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Go-live checklist

When you first sign in to the Installer Portal you land on a checklist of eight steps. This page explains what each one is for, why it sits where it does, and how much of it you can safely skip on a first pass.

The portal tracks your progress as you tick items off, so you can stop and come back.

Before you start​

  • You have been invited to a Simplified account and can sign in to the Installer Portal.
  • You know what you sell and roughly what it costs you at wholesale. This is the only step that needs information from outside the product, and it is the one that takes longest.

The eight steps​

1. Theme and branding​

Settings → Theme

Your logo, colours, and fonts, applied across every customer-facing tool. Worth doing first for a practical reason: everything you look at afterwards will be in your own branding, so it is much easier to judge whether a quote tool looks right to a customer.

2. Hardware catalogue​

Settings → Packages & Pricing → Hardware Catalogue

Every product you sell, with its wholesale cost. This is the foundation for all pricing, and it is the step that takes real time.

You do not have to type it all in by hand. You can load a sample catalogue of commonly used products and adjust it, import products by uploading manufacturer datasheets, or bulk-update costs from a spreadsheet. See Hardware catalogue.

Costs should be entered excluding VAT, at the price you actually pay.

3. Hardware packages​

Settings → Packages & Pricing → Hardware Packages

The system options your customers choose between, built from catalogue products. Most installers start with three per product type.

You need at least one published package per quote tool you intend to use, or that tool has nothing to show. See Hardware packages.

4. Pricing models​

Settings → Packages & Pricing → Pricing Models

How a package price is calculated from its contents: labour, scaffolding, extras, distance, margin. Write the recipe once, attach it to many packages.

You can test a model against sample inputs before it goes anywhere near a customer. See Pricing models.

At this point you have a working quote tool. It is on a Simplified web address, and you can open it and quote yourself to check it end to end. Do this before moving on — the remaining steps are about presentation and plumbing, and they are much less frustrating once you know the core works.

5. Custom subdomains​

Settings → Custom Domains

Move the tools onto your own web address, so customers see quote.yourbusiness.co.uk instead of a Simplified subdomain. Requires adding a DNS record with whoever hosts your domain. See Custom domains and subdomains.

Skippable on a first pass. The tools work perfectly well on their Simplified addresses while you get the rest right.

6. Email​

Settings → Email

Who on your team gets told when a customer requests a callback or saves a quote, and what your customers receive. Do this before you send the tool to real customers, or the first you hear of a new lead may be days later.

7. Add to your website​

Apps & Embed → Widget Studio

Getting the tools in front of customers. This can be as simple as linking a button on your existing site to your quote tool's address, or as involved as embedding an address-capture form into your homepage so the journey starts there.

See Web apps and URLs for the addresses themselves.

8. Connect​

Settings → Connectors

Push leads and quote activity into your CRM, so your sales process does not need a second inbox. Connectors are available for HubSpot, Zoho, GoHighLevel, and Payaca. See Integrations.

Skippable if you are not running a CRM today.

Check it worked​

Before sending the tool to a real customer, quote yourself:

  1. Open your quote tool from Apps & Embed → Web Apps.
  2. Work through it as a customer would, using a real address you know.
  3. Confirm the packages you expect appear, in the order you expect, at prices you would be happy to honour.
  4. Complete the final step with your own contact details.
  5. Confirm the quote appears under Sales Pipeline → Instant Quotes, and that whoever should have been notified was.

If prices look wrong, the cause is almost always the catalogue cost or the pricing model rather than the quote tool itself. Troubleshooting quote tools covers the usual suspects.

What's next​