Construction Marketing Ideas You Never Thought Of.

You run a construction business.

And you’re really good at what you do.

Trouble is – there’s a tonne of competition around you.

Who offer the same services.

You already know your value, and that there’s no way you’re just going to under-cut others as a way of getting the job.

Because you’re clued up.

You know that only leads to cash flow issues, stress and all the other bad stuff you do not need or want in your life.

So what can you do?

Well.

There are so many other Trade and Construction companies out there that, when it comes to the workmanship of the actual job itself, are great at what they do too.

Just like you.

Which means that for your Trade and Construction company to stand out, you need to dig deeper.

And in fact, it’s the smaller details in what you do OFF THE TOOLS that mean your construction business is more visible, credible and memorable.

And many of them are easier than you think.

Let’s run through some construction marketing ideas you never thought of that you can start implementing in your construction business right now to get a step ahead of the competition…

1. Use Scaffolding Banners and Outdoor Signage when on site as a Construction Marketing Idea.

For many Trade and Construction companies, your work can often be indoors, right?

Boiler checks, decorating kitchens, laying flooring inside of blocks of flats.

Or on the other side of a property, out of the public eye.

Gardens, underground car parks, private estates.

Your vehicles play a huge part in your visibility.

When branded that is.

(Check out 5 ways to use your Construction vehicles to get more clients here.)

But what about when you can’t park your branded vehicle on the road straight outside the site?

When they’re hidden behind hoarding.

Or down a tiny back street?

You lost visibility for your Trade and Construction business.

For days, weeks or even months.

Visibility is the first step in growing your Construction business.

How can you grow your Trade and Construction business if nobody knows you exist, right?

This is where clever signage can come into play.

Whether you’re in residential or commercial construction, this is about looking for opportunities for your brand to take focus.

Let’s start with scaffolding banners.

Now.

By law (in the UK at least) all scaffolding must have a branded banner by the company who erected it.

This may be the scaffolding company themselves or it could be the building company who have contracted the scaffolding.

Great visibility for scaffolders and builders, right?

But what about everyone else.

Here's an opportunity.

We actually have a decorating client who has his own scaffolding banners that he uses.

Take a look…

If you too are on a job where you need to use the help of scaffolding, use this as an opportunity to bring extra visibility to your business.

Just like we did for our decorating clients.

Or.

Maybe you’re on site of a project where there is scaffolding.

If you have a good relationship with the project managers/scaffolders/ builders you could have a conversation about housing your banners somewhere.

This could be really beneficial where you are on site for a project for a period of time.

Now.

For those of you who may only be on site for a day or so, erecting scaffolding banners might seem like a lot of extra work.

What you might like to think about is other outdoor signage that you can put in a prominent place that lets passers-by, local residents/businesses and the surrounding public know that your construction company is at work inside.

This could be in the form of outdoor banners, like we did for our mobile body shop client…

These are super quick and easy to pop up – which is perfect if you are on multiple sites every day.

Other ideas include A-Board Pavement Signs (think sandwich boards) or blade/teardrop/feather flags (think golf course sponsorship flags).

Again, these are super quick and easy to pop up on site, don’t damage anyone’s property as they are stand alone and are a great way to bring extra brand awareness to your Trade and Construction business – letting more people know that you are working on this site.

Using signage effectively should include your construction brand identity – logo – and the best contact details to find out more about you.

2. Email Team Photos and introductions so clients know who to expect as a Construction Marketing Idea.

This one has got some seriously good feedback.

Presumably you send out a confirmation email/message the day before your construction business is due on site with a clients?

(If you don’t, definitely worth thinking about as part of your customer care).

Well.

How about sending that confirmation email with the name/s and photos of the construction team that is due to show up?

✅ Brilliant for residential customers who are nervous about strangers in their homes – they know who to expect.

✅ Commercial customers feel comfortable they can hold to account who has entered their business premises.

✅ Shows how organised you are as a construction business.

✅ Begins client/trade relationship building before job has started.

✅ Client can also forward these details onto others – fellow homeowner/business partner etc so that all relevant parties can stay in the loop.

✅ Opportunity to add another layer to your overall brand.

Now.

Whether you are sending one team member or 10, the photos you send are a reflection of your business.

Cropped Holiday photos is not going to cut it.

Blurry images from 20 years ago isn’t going to do it either.

You want to continue setting a standard for your Trade and Construction brand and there’s no point taking on a simple but powerful idea like this if you’re going to do it by halves.

⭐️ PRO TIP: Look at getting some branded team headshots taken for your Trade and Construction business that you can use to send to clients as well as elsewhere in your construction marketing ideas.

