Dispatch, the enterprise technology company that is empowering the home services industry to meet the rising demands of the modern customer, today announced a partnership with ServiceMaster, one of the leading home services providers in the United States. The partnership will make Dispatch the software platform of choice for ServiceMaster’s home warranty and pest control brands.
Dispatch also announced the completion of a $12 million Series A funding round led by Grandbanks Capital and ServiceMaster, with participation from Assurant, Liberty Mutual Strategic Ventures, Promus Ventures, Recruit Strategic Partners and Salesforce Ventures; also joining the round were Huff Capital and Ray Lane. This investment and partnership with ServiceMaster will propel Dispatch in its efforts to make home services more convenient and efficient for service providers, brands and customers.
“The home services industry is a highly fragmented market that has struggled historically to provide homeowners with a quality customer experience. There’s a communication gap between the 1.2 million service professionals, the brands they work for and the customers they serve,” said Dispatch CEO Avi Goldberg. “By seamlessly integrating into an enterprise’s existing technology systems and delivering real-time information about the service experience, Dispatch provides insights into the performance of their service providers. With this, brands can exceed customer expectations and strengthen brand loyalty.”
The Dispatch platform is designed to simplify the home services experience from all angles, improving the experience for brands, service providers and customers. Currently, with more than 20,000 service providers on the platform, Dispatch services more than 50,000 homes a day. Through a single platform, Dispatch users can schedule appointments, receive job status updates, share real-time location information, communicate directly with the customer and accept payments. This single-platform approach allows service professionals to reduce job completion time and increase efficiency, while allowing enterprises to gain valuable insight into every aspect of the “last mile” of the service delivery process, which is often the most critical to the homeowner who’s waiting for the technician to arrive.
“We’re in the business of delivering an excellent customer experience, and a crucial component of that is knowing exactly what happens on the day of service, from scheduling the technician’s visit to diagnosing the problem to fixing what’s not working and following up with the customer after the service is completed,” said ServiceMaster CIO Jamie Smith. “In home services and other industries, we’ve had access to data for a long time, but getting access to that last mile of the service delivery process has been a challenge. Working with Dispatch has enabled us to bring online customer interactions that until now have remained offline.”
In alignment with its new customer service initiative ServSmartsm, ServiceMaster has launched the Dispatch platform within its American Home Shield and Terminix businesses. This partnership will bring transparency to the last mile of home services for thousands of customers AHS and Terminix serve every day. In the initial deployment of Dispatch’s platform, AHS and Terminix have seen early successes in overall field operations, such as an increase in Net Promoter Scores across their customer base and a reduction in the total time it takes to complete a job.
Added Russell MacTough, Managing Director at Liberty Mutual Strategic Ventures, “Dispatch is building an operating system for the $450 billion home services market. We believe Dispatch will change the industry as we know it and are excited to be a part of this revolution.”
About Dispatch
Dispatch is the Boston-based enterprise software company whose mission is to help the home services industry meet the rising demands of the modern customer. Dispatch powers modern service by seamlessly connecting brands to an army of expert-on-demand local contractors, providing those contractors an intuitive platform to assign and manage jobs, and communicating service details automatically to the customer via their mobile device. Dispatch links the people, process, and data to create a modern service experience that delights customers, empowers contractors, and promotes a positive brand image for the enterprise.
About ServiceMaster
ServiceMaster (NYSE: SERV) solves the homeowner’s dilemma. Every day, they visit more than 75,000 homes and businesses through their extensive service network of expert professionals. Technology powers their trusted experts to engage with their customers so they can order, buy and receive services when, where and how they want them. Their well-recognized brands include American Home Shield (home warranties), AmeriSpec (home inspections), Furniture Medic (furniture repair), Merry Maids (residential cleaning), ServiceMaster Clean (janitorial and residential floor cleaning), ServiceMaster Restore (disaster restoration) and Terminix (termite and pest control).
About Salesforce Ventures
Salesforce, the global CRM leader, empowers companies to connect with their customers in a whole new way. Salesforce Ventures—the company’s corporate investment group—invests in the next generation of enterprise technology that extends the power of the Salesforce Intelligent Customer Success Platform, helping companies connect with their customers in entirely new ways. Portfolio companies receive funding as well as access to the world’s largest cloud ecosystem and the guidance of Salesforce’s innovators and executives. With Salesforce Ventures, portfolio companies can also leverage Salesforce’s expertise in corporate philanthropy by joining Pledge 1% to make giving back part of their business model. Salesforce Ventures has invested in more than 200 enterprise cloud startups in 14 different countries since 2009. For more information, please visit www.salesforce.com/ventures.
