Solar provider company achieves INR ₹125 million in revenue within two quarters after employing Bigin

The company

In the heart of Gujarat, Mehul Prajapati brought Say Solar to life in August 2017. What began as a bold step has blossomed into a successful enterprise, dedicated to serving residential, commercial, and industrial clients with reliable solar rooftop solutions. Say Solar is a key distributor for industry giants like Rayzon Solar and Havells India Limited in the B2B market. The company extends its reach directly to consumers, offering seamless solar rooftop installation at their homes. Today, a dedicated team of 24 professionals, spanning finance, administration, sales, operations, and supply chain, work in collaboration to drive Say Solar's mission, making clean energy accessible and efficient.

The challenge

Like many startups, Mehul initially managed Say Solar's operations on Google Sheets and a local software called OctaBees for sales. As deals started rolling in, they introduced Tally for accounting. However, as different teams began relying on separate tools to handle their tasks, coordination became a challenge. With sales, accounting, support, and operations working in silos, information was scattered and lacked coordination. This led to lost emails and negatively impacted customer service. That's when Mehul realized the need for an integrated software that could bring all their teams under one roof.

The solution

A friend of Mehul, a freelance consultant, suggested trying Bigin for his business. Curious to explore, Mehul signed up for a free trial. He began creating contacts and a single pipeline, and within a week, he purchased two user licenses and added two more pipelines. The team gradually adopted the platform, increasing the number of users. Today, 14 team members at Say Solar are actively using Bigin to manage their day-to-day operations.

Zoho Books: Since Mehul was already using Zoho Books, this integration with Bigin was a game changer for the team. The sales team now generates quotes independently, eliminating the extra step of coordinating between the finance and sales teams.

At Say Solar, every customer journey begins with documentation. Whether it's a residential inquiry or a B2B deal, the team collects essential documents to initiate the process. Once submitted, a feasibility check is conducted, where an agent visits the site, assesses installation viability, and updates the status. Upon order confirmation and payment, solar rooftops are dispatched for installation, followed by dedicated post-installation support.

Say Solar streamlined operations using Bigin's team pipelines. Now, their processes are neatly organized into five pipelines—sales, documentation, operations, customer support, and B2B sales.

To generate leads, the sales team runs targeted Facebook and Instagram campaigns linked directly to WhatsApp via Bigin's built-in integration. When an inquiry comes in through WhatsApp, the team validates it and creates a new deal in the sales pipeline from the customer's chat, which is further segmented into a commercial and residential sub-pipeline.

Once a deal is closed in the sales pipeline, Bigin's connected records feature helps create the same record in the documentation pipeline. This eliminates manual intervention between the two teams. Since B2B deals require extensive paperwork, the team tracks document collection before moving the deal into feasibility. If a site is deemed suitable, the deals automatically move to the operations pipelines again through connected records, where materials are dispatched, payments are confirmed, and installation is planned.

Customer support, which was handled manually through emails and calls, is now structured within the support pipeline. The complaints are captured directly via built-in forms embedded on the website.

Finally, B2B sales are managed in their dedicated B2B pipeline, allowing the team to track corporate orders.

Beyond managing pipelines, Say Solar makes use of the following features:

Activities module: Since almost every team at Say Solar interacts with customers daily, tasks, events, and calls are essential for managing communications. Online and offline meetings are scheduled as events, while internal follow-ups and payment tracking are managed through tasks. Additionally, incoming and outgoing calls are logged within the calls section of the Activities module.

Automation: Whenever a new deal gets created in any pipeline, Bigin automatically assigns tasks to a user based on the criteria set up by the team.

Forms: Say Solar has set up three pipeline forms in their Bigin account:

• A customer support form to log complaints directly into the support pipeline
• A B2B inquiry form to capture new business leads
• A referral tracking form to monitor customer referrals via WhatsApp and emails

Benefits and ROI

• The company has been growing at a 100% quarterly rate. In 2023, their turnover was INR 120 million, and, within just two quarters of 2024, they have already surpassed INR 12 billion in revenue.
• Compared to their previous tools, Say Solar has doubled their productivity with Bigin's automation across all teams.
• They increased customer support by 70%, with every ticket being answered within 24 hours.

Looking forward

Mehul is eagerly awaiting automation for WhatsApp templates in Bigin to eliminate the small bit of manual skill required. This enhancement will allow teams to focus on closing deals, saving time, and increasing productivity.