Joe Tolzmann Of RocketPlan On 5 Things You Need To Know To Create a Highly Successful App

An Interview With Rachel Kline

Find software engineers who possess initiative: Apps don’t build themselves. Our software engineers had the drive to ask questions and pushback if something we were asking for didn’t make sense. They determined the best code for what we wanted to achieve. An app has to be about user experience — but tailored to your niche. Make sure your software engineers understand this.

There are millions of apps out there. Many are very successful, but most are not. What are the steps taken by successful app makers that distinguish them from unsuccessful ones? In addition, many people have ideas for an app but don’t know where to begin. What are the steps you need to take to create a successful app? As part of this series, I had the pleasure of interviewing Joe Tolzmann.

Joe Tolzmann is CEO of RocketPlan, an app for property restoration professionals. He has 15+ years of experience starting and successfully scaling businesses. Tolzmann launched RocketPlan back in 2020 when the pandemic started to take hold. But knowing he was building a platform for a recession-proof industry, he forged on. Today, RocketPlan is signing global clients, even though it’s the youngest property restoration management app in the industry.

Thank you so much for joining us! Before we dive in, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘backstory’ and how you grew up?

I grew up in Croatia back when it was still under the Yugoslavian communist regime, so entrepreneurship was more difficult to pursue. I discovered this early on. When I was six, I copied comic books and sold them to my schoolmates. But when the school found out, I was scolded rather than applauded for being so enterprising. But the experience fueled my drive to be a leader, so when I could, I decided to move to a country that would foster this drive. I was able to start my own restoration business in Canada and grow it successfully. It eventually led to me building the RocketPlan app based on the pain points I experienced.

Most of us have been around a lot longer than apps have. What were your hobbies and interests in your youth before anyone knew what an ‘app’ was?

It’s funny when people ask me about hobbies. While others normally say a sport or activity, I’ve always been interested in anything to do with real estate. Even before apps, I would look at real estate listings and try to calculate liveable square footage, how much that condo cost per square foot, what kind of return would I get on my investment, thoughts like that. That’s my hobby. So it translates to property restoration quite well.

It has been said that our mistakes are our greatest teachers. Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lessons or ‘takeaways’ you learned from that?

I wouldn’t call it a mistake, but one of the funniest experiences I’ve had as an entrepreneur was hiring an employee who only spoke Korean…but I only spoke Croatian at the time! Let me tell you, communication was difficult to say the least, but the takeaway has stuck with me throughout my career: you don’t need to speak to communicate. Through observation, we eventually learned each other’s methods of working. Sometimes it took drawing out a schematic, but our collaboration was successful.

I tend to meet two types of app developers; people who are passionate about app development and technology and people who started an app because they saw it as a means to solve a problem. Which camp would you put yourself in, and how did you arrive there?

I definitely fall into the second category: I saw the RocketPlan app as a means to solve a systemic problem in the property restoration industry, mainly, the lack of mobile-first technology. When I had my restoration company, I worked with the crew on a job site doing demolition, cleanup, getting all the documentation and insurance claims paperwork ready. I worked long hours organizing, creating reports, estimates, and billing. As we grew, we tried to implement software to streamline this data capture process. The three we tried all took about three to six months to onboard, only to realize none of them worked. And the reason for that was they were built before smartphones became really smart. And the workflow was backwards because everything happens in the field on a damaged property. So you have to capture all the documentation, bring it to the office — whether it’s emails, paper copies, etc. — and upload it into that software, which is just unacceptable. The amount of confusion, stress, inefficiencies, errors — it cost us a lot of manual labor hours. So I figured I had to hire a software engineer to build something for the employees in the field to capture data on the go. So we built this prototype. It looked like 1980’s DOS, had a black screen, green and red buttons on it, but it worked well. We were able to capture data on-and-go and streamline our entire business from reporting, estimating and billing. Ultimately cutting out 50 percent of admin labor, and we were supporting insurance adjusters, property managers, insurers, etc because now we were easier to deal with than our competitors. And it also helps homeowners get back to normal by shortening the claims cycle. And then one day I realized what a massive opportunity this was to help the entire industry solve that systematic issue. Hence, RocketPlan was born.

Entrepreneurship is a marathon, not a sprint — though I suppose sometimes it’s both at the same time. What kept you motivated to develop your first minimum viable product, and how have you kept your momentum since then?

