California Moving Systems increases efficiency

For California Moving Systems, business pressure came from several directions. Most customer acquisition was manual: the survey team drove long distances to customer locations and the sales team networked and knocked on doors, which kept acquisition costs high.

As a company that traditionally surveyed in person, CMS was hit hard when COVID-19 halted onsite surveys for a prolonged period. After a call from Yembo, CMS was curious how AI could expand its surveying options. Once it started, more virtual surveys were conducted than in person, the cost of goods sold dropped so surveyors could complete more surveys per week, and Yembo became a tool the team used every day.

Generating business was very manual, and the Sacramento area is spread out. Surveyors sometimes drove more than 50 miles for a single survey, taking hours out of the day and making a quick turnaround hard. Customer acquisition was expensive and selling was more expensive still because of fuel and time.

CMS also faced pressure from seasonality, economic factors, and California regulations. When COVID-19 arrived in 2020, customers were uncomfortable letting surveyors into their homes and CMS did not want to put its people at risk, yet it had no alternative survey option in place. To keep up with demand, CMS needed a way to survey without physically stepping into a customer's home.

CMS moved toward a virtual survey model with Yembo while continuing to offer onsite surveys. It leaned into its website to advertise virtual options and made the site more mobile-friendly, creating access points where a potential customer could run a self-survey and request a quote, often before ever speaking with a sales rep.

CMS also capped surveyor travel at 50 miles, steering longer jobs to a Yembo Self-Survey or Smart Consult. That change cut monthly spending roughly in half and dropped the cost of goods sold. Smart Consult guided surveys preserved face-to-face interaction without the drive, and the team found younger customers preferred virtual while older customers still chose in-home. CMS now recommends a virtual survey first and completes 30 to 35 surveys per week, up from about 20 before Yembo.