So you think Tech doesn’t work for trades? Wrong.
You can be on the tools, on the phone and on your marketing… but not at the same time. Something always gets dropped – and it’s usually the person who already tried to reach out.
A lot of tradies think tech is too complicated or too much mucking around. Fair enough. Most of the tools out there were built for offices, not for people crawling under cars or climbing roofs. Missed calls, quotes hidden in message threads and late-night admin aren’t signs you can’t use tech. They’re signs the tech you tried wasn’t built for the way you actually work.
The good news? You don’t need anything fancy to run smoother. The simplest systems are usually the ones that make the biggest difference. And once you see how small they can be, it’s pretty clear tech does work for trades – when it’s built to fit the job, not make it more complicated.
When everything runs through you, everything bottlenecks
If you’re like most of the people Adam chats with early on, your day looks something like this:
Phone wedged between shoulder and ear while tightening a bolt
Quotes scattered across Messenger, SMS, email… and maybe a cardboard off-cut
Mental notes about who asked for what
Evenings spent catching up on calls and quotes instead of switching off
None of this means you’re unorganised. It just means you’re carrying everything in your head. And once you hit that point, you know you’ve reached your limit - that’s a good thing! But you can choose to stop there, and many people are content with that… BUT one small system can take a surprising amount of pressure off, giving you more time, more headspace and the ability to actually do more work in the same time.
A system shouldn’t feel like “extra work” - that’s defeating the purpose. It should feel like the quiet helper in the background doing the stuff you forget because you’re actually doing the work.
This blog walks through a few simple ways to make your day less chaotic by using systems that support the way you already work. I’ve got some examples in here you can implement right now without revenu, just to get a taste of how being intentional can change the way you work.
A quick story to show how simple it can be
One of the first setups Adam built was for a wheel repairer. Great at the work. Terrible at answering the phone while covered in metal dust, understandably. He didn’t need a marketing funnel or a content plan. He needed something that caught people while he was working.
So Adam set up three tiny things:
A simple quote form on a basic website
A missed-call text: “On a job – flick me a photo and I’ll send a quote once I’m free”
A follow-up reminder so quotes didn’t sit forgotten
That was it.
He didn’t suddenly become a tech person. He just stopped losing people who were already interested. When the system is solid, everything you’re trying to do stops feeling like hard work.
Here’s the part most people underestimate
You don’t need to clean up your whole business before you put a system in place.
Systems are what clean things up.
They take jobs out of your head. They stop you relying on memory. They make your day steadier without adding more work to your plate.
And it’s usually the scrappiest, simplest systems that change the most. Because they fit the way you work, not the other way around.
Here’s some quick wins you can use this week
These aren’t big projects. They’re small tweaks that make your day less dependent on remembering everything and more reliable.
1. Standardise your first reply
Your first message back doesn’t need to be impressive. It just needs to happen quickly and consistently.
Save one simple template:
“Hey [Name], got your message about [job]. I’m on the tools right now but I’ve got your details. I’ll get back to you by [timeframe].”
Copy. Paste. Send.
Your future self will thank you ;)
In revenu this happens automatically, but this manual step is a strong start.
2. Put all enquiries in one place
Everyone has that moment: “Where did that bloke message me… Facebook? Email? Carrier pigeon?”
Pick one spot to track everything, even if it’s just three stages:
New enquiry
Quote sent
Won/lost
It doesn’t need to be pretty. It just needs to exist somewhere other than your brain. A spreadsheet or notebook is perfectly fine.
3. Automate one follow-up
Not five. Just one.
Pick the moment you most often forget and automate that message:
“Just checking you got the quote for [job]. Any questions?”
Or a quick review request after a job.
One automated nudge saves hours of chasing people.
Why this matters
Most tradies don’t lose work because they can’t find leads.
They lose work because there’s no structure behind what happens after someone reaches out.
That’s why Adam built revenu the way he did – not as a complicated platform, but as a simple, done-with-you system that plugs into how small operators actually work. The goal isn’t to give you more tasks. It’s to take the weight off so growth doesn’t cost you more time.
If this sounds like your world…
Start with one of the quick wins above.
Feel what it’s like to have even a tiny part of your day handled automatically.
If you want ideas tailored to your trade, send a message with how leads usually come in. Adam can show you the simplest setup to take pressure off your day without adding complexity to your business.
