Owen Philipson

  • About
    • About me
    • Now
  • Articles
    • Writing tips
    • Construction Content
    • Social media
    • Productivity
  • Recommendations
    • Beer
    • Coffee
    • Phone
    • Protein
    • Web hosting

What is Content Marketing for the construction industry?

January 8, 2017 by Owen Leave a Comment

Content Marketing is the idea that any company can act like a publisher or media company, and market their business by publishing articles, video, audio or other content that offers true value to the customer without being a pushy sales message.

Marketing in this way aims to create customers that know, like and trust your company. The benefit this brings is that it can be easier to convert prospects to customers in the first place, they will remain customers for longer, and will spend more with you.

Content Marketing isn’t a new concept – a podcast called ‘This Old Marketing‘ seeks to prove this. The show hosts, Joe Pulizzi and Robert Rose, are long-time publishers and marketers that are passionate about how better quality content can create better customers.

Is Content Marketing a buzzword?

The show’s eponymous ‘This Old Marketing’ segment looks at ways that quality content, have been used for decades, in some cases hundreds of years. Examples like in-house magazines can create value for customers and consequently the businesses publishing them.

In one recent show, their This Old Marketing example is an article published in a journal called Office Appliances – The Magazine of Office Equipment, in 1916.

The article, House Organs Lower Distribution Costs, covers a keynote speech by Robert Ramsay, advertising manager at Art Metal Construction Company from a conference called The Associated Advertising Club of the World in St Louis in 1916.

The ‘house organs’ mentioned are in-house and external magazines that were used to build an audience in a way that were not about pushy advertising but were about a business acting as a publisher that delivers useful, valuable content to your customers.

Back then, it was considered just as difficult to prove the value of this type of marketing –

There was lots of data, but no proof.

However, Mr Ramsay had spent one year interviewing 72 different editors of in-house magazines and went on to explain 19 ways that the content marketing can provide value for a business, including 4 mentioned in the podcast:

  1. Direct results – you can check the results by including a return card
  2. Creating good will and confidence with our customers (SW Strauss & Co)
  3. Saving salesmen’s time by paving the way for new products (Johnson & Johnson)
  4. Clinching salesmen’s arguments (Marshall Wells Hardware)

How can Content Marketing be used in the construction industry?

What does this mean in real terms for the construction industry? I have listed a few quick suggestions for different areas of the construction industry below, and hope to cover some specific examples in future blog posts.

Content Marketing for construction product manufacturers

  • Compare and contrast the benefits of your type of product with others
  • Be open about the options and factors that affect the cost of the product
  • Address head-on the potential problems of specifying or installing the product

Content Marketing for Property companies

  • Opinion pieces on the state of different segments of the market
  • Predictions on where opportunity lies in the future
  • Assess the benefits and drawbacks of different ways of financing a project

Content Marketing for main contractors

  • Analysis: how can building new assets reduce maintenance costs for a local council?
  • Cost: surface some of the common design / construction implications that could mean the difference between a £5m build and a £10m build.

Content Marketing for interior design consultants

  • Space planning: share ideas on how a homeowner can make the most of limited floor area
  • Share your knowledge and suggest pallettes of colour to match furniture or furnishing styles
  • How colour theory can improve profitability in retail and hospitality interiors

Content Marketing for landscape design consulants

  • How quality play areas benefit the health and well being of children
  • Why high quality public realm can increase footfall in town retail centres
  • How planting and external garden areas can benefit

Vertical brickwork, Forth Valley College, Stirling

Filed Under: Content marketing Tagged With: construction, content marketing

Content marketing videos for construction: lessons from #TCMA2016

June 4, 2016 by Owen 2 Comments

I have just attended The Content Marketing Academy 2016 conference. What have I learned that I can teach the construction industry? The inspiring international speakers I listened to included: video authority Amy Schmittauer; writer and content intellect Ann Handley; strategist Bert Van Loon; and author, social media and content expert Mark Schaefer.

Your videos will be a useful archive

Amy Schmittauer highlighted the increase in video on social media and online generally. Every video is an opportunity – with YouTube being a massive search engine, you can invest in an evergreen archive of content, and the aim should be to make it useful for people – not a sales pitch.

Don’t make adverts

Ann Handley reinforced this idea with an example of an instagram video that was ‘just a commercial’ – the stark lack of views, likes and comments was testament to the fact that people just don’t choose to watch your content unless it carries some genuine value for them.

It’s easy to get started

Amy pointed out that the processing power of your smartphone outweighs that of the computer that put men on the moon hundreds of times. It’s easier than ever to just get started making video.

The barriers to entry are low but higher barriers are put up by ourselves – fear of gear, fear of personality and fear of ROI. It’s important to get over these and just get started – you’ll soon be improving and way ahead of your competition. A bit of personality and ‘being human’ is often lacking in construction brands.

The human connection

From several of the speakers, we learned that the human connection can result in very powerful marketing. In my opinion there is an opportunity for the boldest in construction to steal a march by adopting this tactic. Playing it safe won’t get you far.

As Mark Schaefer highlighted later in the day, the opportunity is even bigger if your market sector is not already saturated with large amounts of content. Video is definitely an underused medium in construction so the chance to differentiate yourself from your competitors is massive.

Construction video ideas

How could video be used in construction? Here are a few of my quick-fire ideas:

  • technical tutorials on how your product is made – educate the specifiers!
  • how to install the product – educate the contractors!
  • a human story on how your product or project impacted the community – create a strong connection with the end users! (like this example from IWA Associates below)

#GardeningScotland show garden – @iwastirling with @ScotWarBlinded at @gardenscotland from iwastirling on Vimeo.

Training as marketing

Ann Handley later told how ‘training as marketing’ is a powerful concept and I believe this is a perfect fit for the construction industry. Construction product manufacturers aim at a highly qualified, technical audience but architects (or other specifiers) are generalists, not specialists. They often have to research products and learn more about them, in order to do their job of designing a safe and effective building.

Become a teacher in your area, and the technical audience will thank you for it. Using video for this type of content can bring your product to life – make it like an online CPD not a sales pitch.

Granite bollards with bronze plaques

Filed Under: Content marketing Tagged With: #TCMA2016, video

LinkedIn

  • LinkedIn

Twitter

  • Twitter

Contact

  • E-mail

Copyright © 2023 · Agency Pro on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in