Posts Categorized: Construction Marketing

Wrapping up a busy 2010 for construction marketing

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As the saying goes “Hasn’t this year just flown by?”

Indeed it has and what a year it has been too. 2010 has seen the rise of social media and how construction companies, large and small, look to embrace social platforms for pushing out content and increasing networking opportunities. Interesting discussions have taken place regarding the uses of social media within the industry and whether any form of ROI can be calculated. It seems as though many companies and marketers are still trying to work out how it can be used to assist with their business objectives and goals.

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The construction industry is gradually embracing digital communication strategies and tactics

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Last week Pritesh and I attended the 2010 CIMCIG conference held in London. The event was full of marketing professionals and construction industry experts. It offered a great networking opportunity and the chance to meet influential people with whom we had been talking to on social media sites such as Twitter and LinkedIn.

A major sign that the industry has come a long way is the fact that the #cimcig10 hashtag on Twitter was more popular that day than news about Gillian McKeith in the jungle. On average there were about 10 individuals tweeting live throughout the event (including us), thereby giving professionals, who were not able to attend the event, exclusive up-to-date insight into the topics being discussed. The overall reach accomplished by the #cimcig10 hashtag was over 54 000 people which is phenomenal and would have been very difficult to achieve without social media.

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5 ways construction professionals can use LinkedIn to build a network

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LinkedIn provides a platform for construction professionals to connect with each other and increase their networks by providing valuable business tips and advice. LinkedIn is used slightly differently compared to other social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter. It has a professional reputation and should not be used as a selling tool. Smart construction professionals will avoid excessive self-promotion and instead sell themselves and their services by being a valuable knowledge source in the community which they serve.

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Building loyalty and reducing one night stands

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We’ve spent a lot of time over the last few years re-analysing clients’ web data and measuring the performance of their website(s) against their competitors, business objectives and plans set out for the forth coming year in preparation for the next. Mining through the data to find the insights which will enable me to answer real business questions such as:

  • “Is my website attracting quality traffic?”
  • “Are visitors, and in particular Architects, engaging with my website?”
  • “How many visitors entered my website via my key product pages?”
  • “Is my website converting traffic into leads?”
  • “Which sources are performing the best in attracting traffic and then converting?”
  • “Why do people leave the site from the homepage?”
  • “Which search terms are performing the best against their rankings in Google?” (Hint: Ranking first in Google does not always produce results)

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Integrating your online and offline construction marketing strategies

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The new year is quickly approaching and many businesses have already planned their 2011 marketing strategies. However, for those who haven’t yet, this post provides useful tips and guidelines for integrating your online and offline marketing activities to ensure maximum impact and effectiveness. Some companies in the construction industry still keep their offline and online marketing activities separate, leading to confused messages, inconsistency and wasted budgets.Read More

14 Things to Consider for the Perfect Construction Website Home Page

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The home page of any website should be a sign post. It should be built to move your audience on.

You don’t want your audience on the home page, there is nothing of depth there.

The quest for quick targeted knowledge means the more focused, more relevant, faster loading pages will start ranking higher in the search engines.

If your home page is the only page your construction company is being found for in Google then you have a big problem…

This post is about how to leverage the popularity of your home page to get visitors to where they need to get to quickly and with minimum effort.

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UBM publish research results for construction industry marketers

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UBM (United Business Media) recently released the results of an independent research study amongst architecture, construction and commercial property professionals about mainstream construction industry publications. The data gathered provides marketers with valuable information about the current market situation to guide their future campaign development decisions.

The study showed a gradual decrease in industry employees, falling from 100,534 people in 2005 to 80,513 people in 2010. The greatest difference was in the number of house-builders/contractors which fell dramatically. The number was nearly halved, demonstrating the impact of the recession which forced many companies to decrease employee numbers. Surprisingly, there is a significant increase in the number of architects which were the only group not to decrease in number.
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Random acts of Marketing

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Had a great meeting with a clever guy (nearly five years ago now) who unprompted, confessed to implementing ‘Random acts of Marketing’.

It made me wonder how many agency and client-side senior managers and marketing managers within the construction industry are actually brave enough to step forward and say;

“Yep, that was random. That was probably a complete waste of time and money. Truth is I don’t know”

I know I’ve been prone to a few random acts over the years*

Post updated – October 2014

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5 ways construction companies can use online video

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Following on from my previous post on 5 reasons why construction companies should be  blogging, we now look at how construction companies can use online video and in particular YouTube as the tool of choice.

Online video usage and consumption is on the increase. Fact. Forrester Research recently reported that videos were 50 times more likely to receive an organic first page search ranking than traditional text pages. So, if you want to get some of your content onto the first page of Google very quickly then make sure it’s a video.

A quick search on the web for ‘Rainwater Harvesting Systems’ returns a mix of video, image and text based results. This is called ‘blended results’. What I want to point out here is that the video on the left (circled below) is produced by a company called ISW (Innovative Water Solutions) and yet they don’t have a single text or image based listing on the first page of Google, but the video is there driving traffic to the YouTube channel and then if viewers are wanting to know more they then have to option to visit the company website.Read More