Presented by: Grant, Senior Customer Success Manager
This is a quick-reference summary of the webinar to read alongside the recording — use it to jump to the parts most relevant to you, or as a refresher after watching.
What it is: A search tool covering every planning application submitted across the UK, backdated to 1980 (over 23.5 million applications). Unlike your campaigns/leads, nothing found here can accidentally trigger a letter — it's a research and discovery tool only.
How to search:
Define an area using the map — a simple radius circle, a custom drawn polygon, or by postcode. Multiple separate drawn areas can be used in a single search (no limit).
Narrow results with filters: property value range, number of dwellings/units, application type (e.g. listed buildings, conservation areas), included/excluded keywords (e.g. excluding "mobile home"), decision status (approved, rejected, undecided, withdrawn, other), and date range.
Document search lets you search the full text of attached planning documents, not just the application description — useful for finding detail that wouldn't appear in a short summary (e.g. searching for "passive house" or "kitchen" inside submitted documents, with "could contain" or "must contain" options).
Key use cases demonstrated:
General prospecting — e.g. new-build applications in a specific area, filtered by value, unit count, and decision status, to build a shortlist of live opportunities.
Niche document search — finding applications matching very specific project types (e.g. passive house builds, kitchen extensions) even when the keyword isn't in the application title.
Architect/agent search — searching by agent or architect name to see their full history of applications (e.g. all jobs an architect firm has worked on, filtered by year, with approval rates). Useful for building a business development case before approaching a firm — e.g. "I know you're working on 20+ live applications in this area, and we can support you across that range."
Reference lookup — searching by a specific planning application number to pull up a known project (handy for enquiries that come in outside of Build Scout, e.g. via your website or organic traffic).
Saving and exporting:
Any search criteria can be saved as a named preset and reloaded at any time.
Growth-tier subscriptions and above can export results to CSV (emailed within ~30 seconds–1 minute), compatible with Excel, Google Sheets, or Numbers.
Individual results can be saved directly into Projects to avoid losing them.
Note on outreach: Find Leads results can't trigger a letter send directly (that stays tied to the Campaigns feature) — Build Scout is exploring how to integrate the two, and is gathering feedback on this. For architect contact details not already in Build Scout, Grant's recommended approach is a quick manual search (Google, ChatGPT, or LinkedIn) using the agent name and address shown in the application.
What it is: A built-in project management tool for tracking opportunities and jobs after (or even before) a lead is won — designed to replace ad hoc tracking in spreadsheets, WhatsApp groups, or paper filing, using data you've already paid for as part of your subscription.
Setting up a project:
Create a project and give it a name.
Link it to a planning application (by address, name, or application number) to automatically pull in all associated data — no manual entry needed.
Key details section holds:
Contacts — homeowner, architect, and any others added later (structural engineers, planning officers, subcontractors, designers, etc.), each simple to add, edit, or remove.
Addresses — site address, applicant's address, architect's address, etc. can all be added.
Planning history — adding an address pulls in its full planning history, backdated to 1980, useful for understanding earlier work on a site the homeowner may not even remember.
Attachments — planning documents can be selectively added from the application (a future update will pin them all in by default, letting you remove unwanted ones).
Documents & photos — upload your own files (photos, videos, GIFs) for a running record — useful for health & safety, building control, and general project history so nothing gets lost in email threads or WhatsApp.
Tracking progress:
Each project has a status and can be logged with dated activity notes (e.g. "spoke with customer, booking meeting").
An estimated value can be added and updated at any stage, building a live view of your total project pipeline value.
Projects can be viewed as a list or a Kanban/timeline board — columns are fully customisable (names, colours, order), and a project's value rolls up per column so you can see where your pipeline value sits at each stage. A "blocked" column was suggested as a useful addition for flagging stalled projects to the wider team.
Projects can be marked public or private, assigned an owner, and set to send email notifications when a project moves between columns — giving directors/managers full visibility across a team.
Projects and photo uploads are fully usable on mobile and tablet (mobile view is still being refined — feedback welcome).
Tasks:
Tasks can be created within a project with a description and due date, and marked complete/incomplete.
A future update will add global tasks (not tied to a specific project) and checklists within tasks, for multi-step processes like "send quotation."
