Who is Ergeon?

Ergeon, a leading fence company with 109 franchises scattered nationwide, has firsthand experience with the power of offering consumer financing. 

As outlined in this case study, Ergeon has been able to boost sales by 20% since the company has started working with Wisetack — a massive impact especially considering the size of the company.

Thanks to Wisetack, Ergeon is able to offer a transparent pay-over-time option that the company’s customers often appreciate. According to Sofia, the Shared Services Team Lead at Ergeon, the fact that customers can check their options with no credit impact “really catches their eye.” 

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A local team looking for a boost

Although Ergeon as a whole was having great success using Wisetack, one of the company’s regional teams wasn’t seeing the same results.

The team’s average order value (AOV) was lower than the company’s benchmark and they were losing market share to a competitor in the area.

Once we got wind of this news, we decided to offer our help. Ergeon and Wisetack have enjoyed a great partnership, so we wanted to see if there was anything we could do to help the team meet their goals. Several training sessions and Slack messages later, we came up with a few ideas.

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A two-pronged solution

After talking to Ergeon and analyzing the situation, our team came up with two solutions we thought could be highly effective. 

First, we wanted to help the team feel more comfortable talking about financing to customers. We did that by sharing and explaining our Perfect Pitch prompts, which contain verbiage that sales reps can use to pitch financing.

Moreover, we wanted to make sure Ergeon understood the value of prequalifying customers, and how to use direct customers to the company’s handy prequal link.

Let’s dive a bit deeper into the two strategies.

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The Perfect Pitch

When we sat down with the Ergeon sales rep, we quickly realized that many felt awkward talking about financing, or just weren’t sure what to say.

We brought up the perfect remedy: our Perfect Pitch.

The pitch includes short, easy-to-remember sentences that can address virtually any financing-related scenario. After going through it, many of the reps changed their approach when bringing up financing. 

Specifically, the reps found that presenting financing as just another payment option (alongside cash and card) worked wonders. Before that, they would usually offer financing as a separate or last-resort choice.

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“I feel more comfortable offering financing now that it’s presented as a payment option rather than “financing.”

— Daniel Maxam, Sales Representative, Ergeon

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The Ergeon team also found that omitting the word “financing” and using alternatives like “pay over time” helped soften conversations in their market.

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The power of prequalification

Another tactic we shared with the Ergeon team was to more heavily encourage customers to prequalify by sharing their prequal link in more places. 

When a customer prequalifies, they can see how much they could qualify for, and better understand their spending power — with no credit risk. Not only that, but the customer can go through this process in seconds before they ever step into the office or talk to a rep. 

As a result, when dealing with customers who had already prequalified, Ergeon reps found that conversations about financing went smoother — and that they were more likely to go through with a job.

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“Since we started pushing prequalification more often, customers have been more open to larger projects ($10,000+).”

— Juan Villasmil, Sales Team Lead, Ergeon

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How Ergeon pushed customers to prequalify

Once the Ergeon team realized how useful a tool their prequal link could be, they came up with several tactics to promote it more often.

First, they brought it up as early as possible during talking to customers — often during the initial conversation. When a customer is still in the very early stages of their decision process, asking them to prequalify can be a softer way to introduce them to financing as opposed to sending an application. 

Another way the Ergeon team promoted prequalification was by including the link in a few  of the automated text messages they were sending to leads, such as this one (which you can easily repurpose for your business):

Hey 🏡, envisioning your new fence? Take the next step with us! Book here: [BOOKING LINK]. 🌟 Curious about payment plans? Don't miss out! Check our unbeatable options now: https://wisetack.us/#/o5t7u2i/prequalify. Cheers, - Your Ergeon Team

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The impact — in numbers and in words

Once the Ergeon team familiarized themselves with Perfect Pitch and started promoting prequalification more prominently, everyone was eager to see what the impact would be like.  

The results came in quickly and resoundingly. In less than two months, the team’s AOV went up by a staggering 30%, helping the team blow past its forecasts for three consecutive months (September - November 2023) — with no signs of slowing down.

The qualitative impact has been felt too: the team consistently noted that they not only felt more at ease talking about financing, but were also presenting quotes with more confidence as a result.

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Spreading the love 

The impact that Wisetack and financing have had on the previously struggling team has not gone unnoticed by the company. In fact, Ergeon’s global sales leadership team is looking to ensure that all of its sales teams become familiar with the Perfect Pitch and the prequal link.

As part of our collaboration, Wisetack also led a local competitor analysis, which showed that a competitor was heavily advertising their financing offering. Ergeon then conducted the same analysis in other regions, which yielded the same findings.

Following those analyses, Ergeon is now planning to have a financing page on its website (as we prescribe in our best practices) as well as a mention of Wisetack on its regional landing pages.

All in all, offering financing through Wisetack has helped Ergeon in several areas. The significant AOV boost is the most notable one, but the Ergeon leadership team also feels that the company has gained a meaningful competitive edge. 

The qualitative impact was a pleasant surprise too, with the Ergeon sales team now feeling more confident presenting quotes in general thanks to their increased proficiency in pitching financing.