and the crew mobile functions are all solid and perform well.

Nachteile:

On the flip side the administrative and accounting side of Aspire has some challenges integrating smoothly with our accounting system. The inability to reverse transactions easily is an example. There are some good checks in place like the EOM checklists to keep everything balanced though. A fully integrated and functional accounting system would be a nice addition to the package. I believe Aspire is working on that.

Just getting started, happy with our choice!

Kommentare: The support team is AMAZING. I can't say enough about how helpful they have been as we started with them, even though it's taken a long time to get us where we are. They have been patient and helpful throughout the process.

Vorteile:

The implementation team was phenomenal in helping us get set our system set up for our specific needs. [sensitive content hidden] was amazingly helpful, flexible, and super patient with us - which we desperately needed. We're also very excited about having one platform to use for all of our needs instead of multiple programs to track everything.

Nachteile:

For us the hardest part is finding the time to set up all the items we need to cater the system to our business. We have very specific needs, and the set up has taken a long time solely because of the specific nature and number of items that we need to set up prior to using the system to it's full potential.

The absolute best!

Kommentare: Great, easy to use. Setup is intuitive but detailed, which makes everything easier moving forward.

Vorteile:

Great, intuitive, well designed web page. Easy to navigate, many ways to get to what you need. Great reporting features, regular updates with new features.

Nachteile:

Sometimes too many ways to get to the same place can be confusing, especially for new users.

Honesty

Kommentare: So far its been good, hoping it gets to great

Vorteile:

The idea board to hopefully dream that it can meet our needs more.

Nachteile:

I am not happy at all that there isn't an onsite implementing Manager/ person. Dedicated to us during that season up to launch.

Continues to innovate and improve

Kommentare: I have enjoyed using Aspire. Yes, it has been frustrating at times, but the AspireCare team is great at handling issues in a timely manner.

Vorteile:

There are several aspects of Aspire which I enjoy using. I particularly like the functionality and flexibility of the reporting module. There are "canned" reports, but from there, you can also create your own and modify the report to fit your own needs. I have enjoyed working with the Customer Portal and being able to present this to our clients. I appreciate how Aspire is continuing to innovate and improve their product.

Nachteile:

I would like to see an app designed for the admin user. There are times when I don't have access to a tablet or desktop computer and need to look something up in Aspire, create a PO, etc. In the knowledge base, I would appreciate more downloadable materials (PDF) rather than so many videos. I often am unable to set aside time to watch a video, so having something I can pull up and read would be more beneficial.

ASPIRE ... a MUST for SUCCESS

Kommentare: Our experience with Aspire has been simply amazing and the proof of its value to us is the success we experience every day and year we operate. We're proud to be among the early pioneers of Aspire and continue today utilizing its amazing technology and power to operate our highly successful landscape/winter service business.

Vorteile:

The dependability. The platform on which it is built is obviously rock solid. We've been on Aspire for over (10) years with little to zero down time. The updates and refreshing that occurs periodically are always seamless and non-disruptive.

Nachteile:

I can honestly say that nothing comes to mind about not liking something about Aspire. Maybe in the early years (2013-2014) after it was first released. We were among the early pioneer users, and it was somewhat cumbersome and frustrating at times, which should be expected, however, the Aspire Team worked collectively and diligently with us and many other users swiftly to correct and improve issues along the way.

Great at first

Kommentare: I really enjoyed it as a user and was extremely frustrated as an admin.

Vorteile:

It was a great tool for landscape maintenance and really easy to build reports.

Nachteile:

The roadmap was completely unrealistic and everything important was left on the back burner while insignificant stuff was addressed.

Aspire Financial Area

Kommentare: Overall it has helped but the financial problems with us, them, the trining we received, whatever has me feling like a stepchild instead of one of the family. We pay a lot to have this; I want that problem fixed.

Vorteile:

The pros are definitely the connectability of everything in one place. I am able to do much more work in half the time. Implementing this has cut my office staff which really adds to the bottom line. I was able to see waste by implementing Aspire through labor over usage, overall operations, and office staff. This made me make changes to all of these areas which has really added to our bottom line profits.