My early motivation was to streamline my own restoration business and help my field teams do their jobs more efficiently. Sure, it improved the company’s bottom line, but what drove that growth was improving my teams’ work environment, which led to higher productivity. That DOS-looking app was basic, but it worked. And improving upon that first MVP has kept RocketPlan’s momentum going.

Ok, thank you for all that. Now let’s shift to the main focus of this interview. Can you tell us a bit about your app? How does it help people? What do you think makes it stand out? What are you most proud of?

The success of the RocketPlan app lies in its simplicity. It’s mobile-first (obviously), and helps all stakeholders of a property restoration project stay connected. When a disaster like a flood happens, a restoration contractor is out there capturing data. That person can do the entire job on the RocketPlan app — take photos, infrared scans, notes, project/loss data, equipment logs, atmospheric readings, everything they need to streamline their reporting, estimating and billing with easy data capture from their mobile device and submit the claim directly from his or her smartphone. Insurers receive the claim, contractors receive work authorizations, project managers keep track of which projects are on the go and so on. All data is time-stamped and GPS-tracked so disputes are handled easily. I’m most proud of the app saving field teams the headaches of data capture. It’s easy to use, takes just a few minutes to onboard, but saves countless hours of manual data entry.

Approximately how many users or subscribers does your app currently have? Can you share with our readers three of the main steps you’ve taken to build such a large community?

We are experiencing explosive growth. We have some of the largest national and international firms on board. We have branches with 30+ employees self onboard without any challenges. RocketPlan takes 14 minutes to set up a team of 2 or 200. It’s the same 14 minutes and it doesn’t require training. Anyone who can take a selfie is ready to go.

What is your monetization model? How do you monetize your community of users? Have you considered other monetization options? Why did you not use those?

It’s a simple subscription, per user, billed monthly or discounted annually. RocketPlan’s pricing is transparent, easy to calculate, with an ROI estimator right on our website. We’re focused on this particular monetization method because it works, and simplifies the math. The app is all about ease of implementation, so it wouldn’t serve our cause to make our subscription plans difficult to understand.

Can you tell our readers about the most unconventional tactic you’ve used to test, market, or gain feedback on a product? What did you try, what was unique about it, and what was the outcome?

Absolutely. When we demo our product to potential customers, we simply ask them to download it on their smartphone and onboard themselves. That’s our entire demonstration model. Let the product do the talking, it speaks for itself. And feedback has been amazing. They can’t believe how easy it is to use.

What are some of the strategies you have used to improve your products and build on their success?

Definitely listen to your customers. We’ve recently introduced time-tracking and accounting integration features because it further automates the property restoration process. Our goal is to be the one-stop shop for all property restoration data needs.

Thank you. Here is the main question of our interview. Based on your experience and success, what are the five most important things one should know in order to create a very successful app? If you can, please share a story or an example for each.

1 . Choose the right industry that fits your experience: I chose to build an app for property restoration management because I had experience running a restoration company. I experienced the pain points first hand, so I knew what my app needed to address in order to achieve success.

2 . Build the right team: When I started RocketPlan, my closest colleague was also someone with whom I had worked during my restoration days. We had the same company vision because we had experienced the same challenges. Growing the company and building out the app, I had someone I could trust to make sure the team’s goals were always aligned.

3 . Find software engineers who possess initiative: Apps don’t build themselves. Our software engineers had the drive to ask questions and pushback if something we were asking for didn’t make sense. They determined the best code for what we wanted to achieve. An app has to be about user experience — but tailored to your niche. Make sure your software engineers understand this.

4 . Make it intuitive: RocketPlan clients onboard themselves. We don’t offer training sessions because we’ve built an app that doesn’t require one. If you can take a selfie, you can use RocketPlan. So make sure your app is easy to use, or nobody will use it.

5 . Be sure it solves an industry problem: The app you build HAS to be unlike any other app out there. With RocketPlan, I was out to solve one very specific problem that legacy platforms didn’t address — how to help field teams capture data efficiently for property restoration insurance claims. I knew the pain points, and built features to take the pain away.

You are a person of great influence. If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. :-)

I firmly believe that each of us bears a duty and responsibility to contribute in whatever capacity we can. When considering business economics, it is crucial to go beyond just being ‘profitable’. It presents an opening to embrace the potential for creating a positive impact on society and the planet. Investigating such avenues becomes imperative.

How can our readers further follow your work online?

Find us on https://www.rocketplantech.com/about and reach out! We’re also on Instagram.

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!