Construction Marketing Ideas

Clay Posey, principal at www.mychiefmarketingofficer.net took the time to answer the questions I posed about my challenges in making this blog an effective marketing resource. Here is his email (reprinted with permission):

Mark,

Thanks first of all for your work. I always enjoy the read. You asked some questions at the end of your last email. Here is my two cents worth:
Does "Construction Marketing" require hands-on locally based consultations, or advertising in relevant media that we don't provide?

“Often I think this may be the case as to hands on, face to face consultation. MY primary target market is the construction and related industry (Architects, engineers, etc.) This is where I’ve spent my career, and as you know, we are hands on folks. Bricks and Mortar.” However, leveraging web 2.0 tools is changing that. Reaching the millinials that now are taking their place in this marketplace helps too. They are digital natives; we (40++ in my case) are digital immigrants. As for advertising… well, it’s dead.”

Do we have the credibility and proof that we can deliver more expensive services, for a fee, because of this blog?

“You should, by now. The trick of course is to get buy in from your audience. What “freemium” material (other than the blog) do you offer that people can sign up for? White papers, webinars, reports, tools, etc. To get these, people have to go through a “squeeze page” where you collect (squeeze) info from them on an opt in form.

Permission to follow up is an explicit part of the form. Lead Nurturing follows and ultimately, the sales process.” Here is a link to a vendor/partner of mine that just published a great post on getting business from your blog. Mike does a fantastic job of showing how you can have thought leadership (which you have) and business (which is sounds like you may not) too. http://blog.hubspot.com/”

Whenever I've overtly tried to sell anything through this blog or the newsletter, I usually achieve nothing but negative backlash.

“Not a question outright, but implied. Look at Mike post above. He gives meaningful content and then a couple of offers at the bottom of the post, for a webinar and a white paper. He’s not selling there, but I promise, once you grab the “freemium material”, he or one of his reps will be in touch. It’s a permission based process – no negative backlash when they ASK YOU to sell them.”

Do you have ideas or suggestions of your own to solve this challenge?

“Nuff said, except for, check out Inbound University (http://www.inboundmarketing.com/university). It’s a great place for old school marketers to get retrained to web 2.0.”

Maybe you can help me solve this marketing puzzle.

“I’d love too. Drop me a line back, give me a call, or catch me at Twitter, Facebook, or LinkedIn.”

Best,

Clay Posey, principal
www.mychiefmarketingofficer.net
404-419-7691
404-345-5235 cell or text

These are useful resources and I will follow up with Clay in the near future.