Go iLawn Blog

Follow this link to view the new user interface. We plan to launch it this month.

http://www.goilawn.com/demoapp/demoapp.aspx

As we grow we want to hear about your growth experiences using Go ilawn.

Enter a comment, we’d be glad to hear from you.

Lawn and Garden Webvision (LGWV) features Go iLawn in their latest NEWS video!  Check it out at:  http://www.lgwvpro.com/pro-videos/lgwv-news.asp?vide=Go-iLawn

We have an address search box and we have a street map.

Search Box: enter a street # and a street name (skip Ln, Rd, St, Ave), enter a zip code in our coverage area. Click the Search button.
This will bring up a photo of the property or it will give you suggestions. You can select from two drop down lists organized by number or name.  And, you can select the “click Here for suggested image” to use the street map. The street map works very well if your address is close to correct.

I suggest that you test your address using the USPS.com address look up and then go to an online street map, there are several, to test your address and locate the neighborhood.

You can also us the street map in GoiLawn, select your state, zoom in to the area, find the landmark and cross street, Use our tool “Map to Map”, click on the map and a photo of the property will appear.

RFQ’s for snow removal are starting to come in and GoiLawn can be an effective, productive and accurate tool.

John Allin, an expert in the snow removal industry, talks about his experience with building a proposal using GoiLawn. The entry shown here is from his blog: www.johnallin.com

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More on www.goilawn.com
As a follow-up to my recent post about www.goilawn.com – the past couple of days, I worked with a contractor who is learning the goilawn system.  The owner wants to grow his business and has hired an individual to do sales.  This individual has some specific growth goals to achieve.  I recommended he use the goilawn system for measuring sites.  The owner wanted a “test” to see if the goilawn method would measure up to “the old way”.  So – I suggested we do up a proposal using goilawn.com and the GIE Media estimating package, and then compare it to the owners numbers (from two years back).  It was a large industrial site.  We had previously driven through the site as the owner was showing me a site he would like to have in the future. 

So, in about an hour we measured the site on-line, made notes of imperfections, did up a detailed proposal – and presented it to the owner of this snow contracting business.  I had told the owner (who had hired me to consult with him on growth initiative) not to share his “numbers” until we were done preparing our proposal.

The quote and the measurements were different from the “old” quote by about 10%.  We were 10% lower than what had been previously figured two years ago.  So, we had a discussion and I asked a bunch of questions about how the previous measurements had been obtained.  Come to find out – the person who originally measured the site (with hand wheel and walking) had “squared off everything”, had not taken out the grass islands and had driven the roadways (using the truck odometer to ascertain the distance).  With goilawn (this time around) we had measured everything as it was shown, deleting out the grass area and not “squaring off” the parking lot.  When we went back to the measurements on goilawn, and added up the “deducts” (grass areas, islands, etc.) – the measurements were almost dead on.  As such, we figured the quote numbers were really quite close when drilling down on the data and the differences.  Obviously, our recent measuring was very accurate and the estimating package came up with the right numbers once the margin’s were equal with the old proposal.

The kicker for me was finding out the workup from two years ago took danged near all day to do – and this time around, it took about an hour, start to finish.

After the SIMA Symposium I was impressed with what I saw in their booth.  Now that I’ve had some personal experience with www.goilawn.com – I can say with conviction this is a great tool all snow contractors should use in their business.

View photos of property across the USA.

See property straight down over the roof.

See parcel boundary line.

See Property from a 40′ angle North, South, East, West

See Property in a larger Neighborhood view.

Trace Shapes on the screen as you follow objects in the photo.

Traced areas are shaded in green and Square Footage is quickly calculated.

Subtract objects for the shaded green area. Square footage is quickly calculated for subtracted area and sum total is tracked.

Calculate Volume of fill material required for a measured area ( mulch bed, etc.) based on depth of fill required.

Calculate distance, slope/grade, pitch, height, area.

Change unit of measure: inches, feet, meters, yards, acres

Search property by address.

Search property by interactive map.

Save Photos. View, Print or email from your local computer.

Save measure data to spreadsheet

Save measure drawings.

Label items in the property photo.

Count or inventory objects in the photo (Trees, shrubs, rocks)

Define the process to measure a property.

Know the cost to measure a property and build a proposal.

We have just added Laramie County, WY (Cheyenne) to our current coverage. See current coverage here http://www.goilawn.com/documents/County%20Data%20Coverage.pdf

If you are getting a browser compatibility error when logging in to the site, please follow the steps below to allow compatibility between I.E. 8 and GoiLawn:

Compatibility View

Internet Explorer 8 is a new release and some websites may not yet be ready for Internet Explorer 8. Click the Compatibility View toolbar button to display the website as viewed in Internet Explorer 7, which will correct display problems like misaligned text, images, or text boxes. This option is on a per site basis and all other sites will continue to display with Internet Explorer 8 functionality. To go back to browsing with Internet Explorer 8 functionality on that site, simply click the Compatibility View button again.

 Try clicking the “Compatibility View” toolbar button to fix the problem. It’s located next to the Refresh button on the Address Bar.

You can maintain a list within Internet Explorer 8 for sites that should be displayed in Compatibility View. From the Command Bar, select Tools, and then select Compatibility View Settings to add and remove sites from this list. There are also options for viewing all websites and intranet sites in Compatibility View.

We recently updated the site to include 30 million new parcels as well as some exciting new functionality that will make searching a snap.  Please feel free to contact us with any questions, comments or suggestions that you may have.

The Go iLawn system is designed to search parcel addresses.  We acquire parcel data with addresses from all the counties that we have coverage for.  Commercial properties are addressed a little differently (than residential).  Oftentimes, a commercial property’s MAILING ADDRESS is different from the actual PARCEL ADDRESS.  If you are having issues locating commercial properties/businesses, this is the reason.  Just send an email to support@gisdynamics.com with the addresses you are trying to locate.  We can locate the correct PARCEL ADDRESS for you and you can be on your way measuring.