Want to get a deck built? Try 'splurfing' for quotes

Wake up and check your Splurf.

That's the way creators of a new website hope to change the routine of small-business owners around the country in the next few months.

With membership to the service growing at the rate of hundreds a week, the early signs are "splurfing" could catch on.

The website connects customers (splurfers) with local businesses providing the goods or services they are looking for.

After sending their job request to the website, it is then sent out to appropriate businesses to bid for the work.

A splurfer wanting a deck built could describe what they want and where they want it built. Splurf then matches their request with Splurf-registered builders that meet the requirements.

They then supply quotes to the splurfer who can negotiate and choose their preferred builder for the job.

Although the service would be particularly useful for tradespeople, Splurf has signed up businesses as diverse as florists, signwriters, freight companies and wedding planners.

"Splurf harnesses the power of the web in a way not done before to help businesses grow," said founder Patrick McPhee.

"In the past, having a website or getting themselves on to a search engine or a business directory was about all they could do."

While the returns from classified and Yellow Pages advertisements could be difficult to quantify, the benefits of Splurf were easier to calculate.

While free to the splurfer, businesses pay an annual site registration of $49.99 and are charged 50c for every Splurf request sent to their Splurf email inbox.

Daily Splurf quotas can be set and businesses can also specify the nature of the job request they want to be sent - say only those in West Auckland.

Those not operating from an office can receive a Splurf via text message and splurfers can phone an 0800 number to listen to their quote.

Splurf plans to sign up companies such as large retailers to sponsor those text messages.

"Business has been searching for business in all the wrong places. The Yellow Pages and search engines are not designed to match what customers want," said McPhee.

Six months in the making, McPhee identified the opportunity for Splurf through customers of his Auckland-based finance company Finance1st.

"We were doing a lot of personal finance for people looking to renovate their homes and there was no facility for them to use to find the services they were after quickly and easily," he said.

McPhee and business partner Nigel Lewis are so confident of its success that they have invested more than $100,000 to develop and test the site.

They now have 12 business development reps on the road signing up businesses in advance of the mid-October launch.

Targets of 100 businesses a week are being met and McPhee hopes to reach 10,000 registered businesses during the first month of going live.

So far the pair have gone all this way on a hunch but are confident Kiwis will embrace the opportunity to source multiple quotes at the push of a button.

"Everyone needs to save time today," said McPhee.

"What's better, you won't have to search through hundreds of pages to find what you want and waste more time calling those businesses for quotes.

"With Splurf, we've eliminated the need to search. We simply take your exact requirements and match them with the right businesses."

Feedback from Splurf users would be used to build up performance ratings for registered businesses.