Overview
Gorilla Surfaces quotes and installs surface work where site conditions matter — access, approximate area, existing layout and job complexity all affect whether a lead is worth a site visit. Enquiries were arriving with incomplete detail, and estimators were spending time on calls and emails just to establish basics that could often be inferred earlier.
Think Online built an enquiry automation flow that combines instant response, structured intake, satellite imagery review and quote follow-up. The goal was not to replace estimators. It was to give them better context before they pick up the phone, and to stop good leads going cold while the team is on site.
The Challenge
Many enquiries lacked usable site information. Staff were manually asking for photos, checking maps separately, and re-typing addresses into different tools. Follow-up was inconsistent once a quote went out, and urgent jobs were not always separated from low-fit enquiries early enough.
What We Built
- Instant enquiry response with structured questions for job type, surface, timeline, access and budget range.
- Address capture and geocoding on form submit, with service-area checks before the lead hits the sales queue.
- Satellite imagery pull for each qualified enquiry so estimators start with an aerial view of the property, not a blank CRM record.
- Rules-based pre-qualification flags for likely job size, access constraints and out-of-scope requests.
- CRM handoff with imagery, intake answers and recommended next step attached to the deal.
- Automated quote follow-up sequences for leads that go quiet after pricing is sent.
How The Satellite Enquiry Flow Works (De-Hyped)
The logic, step by step
- Enquiry capture: Website form, phone miss-text-back or ad lead lands in one intake flow. Minimum fields: name, phone, email, job type, address or lot identifier, and urgency.
- Geocode + service check: Address is normalised through a geocoding API. If the property sits outside Gorilla’s service radius or looks incomplete, the system asks for clarification before routing to sales.
- Satellite imagery fetch: Once geocoded, the workflow requests recent aerial/satellite tiles for the property boundary — typically via a maps imagery provider such as Google Maps Static API, Mapbox or a local aerial provider where higher resolution is needed.
- Site context pass: The image is stored against the lead record alongside basic derived context: lot footprint estimate, visible access paths, adjacent structures, open ground vs built-up area, and whether the site looks residential, commercial or rural. This is rules + human review, not magic measurement.
- Qualification rules: Simple logic decides what happens next. Example: large open area + requested surface type + in-area address = priority estimator queue. Small repair + unclear access = callback task. Out-of-scope job type = polite decline or referral path.
- Human estimator handoff: The estimator receives the CRM task with intake answers, map pin, imagery snapshot and suggested questions still missing. They confirm scope on a call or site visit — the automation does the prep, not the final quote.
- Follow-up layer: After quote issue, SMS/email sequences chase the lead until won, lost or paused, with replies routed back to the owner.
Common-sense summary: satellite imagery is used to speed up triage, not to auto-price from the sky. Geocoding finds the site, imagery gives the team a head start, rules sort urgency, and humans still own the quote.
What They’re Actually Using (De-Hyped)
The stack, without the buzzwords
- Intake layer: Website forms and ad leads into GoHighLevel / CRM, with instant SMS acknowledgement.
- Location layer: Geocoding API plus service-area polygon checks before a lead is marked sales-ready.
- Imagery layer: Satellite or aerial image fetch on qualified enquiries, saved to the lead record for estimator review.
- Automation glue: Make.com or n8n orchestration for geocode → imagery → qualification flags → CRM task creation.
- Follow-up layer: Twilio SMS and email sequences tied to quote-sent status, with reply handling and owner alerts.
No computer-vision hype required for v1. The value is faster context at enquiry time, cleaner routing, and less back-and-forth before a human gets involved.
Outcome
Gorilla Surfaces can respond faster, filter weak enquiries earlier, and arm estimators with site context before the first call. Quote follow-up runs in the background instead of relying on someone’s memory after a day on site.
As with our other case studies, we are not claiming specific revenue multiples here. The operational gain is speed, qualification quality and fewer leads lost between enquiry and booked work.
Services Delivered
- Enquiry intake and instant response automation
- Satellite imagery workflow for site pre-qualification
- Lead routing and CRM handoff logic
- Quote follow-up sequences
- Estimator-facing documentation and workflow SOPs
Related Service Links
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