Restoration CRM Implementation: A 30-Day Rollout Plan

The hardest part of new restoration software is rarely the software. It is the switch: moving years of jobs and contacts, getting the office and the field to change habits, and doing it while water losses keep coming in. Most rollouts that stall don't stall on features. They stall because the switch dragged on, both systems ran side by side for months, and the team drifted back to what they knew.

A 30-day plan prevents that. Here is a week-by-week rollout that works for most small and mid-size restoration companies.

Before day 1: three decisions

• Pick one owner. One person — often the operations manager — owns the rollout, makes the calls, and has the time to do it.
• Set the cutover date. Put the day the old system stops taking new jobs on the calendar now. Thirty days out is realistic for most teams, and a fixed date is what keeps the project moving.
• Decide what migrates. Open jobs, active contacts, referral partners, and recent closed jobs almost always move. Ten years of closed jobs may not need to, or may move as read-only history. Decide up front.

Week 1: configure

Set up the platform to match how you actually run jobs, not how the old system made you run them.

• Job types and stages. Water mitigation, rebuild, mold, fire, and contents, each with stages that match your real process.
• Roles and permissions. Who sees financials, who approves estimates, and what technicians see in the field.
• Templates. Work authorizations, certificates of completion, email and text templates, and job checklists.
• Equipment and pricing. Your equipment inventory and the price lists you work from.

Keep it simple. Configure for the jobs you do every week. Edge cases can wait until month two.

Week 2: migrate and verify

• Export from the old system. Pull jobs, contacts, companies, and documents. Find out how your current vendor handles exports before you give notice.
• Import, then spot-check. After the import, open 20 records at random and compare them with the old system: names, addresses, carrier and claim numbers, job stage, and balances. Problems found in week 2 are easy to fix.
• Clean as you go. Migration is the easiest moment you will ever have to merge duplicate contacts and close out dead leads.
• Connect accounting. If you use QuickBooks, connect it now so customers, jobs, and invoices line up before the team starts working.

Week 3: train and pilot

• Train the office first. Intake, scheduling, estimating, and invoicing. The office sets up the jobs the field works in, so they go first.
• Then the field, on a phone. Technicians learn on the device they will use every day: photos, readings, scans, signatures, and job notes. Keep sessions short and hands-on.
• Run a pilot crew. Put one crew's new jobs entirely in the new system for the week. They will find the gaps before everyone else does.
• Record the sessions. Next month's new hire will need the same training.

Week 4: cut over

• All new jobs go in the new system, starting on the cutover date.
• Open jobs finish where it makes sense. Jobs near closeout can finish in the old system; everything else moves.
• Make the old system read-only. If people can still enter jobs there, some will.
• Hold a 15-minute daily check-in for the first week after cutover to clear blockers fast.

After day 30: measure

Choose three numbers to compare with the old system after 60 days — for example, estimate turnaround, time from completion to invoice, and aging receivables. Our list of restoration KPIs has more to choose from. If a number isn't moving, look at adoption first: who is still working on paper, in a side spreadsheet, or in the old system?

What stretches 30 days into six months

• No single owner, or an owner without the time.
• No cutover date, so both systems run "until we're ready."
• Migrating everything, including a decade of data no one will open.
• Training only the owner and the office manager.
• Customizing every edge case before go-live.

How riivet onboarding works

Riivet onboarding follows the same shape, with our team doing the heavy lifting. A one-time onboarding fee covers configuring your workspace (job types, pipelines, workflows, and roles), migrating your data from DASH, Albi, Xcelerate, PSA, or JobNimbus, live remote training for the office and the field, session recordings your team keeps for new hires, and a dedicated onboarding lead all the way to go-live. The fee and the seat price are on the pricing page.

If you're still choosing, start with the 12-point checklist for choosing restoration software, and if you run a smaller team, read choosing a restoration CRM for a small company. When you're ready to see it with your own team, book a demo.

The takeaway

A CRM rollout succeeds on decisions more than features: one owner, a fixed cutover date, and a clear line on what migrates. Configure in week 1, migrate and verify in week 2, train and pilot in week 3, and cut over in week 4. Make the old system read-only, measure after 60 days, and fix adoption before anything else.