Posts By: Stuart Dinnie

Why a cut in marketing budgets might not be a bad thing for marketers

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Over the last few months there has been various studies released focusing on headcount and marketing budgets as we approach 2013. Research conducted by Lead Edge ‘Construction Market Barometer‘ recently showed that 28% of companies are expecting no change to their marketing budget, with 36% expecting growth. Whilst that is a good sign I personally also think that leaves more room for random acts of marketing (do more! do more of the less effective stuff!!).

Which means the remaining 36% of companies surveyed are looking at reducing marketing budgets. I can only assume that the companies which belong in this bucket are trying to assess which tactics, channels and strategies to cut or eliminate as we move closer to 2013.Read More

Has your site been affected by Google algorithm updates?

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Over the last 12 – 18 months or so Google has introduced a number of major updates/rollouts to its algorithm all of which are to bring better quality results to its users. By doing so it has to down rank, sometimes eliminate, some sites from its index which are deemed as spammy, contain low quality content or just simply sites which contain content available elsewhere (duplicated content). One of the biggest updates caused sites to be penalised because of unnatural link profiles – if you have been caught with an  unnatural link profile then your webmaster (who ever looks after your website) should have received a notification from Google regarding this and that action is required.Read More

Marketing boils down to providing unique value

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I recently viewed a keynote by the great Guy Kawasaki who tells us the 12 things Steve Jobs taught him. One of the things Steve taught him was marketing and providing unique value. As always, I try to find ways to translate this information and insight and make it relevant to our complex industry full of intricate supply chains. As a building product manufacturer with lots of competitors how do you make yourself unique and valuable? Most products are ‘me-to’ products and the only difference is the size of the organisation.

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15 things Marketers must stop doing now!

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Here is a list containing 15 things marketers must stop doing now largely based on recent conversations I’ve had with marketers, things I’ve observed and also from my own previous experience working client side for a large product manufacturer.

<rant>

1. Stop wasting money on big, heavy, glossy product brochures

Start putting things online. Drive people to the website where the information is most up to date and can be viewed on mobile or tablet. Save money on print costs and valuable space in the back of sales reps car boot. That space could be filled with golf balls.

2. Stop doing the same things you did in 2007

Start experimenting. Try something new for a change. Challenge the status quo for once. Push the boundaries and start learning something new. Stop something and see what the impact it has on the business (hold-out test) then you’ll realise how valuable that tactic is.Read More

Where do Construction News readers share news stories?

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Yesterday I had a look at where Construction Enquirer readers were sharing its news stories and interestingly most news stories were shared on LinkedIn and not Twitter as I thought it might have been.

So today I’m going to take a look where Construction News readers share articles. Over 40,000 pages from the website were scanned and a total of 4123 pages had been shared across social networking sites.Read More

On which social sites do Construction Enquirer readers share articles?

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Below is a table to show the most shared content from the Construction Enquirer website since it’s launch a few years ago and where stories are being shared. A total of 4229 shares had been counted from just 586 pages scanned on the Construction Enquirer website.

Predictably, the most shared content is from July probably because more Construction Enquirer readers are now on social networks than ever before and probably still growing. Only 1 story from June made the top 20 stories. The most shared story is the recent ‘No UK firms in world construction top twenty‘ which has been shared 107 times.

The ‘Contract Spy‘ page has been shared on Facebook more than it has done on Twitter or LinkedIn. Interesting?Read More

Marketing to the construction industry in a multi device world

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A few days ago I came across a very interesting slide deck by Michael Lanz, Industry Director at Google (shared by one of my Google+ buddies) about ‘Making the Web Work for You’. The presentation was focusing on the recent web trends, behaviour changes and the choice of devices available which in turn causes an acceleration in sharing on the web today.Read More

Top tips for managing a PR crisis for construction companies

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Does your construction company have a crisis management plan? Crisis planning is becoming increasingly important in our digital age, and should plot your response – or response procedure – to everything from a factory fire or flood, through to a major product failure.

If you haven’t already got a plan, the point at which your company creates a social media marketing campaign and policy, is also the point at which your crisis management plan MUST be implemented. Lack of response or a poorly considered response to a social media crisis can cause irreparable damage to your business communications, due to the speed and mass communication elements of the medium.Read More

“We’ve just launched our new building products website” Now what?

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Most marketers would consider the launch of a new website the end of a successful project and off they move onto the next project or job on the list. For us at Pauley Creative and our clients it’s only the start. This is where the action begins.

After launching a new site it’s perfectly normal to allow for a few weeks to monitor the change over from old site to new site from a visitor level and from Google perspective. Visitors who were regular visitors to the old site are now having to adjust to the new site. New visitors will have never seen the old site so it will be the first time they navigate through your website. Where will they start and where will they end? This is the period where lots of information can be collected on how users behave on the new website.Read More