Nachteile:

The financial section is very clunky. The journal entries or moving payroll over to quickbooks does not integrate easily. I would like to run on a Cash basis. This system is all accrual. I still have yet to be able to get accurate financials so I think my business is better but I can't gauge that yet. That to me is the most ridiculous and will have me leave Aspire if we can't get it fixed asap. I would rather have nothing then messed up financials.

Ease of Use

Kommentare: Overall we are happy with the ease of the implementation of the software, the support and the overall functioning of the software. It is nice to have one software for our company.

Vorteile:

Easy to navigate around through the modules.

Nachteile:

Some of the accounting reporting or things you would use for HR/Accounting, are not as developed.

Aspire from the Financial Office's view

Kommentare: We have a much better view of our revenue and costs from jobs while they're happening.

Vorteile:

Real time job costing capabilities, as well as the ability to sync with accounting software

Nachteile:

"the system of a thousand clicks", it is customizable to a fault at times.

Highs and Lows of Aspire

Vorteile:

All the critical data to perform daily tasks such as time entry, proposal making, etc. are all in one place.

Nachteile:

Some areas of Aspire that we think would work a certain way do not work that way or work backwards from how we think it should.

Leif's thoughts

Kommentare: Been amazing. The longer we use it the more profitable we become.

Vorteile:

Love that it has the ability to manage everything from the initial phone call to the entire management of the project and time tracking for the guys out in the field. Love that it sinks with Fleet sharp and tracks equipment hours. Love having everything on the cloud to access all information from anywhere I have wifi. Love the ease in scheduling projects and love seeing the progress on the job. The list goes on and on. I love that the basis to the system to create and manage jobs is based on labor, equipment and materials. I love to adjust the complexity of the job for reasons such as drivetime, custom projects, and difficult clients, etc... Aspire protects our margins so that we capture great margins on small and large projects alike.

Nachteile:

I don't have many cons, but the most difficult thing just comes down to using it daily. It is a powerful system with many, many tools. The learning curve is a bit taxing before you learn how really to make the program work for your liking. I wish that editing and changing layout was easier and that having the ability to do so personally didn't require another level of extended training. I wish it were more intuitive and easier to navigate so that any aspire user listed as an administrator could jump on and work on it. I wish you could have different brand names for different branches without showing all the names or choosing one as the main.

Good Commercial Landscaping Software Option

Kommentare: We have an Aspire rep assigned to keep track of our needs.Aspire Care, the Support side of Aspire, is responsive and there are many webinars offered to help companies work through any issues or learning gaps with Aspire.Aspire is a fairly detailed CRM so it takes a while for everyone to get on board with some processes, but once they do it seems everyone is happy with the functionality and amount of reporting available.

Vorteile:

Being able to add custom formulas to reports (lists) created in Aspire.Detailed quotes that look professional.Managing contacts of a property.SiteOne integration works well for us since they are our primary vendor for Irrigation inventory.Easy inventory pricing tool to quickly update prices.Easy to move jobs on the schedule and schedule for multiple days or as a series for repeated jobs.Since their acquisition by Service Titan development has really ramped up.

Nachteile:

Job Management is good until a change order is made. The best option is recreating the quote.Cost of software is based on your revenue not the amount of customers, so price doesn't really equal the amount of use if you just have a small number of large revenue customers.Too many functions. Sometimes if you don't use them all it skews reporting.

Aspire Review

Vorteile:

It is user friendly between our Ops and Sales department. We have been deep diving into other areas as well like inventory and site audits and Aspire has a lot to offer.

Nachteile:

The site audits when being used on the phone are not user friendly.

Aspire just works

Kommentare: We used CLIP for 15 years, LMN for 5 years and now Aspire. Aspire costs more but you also get a lot more.

Vorteile:

Accuracy of estimating. Speed with which estimates can be generated using templates, the equipment module syncing with gps and alerting for all of the maintenance. I also wish you could generate an efficiency score for each employee rather than only for the crew leader.

