Posts Categorized: Building Product Manufacturers

How a tile specialist is using social media to share advice and build customer relationships

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This is the fourth blog post in our interview series that investigates how different companies within the UK construction sector are using social media for their business. Karen joins me from Reed Harris, a specialist tile importer, to discuss how Twitter and blogging have helped them connect with architects, interior designers and other construction professionals from all over the UK. I personally met Karen on Twitter when she joined over a year ago and then had the pleasure of meeting her face to face at Ecobuild last year.

I am also a big fan of her blog which is full of useful design information and inspiration. If you would like to know more about their fabulous tiles then download the Reed Harris tile guide which gives an overview of the methods and materials used in their successful projects.

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Digital marketing seminars and workshops for building product manufacturers

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Last year we held two very successful digital marketing events in London and Manchester with delegates from all over the construction industry. Due to the popularity of the events, we are running a series of digital marketing seminars and workshops throughout this new year, targeted at business owners and marketers from building product manufacturers. The full day seminars will be held in London and Manchester while the more intensive and hands-on half day workshops will take place at our office in Milton Keynes.

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MDi TV Episode 9 – Optimising page titles for product manufacturer websites

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The latest episode of MDi TV illustrates how product manufacturers within the construction industry can optimise their product page titles. When architects and specifiers are searching online they might already have a specific product in mind and will type this brand or product name directly into search engines. If your page titles are not optimised then you could be missing out on a large volume of quality traffic. Watch this screencast to learn how important unique page titles are and how you can ensure that your website appears in search results for your products.

Please let us know if you have any questions that you would like answered in a future episode by sending a tweet to @PauleyCreative or emailing us.

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How a building product manufacturer is using social media for their business

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Welcome to our first guest blog post where we take a deeper look into how product manufacturers within the construction industry are using social media. First up in this series is Playrite, who manufacture artificial surfaces and synthetic grass for sports facilities, playgrounds and leisure surfaces. They have an active presence on Twitter, Facebook and regularly update their company blog.

I initially heard about Playrite and their products through Twitter and since then have shared many interesting conversations on Twitter. In October we had the pleasure of actually meeting their marketing manager, Lorna Duncanson in person when she attended our Digital Marketing Seminar. Meeting online friends offline is one of my favourite things! I will now happily hand you over to Lorna to give you a short introduction to Playrite, what they do, how they use social media and what positive results it has had on their business.

UPDATE (16/05/2012) Marketing manager Lorna Duncanson is running 5k for race for life in July so please donate here.

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Increasing the visibility of your construction product website in search engines

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I was kindly asked to present at the RIBA Insight Consultancy Day for its members, mainly product manufacturers and suppliers. Over 100 delegates attended the day which saw a range of topics presented and discussed including ‘BIM take up amongst professional services’ and ‘what do Architects want from product CPD’s’ and an ever popular topic ‘Adding Social Media to your Construction Marketing Mix’ presented by Paul Wilkinson.

Finally my presentation on increasing the visibility of construction product websites in search engines and ensuring they are found by specifiers, architects, engineers and designers when they are looking for new products, services or businesses for a particular project or problem. The presentation can be viewed below. Feel free to leave any comments or questions in the comments section below.Read More

How to Create Construction Content Using Search and Google Analytics

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So you have a blog. What do you write about? How do you intend to make sure that the content on your blog is relevant to your website visitors and your prospects? Online content is the most important part of any website when it comes to converting visitors into leads. If your content is valuable and usable then it is more likely that the visitor will subscribe, download, share or register in order to get more valuable content from you. If your content is poor, don’t expect visitor growth, increase in leads or conversions from your website.

I am going to share with you a simple technique which I have been using for a while now to help kick start a content strategy for construction product manufacturers to help them produce content which is relevant and useful for their prospects and customers. This technique may only apply to websites which have satisfactory levels of search optimisation applied and are already acquiring a good level of traffic from search engines. Why? Put it simply, you will be using search to drive content to drive search.

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How product manufacturers can make their email marketing more social

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Email marketing remains one of the main communication mediums in the construction industry. Building product manufacturers use it to update their customers and prospects on new products, to promote exclusive discounts and discuss industry news. There are articles floating about saying that social media will ‘kill’ email but these forget the most important point; you need an email address to have a social media account in the first place! Email is not going away but the way it is used for marketing needs to adapt and align with the changing buying behaviour of specifiers and architects.

Social media should be seen as a partner and not as a threat to email marketing. Together they can strengthen your brand message, provide new communication channels and increase your exposure to existing and potential customers. Both email and social media aim to keep your construction products top of mind for architects and specifiers by communicating with them in a relevant and timely manner that is both testable and measurable. Social media is the new tool but does not work alone. It is part of your overall marketing mix, of which email plays a large role.

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Calculating your website’s ‘share of search’ and prioritising your SEO

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A common request we get from prospects/clients is “I want my building product website to be ranked on page 1 or at the top of Google for these search terms” and pulls out a piece of paper with 20 or so search phrases scribbled on it. My reply would always be “How do you know they are the search terms or keywords your prospects use?”

To help clients understand the impact of search engines on website performance, search traffic generation and implementing a search engine optimisation strategy we need to understand where they are now by benchmarking. I wrote in a previous post about the importance of benchmarking to help identify where improvements can be made and where additional efforts are required through controlled experiments (small changes but made often).

The benchmarking process involves gathering data from various analytical sources to help identify:

  • What are my top 20 non-branded search terms? (non-branded = excluding company name and this is where your SEO should be focused)
  • Where is my website currently ranking in Google for those non-branded search terms?
  • How many visits have been generated to the website from those non-branded 20 search terms over a 6 month period?
  • Approximately how many ‘exact’ searches are made in Google for those top non-branded 20 search terms over a 6 month period?
  • What is my % share?
  • Which search terms should I prioritise and optimise? (Note: This is the outcome, actions!)Read More

What defines a market leader in building products?

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Any business has a specific target market(s). ‘Markets’ can be defined and grouped in different ways such as by geographical location, demographics, customer type or a combination of several elements. This concept is relatively easy to understand but the tricky question lies in defining a market leader. The word ‘market leader’ seems to have different meanings for different people. Most importantly though what does it mean for your customers? They are the ones who are buying your products so you need to know how they define it, not just how you define it.  According to an online business dictionary it means:

A brand, product, or firm that has the largest percentage of total sales revenue (the market share) of a market. A market leader often dominates its competitors in customer loyalty, distribution coverage, image, perceived value, price, profit, and promotional spending.

This definition includes a variety of elements and some market leaders dominate in all categories whilst others might only dominate in a few of them. When specifiers and architects are choosing building products, what is most important for them and how do they a define market leader? Do they focus on the company with the largest sales volume and profits, the widest distribution network, the best proven product performance?Read More