...and it won't cost you a single scone!
A recent survey by New Zealand building products online library provider EBOSS found that 61% of architects state company e-newsletters as very helpful in keeping specifiers up to date.
This evidence points to the trend that architects and specifiers are not impressed with morning tea presentations unless they are right on point with relevancy. To get the timing right when an architect is explicitly looking for your product through a morning tea presentation is a long shot at best. Stop buying scones for architects!
The report also found that almost 50% of builders and contractors are regular readers of supplier-specific newsletters. (Specified 2018)
What these statistics highlight is that the most significant opportunity to promote material to both specifiers and building contractors is through online channels.
There are several methods to grow and promote a company and its products and services online using content-based marketing, including
Social media
White papers
E-books
Case studies
Blogs for websites (your own and other sites)
Videos
Infographics
But, there is one digital marketing tactic that stands above all in terms of ROI.
Email marketing.
In fact, according to a recent eMarketer study, the median email marketing ROI is 122%.
That's four times higher ROI than any other digital marketing channel.
I have highlighted the features and benefits of using email to reconnect with customers in my previous post "Does email marketing still work?".
There are essentially two types of email marketing relevant to the construction industry.
E-newsletter - usually a relative content piece within a company monthly newsletter
Promotional email - a specially designed email campaign promoting your goods or services
A good measure of distribution is the 80-20 rule of 80% useful and relevant content and 20% sales or promotion-focused.
We know that it is a useful tool to communicate with our audience, and it is a relatively low cost, high reward marketing activity. Why is it then, that so few building product manufacturers regularly connect with customers and clients using the humble newsletter?
Is it confidence in writing ability?
Is it a task that is brushed aside as soon as things get busy?
Is it a struggle to come up with ideas?
Maybe it's all of the above. If you are having trouble with any of the roadblocks listed above, feel free to reach out to me for advice or assistance matt@mydma.co.nz or leave a comment.