TWO: Marketing Communications Decision Matrix

Where Do You Need To Spend Your Time?

MARKETING IS MORE THEN A LIST OF THINGS TO DO. It’s a very carefully strategized group of messages, activities, programs and events that articulate a company’s position in terms of differentiation.

BASICALLY, YOU HAVE TO ASK THIS QUESTION? Why should a prospect want to do business with your company as opposed to the competition?

McKenzie’s Secrets of Construction Marketing #2

The marketing message is a very carefully strategized tactic. Strategy sets the direction, but it is the marketing message that communicates it in a variety of ways – both direct and indirect, because, marketing creates the environment for the sale to occur.

Marketing should be prioritized on an annual basis. One way to accomplish this is to use a system based approach. The purpose is to evaluate your current marketing program(what needs work now) relative to your companies corporate strategy, and also compared to what the competition emphasize in their marketing. This does not mean that you are going to copy your competition, but it does mean that you want to be aware of what they are doing so you can out flank them – to put it in military terms.

The systems approach uses a weighted decision matrix, meaning that some decision is more important than other decisions. There are three components:

 

• Strategy
• Needs Work
• Competition

Strategy is weighted more heavily then Needs Work, and Needs Work is weighed more than Competition. Strategy. If the activity is important relative to accomplishing your corporate strategy, then is receives a score of a 10. If it is not important then it receives a low score of a 1. Or it is related somewhere in-between.

Needs Work: If the activity needs a lot of work regardless of how important it is in the overall strategy, rate it a 10, and a 1 if it doesn’t need work.

Competition: Does the competition use this activity in their marketing; if so and if you think it’s important value it high, if not give it a low 1 score. The consideration here is that you may find areas that you consider crucial to your strategic plan, that the competition doesn’t feel crucial, and hence this might be an area to exploit.

Below is a sample chart showed with the actual ranking and then sorted showing what needs work based upon the highest score. You can add and subtract from the list as your companies marketing matrix may be different.

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ONE: Business Development And Marketing

What Is The Difference Between Business Development And Marketing?

THE EASIEST WAY TO EXPLAIN the difference between business development and marketing is with the following definition.

McKenzie’s Secrets of Construction Marketing #1

Marketing creates the environment for the sale to occur.

Business Development goes out and gets the sale.

Another way to think of the differences between business development and marketing is that marketing is thought of as an 8-5 job, whereas business development is thought of as an 8-8-8 job. This means that almost everything a business developer does is connected with their project. Breakfast in the morning with an influencer; lunch out with a prospect, and golf in the afternoon and weekends. That’s a business developer’s life. Another way to understand the difference is that clients and prospects will follow a business developer if they should leave one firm and join another, but the marketing person will not have anyone follow.

Picture it this way. You have decided to attend a trade show and you’re working the booth. You have graphics up which identifies your company. You also have some photos of the work you do and perhaps some signage meant to get people to stop. A tradeshow attendee is walking down the aisle,(you hope a prospect), and he/she glances over at your booth. Something interests them. They stop at the booth. You stick out your hand and say something like “Hi, I’m Steve. Can I answer a question for you?” The person, whom we will refer to as Richard responds with, “Yes, do you build in the Richmond area?” He grabs your hand and you shake and make eye contact.

The booth created the environment for the meeting to occur. But when they shook hands, it’s now a business development activity. Business development is all about relationships. Marketing created the environment for the sale to occur, and it’s business developments role to go out and get the sale.

One misconception in almost every business is that employees who are engaged in producing the work are not part of marketing. The very opposite is true; everyone in the company has some role in marketing. How they are greeted on the phone, how they are greeted by the receptionist, how the project architects relate to the subcontractors and vendors are all important aspects of marketing. In fact, some people have the opportunity to contribute to marketing and business development in a huge way.

Now this is confusing, but if one thinks about it, it makes sense. Everyone in a company interacts with their clients, and sometimes prospects, in different ways. Everyone has a network, so that means everyone knows different people that can and do make a difference n a business.

When a company has this “marketing mindset: truly amazing things can happen. Bit it is a difficult point to get to and most firms never get their. It is easier to take an ‘its not my job” attitude.

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Table of Contents

SECRETS OF CONSTRUCTION MARKETING

101 Essential Marketing, Business Development And Strategic Planning Tactics You Need To Know About In The Construction Industry

A.  MARKETING

1.         Business Development And Marketing – What Is The Difference Between Business Development And Marketing?

The Legal Stuff

101 SECRETS OF CONSTRUCTION MARKETING

All Rights Reserved. Copyright © 2012 - Ronald A. McKenzie

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without the permission in writing from the publisher.

 Any references to real events, businesses, organizations, and locales are intended only to give this business material a sense of reality and authenticity. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.

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101 SECRETS OF CONSTRUCTION MARKETING
101 Essential Marketing, Business Development And Strategic Planning Tactics You Need To Know About In The Construction Industry

for

Contractors, Subcontractors, Design/Builders, Construction Managers, Architects and Engineers

This book is full of strategies to help you with business development and marketing
in the construction industry. I have picked the point of view of the general contractor for most of my comments.

As everyone knows, one of the biggest
trends has been the merging of construction disciplines in an effort to become more competitive. Hence, the delivery of construction services is no longer limited to the traditional owner, architect and contractor triad relationship, but now includes design/build, construction management and a variety of similar delivery approaches.

The important point is that these tactics apply to everyone, as everything is built around the construction of the project. As a result, out of necessity to develop a writing convention, I frequently will refer to the contractor as an example, when they may equally apply to subcontractors, design/builders, construction managers, architects and
engineers as a group.
This book is a serious effort to communicate that business planning can make a difference. I at times use humor to convey a point, and it’s meant as humor and not in any way to make light of
the material or to offend anyone.
Each post I make will include chapter of the book. For more information, go to the following link: www.compassconsultantscorp.com
Ron McKenzie. Architect. Author. Advisor.