Nachteile:

Not being able so see notes on the equipment serviced report. You can see the notes on the equipment needing serviced report but for some reason not on the report of the equipment that has been serviced.

Getting Better All the Time

Vorteile:

It is easy to use and gives tremendous amounts of data for analysis to enable us to make good business decicisions.

Nachteile:

Where do I begin... There is so much information in here that there are several things that we should be able to do within the system as opposed to having to export the information and create our own data tables. For instance, all Contract Direct Costs exist within Opportunities, so why is there not an easy way Aspire has a button to show us what our current Budget is based off of those values? This is something that every company should have and Aspire could help make this an easier process. Also, we need a better way of analyzing our top performing Properties and Companies in addition to our bottom performers. This can be achieved by exporting informaiton, but Aspire should be able to provide us with our Top and Bottom 10-25 with the click of a button.

Milosi - Finance Manager

Kommentare: Implementation was about 6 months before I came on board. It is my understanding that this experience was short and did not provide enough training for the staff. We have had challenges due to misunderstandings through the implementation, but seem to finally be making progress on our Aspire processes. We are looking forward to getting into the YOJ classes!

Vorteile:

Industry specific alignment and integration with phone apps for field use.

Nachteile:

Inability to get real time entries in to QB. Would like to see a daily update via the connector, very similar to what a restaurant POS system can provide. I understand there will be challenges with Earned Revenue, but also believe there to be a viable solution.

Aspire Review

Kommentare: Aspire is very hard to set up if your client data hasn't already been combed over for errors. We struggled in the beginning, but Aspire's customer service team gave us smart solutions to any challenges we had.

Vorteile:

The logic behind Aspire has challenged us to think about how we do business. We're now more agile than ever, and have refined our admin and operations processes immensely.

Nachteile:

We use Airtable to track design projects in progress. Aspire has pretty decent project management tools, like tasks and activities, but it isn't a project management software. Its CRM functionality is a little rudimentary for our needs.

Aspire For Me

Vorteile:

Having gone through 2 other software programs before we got Aspire, I can say that Aspire was the easiest and most user friendly one. I really enjoy having the knowledge base and the Aspire support team readily available when you have any questions.

Nachteile:

There are certain things that I feel Aspire could improve on:1) Real time labor increases throughout the system. If we have a labor or price percentage increase, it would be nice if the system was set up to update all areas that the labor or price needs to be adjusted. Currently, we have to go into each and every contract and update all prices and into each and every service on that contract. Very time consuming. 2) Having the ability to put the same service more than once on an opportunity. 3) Having more description on the mobile app than just the service on the schedule would help.

Aspire Review

Kommentare: Overall, I have really enjoyed the support that Aspire gives.

Vorteile:

I like how structured the program is. You can't have anything slip through the cracks if you follow the clean out instructions.

Nachteile:

I feel that they could work on making the app out in the field easier for the crews. I am excited to see what the new will work.

Should be better for the price!

Kommentare: As the person responsible for the financial reporting of the company, Aspire sucks. It is TOO expensive for the kind of reporting we are getting.

Vorteile:

Estimating, scheduling and invoicing are much improved over our old system. On the landscaping management side, Aspire has provided much needed help.

Nachteile:

The drawbacks are numerous. There is little onsite training, as a matter of fact, we have had to pay an outside source to give us the training needed to use Aspire efficiently. Accounting integration is poor. The inventory system is non-existent from an accounting perspective and requires a lot of manual journal entries to reconcile. Aspire requires a lot of additional time to get financial reporting accurately into Quickbooks. The pivot tables within Aspire are not real time but include info up to the prior day. . DO NOT believe that you will be able to get this running in less than a year. It is very disappointing!

Wonderful tool with insightful features

Kommentare: Overall great experience.. I enjoy all of the support Aspire offers in every scenario

Vorteile:

endless information at your fingertips

Nachteile:

glitchy-ness.. There is always a bug that needs worked outcrew mobile isn't running on all cylinders at all times.