I was initially drawn to learn more about how construction companies use digital marketing for two reasons:
- I've worked with companies in the data center industry, many of which were actively engaged in very complex construction projects -- like building huge hyper-scale data centers for companies as big as Facebook and Microsoft. (mission-critical real estate, data center real estate types of projects)
- I live in an area of the country (South Florida) with non-stop, high-volume commercial and residential construction projects in response to population growth.
1) Content Creation
2) Differentiation
3) Inbound Marketing
4) Lead Generation
5) Online Events
6) Thought Leadership
1) Content Creation
Content creation is extremely important in a digital-first world where people do tons of self-directed research before they ever get to your company.
The best way to scale this, to attract more of the right clients that are a great fit for your company, is to invest in content creation that's aligned with the challenges and goals of your buyer personas and where they are in the buyer’s journey.
2) Differentiation
Differentiation is all about how your ideal customers or clients perceive your company and your brand. Once you figure out who your primary buyer persona is, as well as your secondary buyer persona, you’ll know exactly who the most important economic driver is for the growth of your business.
Their perception of your company’s differentiation counts, not yours. If you want to nail differentiation, spend much more time understanding your buyer personas and what they care about early on. As a trusted advisor and subject matter expert, learn how to intercept them as early as possible.
3) Inbound Marketing
Inbound marketing is all about attracting prospective clients to your business through helpful content rather than obnoxious interruptions. Inbound marketing begins with detailed buyer personas of your ideal clients. From there, create content for your buyer personas for each stage of their buyer's journey (attract, engage, delight).
The idea behind inbound marketing is all about getting found and not chasing leads. Blogging, keywords, educational content, social media, search engine optimization (SEO), and search engine marketing (SEM) can all be used to attract your ideal customers.
4) Lead Generation
Lead generation is how you go about converting website visitors into leads. Leads that are segmented and nurtured properly help to drive bottom-of-the-funnel sales opportunities.
So it’s understandable to get excited about accelerating leads into sales opportunities and sales opportunities into new clients -- that provide scalable, predictable revenue growth. Traffic generation needs to happen before lead generation. Many of the ways that people generated leads historically with the traditional marketing and sales playbook don't work as well as they used to. For decades, sales teams relied on cold calling and cold emails. But cold calling is not terribly effective today because no one answers their phone anymore without viewing caller ID.
Cold emails are an uphill climb as well. Between Google Priority Inbox and aggressive filtering, getting messages through to people with whom you don't have a pre-existing relationship is tough. For lead generation to be effective in a digital-first world, your strategy must consider buyer personas, the buyer’s journey, premium content creation, and closed-loop reporting (what's working?). Lead generation building blocks for conversion paths include premium content, forms, landing pages, calls to action (CTAs), and confirmation pages.
5) Online Events
Online events are what most people would categorize as webinars, webcasts, web briefings, or online events hosted on social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, or YouTube.
The basic idea is that you're getting a group of people together for the common purpose of experiencing content in a live, virtual format. Who is the buyer persona you want this online event to appeal to when planning online events? Also, where is that buyer persona in their journey or life cycle?
For example, you might have an online event for clients that covers very different topics than an online event for strangers who have never before heard of your company or only have limited familiarity with what your company is all about. It can also be helpful to have SMART goals set for each of your online events. How many people do you want to register? How many people do you want to attend? In addition, online events provide you with a great opportunity to create content.
6) Thought Leadership
Thought leaders spend a lot of time obsessing about their buyer personas, what motivates them, what drives them, and what behaviors they exhibit.
Thought leaders want to know how to be more relevant to their buyer persona’s questions and problems, helping them with their goals as early as possible in the buyer's journey. If you want to be a true thought leader, learn more about your buyer personas and develop content that helps them solve their biggest problems.
Do you work at or lead a construction company? If so, which marketing strategies have been most impactful? Let me know in the comments below.
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