Built a quote calculator tool for service businesses, not sure if there's a real market for it, would love honest feedback

[Nexadesign LTD]

I run a small web and software studio and earlier this year I built a tool called QuoteKit after a courier client kept losing leads from his website. Visitors would land on the site, couldn't get a price, and just left.

The tool lets service businesses; couriers, cleaners, gardeners, trades, embed an instant quote calculator on their website. Customer fills it in, gets a price immediately, and the business gets their name, email and phone automatically. No phone tag. It handles distance-based pricing, fixed pricing or hourly, captures the lead details, sends them a quote confirmation and notifies the business instantly. There's also a booking request option so customers can pick a date straight from the widget.

We have a small early user base and it seems to be working for them, but I genuinely don't know if there's a wider market for it or whether most service businesses just prefer the phone call approach.

Honest question, if you run a service business, would something like this be useful to you? And if not, what puts you off?

 

[fisicx]

Is it a Wordpress plugin?

I built a quote tool for a client a while back and it got so complicated we gave up. There were way too many variables.

What worked far better was a simple callback form. You enter name and phone number and we call you back.

 

[Newchodge]

I run a small web and software studio and earlier this year I built a tool called QuoteKit after a courier client kept losing leads from his website. Visitors would land on the site, couldn't get a price, and just left.

The tool lets service businesses; couriers, cleaners, gardeners, trades, embed an instant quote calculator on their website. Customer fills it in, gets a price immediately, and the business gets their name, email and phone automatically. No phone tag. It handles distance-based pricing, fixed pricing or hourly, captures the lead details, sends them a quote confirmation and notifies the business instantly. There's also a booking request option so customers can pick a date straight from the widget.

We have a small early user base and it seems to be working for them, but I genuinely don't know if there's a wider market for it or whether most service businesses just prefer the phone call approach.

Honest question, if you run a service business, would something like this be useful to you? And if not, what puts you off?

No app could produce a quote for my business, there are too many variables.

 

[Nexadesign LTD]

Is it a Wordpress plugin?

I built a quote tool for a client a while back and it got so complicated we gave up. There were way too many variables.

What worked far better was a simple callback form. You enter name and phone number and we call you back.

Not a WordPress plugin, it embeds on any site with a single script tag, WordPress included. Nothing to install or update.

The callback form works well for some businesses but the problem is you lose the customer at the point they most want an answer. Someone searching for a courier at 9pm isn't going to wait for a call back in the morning, they'll just go to the next result. The instant price keeps them on the page. That's what I found with some of the businesses I have worked with anyway.

You're right that complexity kills these tools. That's exactly why QuoteKit is deliberately limited to service businesses with predictable pricing; distance, fixed or hourly. If a business has 50 edge cases it's not the right fit, but for a cleaner charging £20/hour or a courier charging by distance it's running in under an hour.

 

[Nexadesign LTD]

No app could produce a quote for my business, there are too many variables.

That's a fair point. Employment law and payroll is exactly the kind of business where something like this wouldn't work. Every case is different and the price depends on too many factors to automate.

QuoteKit is really built for businesses where the pricing is mostly predictable, i.e... a courier charging by distance, a cleaner by hours, a gardener by job size. Those businesses get asked the same questions every day and the widget just automates the answer. Not a universal solution but for that specific type of business it saves a lot of back and forth.

 

[fisicx]

Adding a demo to your site would help.

This is the one I usually use:

Stylish Cost Calculator – Quote Generator, Lead Gen & Price Estimator

Cost calculator for WordPress: 🌟 Engage visitors and boost conversions with interactive calculations, lead capture, and payment integrations.

en-gb.wordpress.org

Build a plugin and you will get far more traction. Asking your average WP user to embed a line of code would be beyond a lot of them. I still get asked how to add an image to a page.

 

[Nexadesign LTD]

Adding a demo to your site would help.

This is the one I usually use:

Stylish Cost Calculator – Quote Generator, Lead Gen & Price Estimator

Cost calculator for WordPress: 🌟 Engage visitors and boost conversions with interactive calculations, lead capture, and payment integrations.

en-gb.wordpress.org

Build a plugin and you will get far more traction. Asking your average WP user to embed a line of code would be beyond a lot of them. I still get asked how to add an image to a page.

Good shout, I'll make the demo more prominent on the site so people can try it before signing up.

On the plugin, it's on the roadmap. For now most users paste the script into an HTML block in Elementor, wix, Ionos or the standard WordPress block editor and many more! It works without touching code, but I take your point that it's still a barrier for a lot of people.

Here's the link if you want to take a look: https://quotekit.nexadesign.io

If you're open to trying it properly I'd happily give you free access; your feedback as someone who builds these tools for clients would be genuinely useful.

Cheers!

 

[Newchodge]

On the plugin, it's on the roadmap. For now most users paste the script into an HTML block in Elementor, wix, Ionos or the standard WordPress block editor and many more! It works without touching code

Could I just say that I do not understand a word of that!

 

[JEREMY HAWKE]

I would say that this is already widely used

 

[Nexadesign LTD]

I would say that this is already widely used

You're right that quote tools exist, but most are built for trades and job management & they can be complex, expensive and require the customer to wait for a manual quote to be sent back. QuoteKit is specifically for service businesses that have predictable pricing and want to give an instant price on their website without any back and forth. Different problem, different solution.

If you don't mind me asking, as a courier company yourself what do you currently use for quoting clients?

 

[JEREMY HAWKE]

You're right that quote tools exist, but most are built for trades and job management & they can be complex, expensive and require the customer to wait for a manual quote to be sent back. QuoteKit is specifically for service businesses that have predictable pricing and want to give an instant price on their website without any back and forth. Different problem, different solution.

If you don't mind me asking, as a courier company yourself what do you currently use for quoting clients?

Does it cater for dynamic pricing

 

[Nexadesign LTD]

Does it cater for dynamic pricing

Yes, QuoteKit supports distance-based pricing which calculates the quote dynamically based on the pickup and delivery postcodes, so every quote is different based on the actual route. You can also set surcharges for weekends, evenings, same-day and bank holidays, these are factored into the quoted price automatically based on when the booking/quote is made, so the customer always sees the correct price upfront.

Is that the kind of dynamic pricing you had in mind, or were you thinking of something more specific?

 

[louis292]

I run a small web and software studio and earlier this year I built a tool called QuoteKit after a courier client kept losing leads from his website. Visitors would land on the site, couldn't get a price, and just left.

The tool lets service businesses; couriers, cleaners, gardeners, trades, embed an instant quote calculator on their website. Customer fills it in, gets a price immediately, and the business gets their name, email and phone automatically. No phone tag. It handles distance-based pricing, fixed pricing or hourly, captures the lead details, sends them a quote confirmation and notifies the business instantly. There's also a booking request option so customers can pick a date straight from the widget.

We have a small early user base and it seems to be working for them, but I genuinely don't know if there's a wider market for it or whether most service businesses just prefer the phone call approach.

Honest question, if you run a service business, would something like this be useful to you? And if not, what puts you off?

Automating the quoting process seems like a great way to save time, but I wonder how many customers still prefer a phone call to talk through the details. I think the key is finding a balance where the digital tool handles the initial numbers, but there's still a human touch if they have specific questions.