If I said your Construction business could be viewed as a “major brand” with a selection of effective construction marketing techniques would you laugh?
Well, whilst your construction business might not currently compete in terms of sales, awareness and credibility there is no reason why you can’t give the impression you are a force to be reckoned with.
Whether you construction company is on a strict budget, just starting out or looking for new methods of connecting with existing customers here is some great tips and advice
First Impressions
Like a job interview, making the right first impression to a potential customer is invaluable to your construction business. You may have a great business, great products and services, but this may not be the message you are conveying to your customers.
Let’s have a look at some of the construction marketing essentials that can create a great first impression of your business on a new audience.
Stage 1: Construction Marketing Essentials
1. Brilliant Branding
Branding embodies everything your business is about and represents a promise to your customer. Branding represents how a construction business differentiates itself from the competition, your position in the market, the value of your product. You can find out more about branding specifically here.
These are essential customer facing elements of your company branding
Construction marketing style guide
Your customers won’t see this document directly, but having one is essential to ensure your business is represented correctly through all of your marketing activities. The fonts used, the exact colour pantones and dimensions will make for the ultimate reference point for all marketing materials you produce.
Construction company logo
Is it distinctive, engaging, modern, fresh, intriguing? Does it do enough to catch the eye? Your logo needs to be consistently represented across all of your marketing channels, slight variations in colour, font, size and pixilation can have a very negative effect on first impressions. Your construction business logo is a key component of how your brand is specified and you can find out more about the type of process that often goes into creating a logo with branding and profile in mind.
2. Website
As mentioned in a recent post your website should be at the core of any construction marketing activity and is often a potential customers first port of entry to your construction business. Make you website interactive, clear and full of the content your audience will expect to be able to find (technical data sheets, installation guides, videos and more).
Stage 2: Clever Construction Marketing Techniques that Standout
Create great content that showcases the best your construction business has to offer. Gathering the content your business needs to propel it to new heights doesn’t need to come at great expense, here are some great content capturing techniques that can be obtained with a limited marketing budget.
3. Company showcase video
This a great way to build credibility for your construction business and impress potential customers, and can be of value for a number of years. Show customers your product production line, your workforce, interview key staff about what the company does and the service. Shown on the homepage of your website and shared via your social media, a company video can be one of the best investments your business makes.
4. On-site installations
Such is the quality of smartphone cameras it”s easy to capture website worthy video and photos to showcase your insulation products and services being delivered on site. With some minor touch-ups using adobe creative suite or other online tools video can be personalised quickly, hosted on your website and shared via social media and email
5. Case Studies & Testimonials
An essential means to give your company significant credibility. Customers will want to know where your insulation product or service has been installed or utilised before, and prestigious recognised projects are the perfect way to build a bridge between you and the customer
6. Technical Literature
A must for all construction companies, incredible technical literature that details all specifications, applications and accreditations associated with your products and services must be available online
7. 3D Product Images and Animations
On site smartphone footage is invaluable, but rendered animation images or video of your product or service in application can be clearer and add an extra layer of professionalism.
8. Go Live with Social Media
Social media tools such as Facebook Live or Twitters periscope are an entertaining way for companies to engage with their audience. Your construction business could use these in-the moment platforms to showcase profile projects, product launches or to even greater effect at construction events where they can attract the interest of people at the show or those unable to attend. Due to the popularity of twitter in the built environment periscope might seem the obvious choice, but recent statistics indicate that Facebook Live is vastly more popular than periscope amongst companies, largely due to better functionality and it’s significantly larger number of users (twitter 300 million/facebook 1 billion). If your construction industry business has a strong facebook following it may prove to be the most beneficial social media channel to adopt for your live filming requirements.
Stage 3: Communicating Your Construction Marketing Content
You’ve got the essentials and the standout content that your business needs, communication is the final step to place yourself amongst the big business’ in the built environment:
9. Email Campaigns and Newsletters
Your existing database of customers is an extremely valuable asset and if they have signed up to receive regular communications they WILL open your emails. This direct line of communication continues to be hugely valuable tool across all industries
10. Social Media
Utilising the content from your website, use automation tools to feed press releases, case studies, blog entries and news regularly into your social media accounts (twitter, linkedin, Google+)
Enhance this content with engaging images using a free online creative tools or professional tools such as adobe creative cloud. Use hashtags (#) and handles (@) to increase engagement and leverage your content where and reach a wider audience on social media
Construction Marketing Fit for a King
Even with a limited construction marketing budget it is possible to make a big impact in the online and offline space.
The list here is by no means definitive (no examples of offline marketing such as exhibitions), but is a great starting point for anyone who is trying to navigate a new business venture, or implement effective marketing tools that won’t cost the earth.
The key is creating great content and utilising the tools and platforms available consistently to create a consistent presence in a highly competitive environment.