The investment you make with a pro photographer for you and your team, you will make back 10 fold.

You’ll use these construction headshots on your website, social media, brochure designs… the list is endless.

Here’s a great example we helped our tree surgeon clients with…

Now our team could each have given us a photo they had taken of themselves and we could have popped it into the graphic.

But instead, a professional photoshoot was had so that the style of photo – from the angle, lighting and background – could all be the same for everyone in our construction team.

Meaning that our Tree Surgery employees looked exactly that… a unified TEAM.

Imagine how great these are to receive as a client a day or two before the team come to meet you?

How much more comfortable might and assured might a client feel and what impression this gives about what level of service clients can expect from you?

3. Send client Welcome Packs as part of your Construction Marketing Ideas.

This is so much easier than it sounds.

You can be as simple or creative as you like for this one.

What is a Welcome Pack?

A Welcome Pack is a branded pack that is sent or given to a client prior to the work starting to introduce, inform, prepare and kick off a customer relationship the right way for your construction business.

Simple version.

This could be a simple branded PDF document.

Imagine you are a window glazing company.

And you’re about to start a big job in a customer’s home.

Your welcome pack might include an introduction to the team members who will be on site throughout the job.

It might include a list of how to prepare your home ready for a swift install (i.e.. Where furniture needs to be moved or curtain poles taken down).

There may be a timetable on one of the pages outlining the project milestones so a client can follow through the stages.

There could be some information about how you are best contacted now that they are a customer – perhaps you give your mobile number to actual customers rather than the company landline or you set up job specific WhatsApp Groups.

You can include whatever relevant details you think will help reassure and prepare your clients so that the job runs as smoothly as possible.

It doesn’t have to be rocket science.  🚀

But.

If you want to be creative.

You can make your Construction Welcome Pack 3 dimensional.

One of our building clients used to send a Welcome Pack Box.

This included a printed and bound Welcome Pack, a branded tape measure, some herbal teas, chocolates and something personal to their job – some tiny sample paint tins for example.

All presented in solid box.

Now, you might be thinking what on earth would the client need any of this for (other than the written Construction Welcome Pack)?

Well, they may have decided on the company they would like to use but haven’t yet made decisions on colours, finishes etc – so the pack may well help them make a decision on something you know will aid your job.

Though to me, from a brand point of view, it’s more about what it says about your construction business.

✅ Organised.

✅ Thoughtful.

✅ Prepared.

✅ Forward thinking.

Works for residential and commercial too.

You just need to think outside the box (every pun intended) for what you could swap out for the commercial.

Though if you think about it, the box will still be going to an individual – be it a company director or a manager – and there is still a human being there.

So nothing to stop you still including consumables.

You set a standard.

And are doing something hardly any other construction business is.

What a way to kick off a client relationship.

4. Finish a job by sending client Thank You Gifts as part of your Construction Marketing.

So, on the flip side of a Welcome Pack – at the other end of a job – you have the Thank You Gift.

This can come in the shape of Thank You Cards or actual Thank You Gifts – depending on the size of your jobs.

Let’s look at the benefits first.

✅ Hardly any other Trades are doing it – means you stand out from your competitors in an instant. Ching ching ching!

✅ Shows gratitude and that you do not take your customers for granted. How greatly does that reflect your brand?

✅ Leaves a great ‘after taste’ when you’re long gone – reputation… winning!

✅ Creates brand awareness – who will visit their house/office and see that branded card or gift on the mantlepiece or office desk/noticeboard.

✅ Creates conversation starter around your Construction business - who will clients show it to.

✅ Drives clients and customers to your website and social media platforms which can help get that all important traffic up – as your contact details will be present on the card/gift as it will be branded. 🚥

✅ Can help encourage clients to leave you a sh*t hot review without you going about it in a sleazy way (as your branded card can have details on how to leave one if a customer’s feels they would like to).

We’ve had construction clients who see multiple customers in a day give a Thank You Card to every single one.

We’ve had an Artificial Lawn client wrap up a project each week and send these epic branded cupcakes to every customer.

We’ve had a construction client have a bespoke cake made for every customer who they’ve finished a job for, to match the design of the kitchen diner that they have completed.

Check out what the actual kitchen-diner looked like to match this cake and more ideas on Thank You Gifts right here.

5. Reward customers for their loyalty as part of your Construction Marketing Ideas.

This one can be overlooked.

But works a treat for Trade and Construction companies that work on regular repeat business.

The likes of Gardeners, Tree Surgeons, Mechanics, Gas Engineers (think annual boiler checks) etc.

Creating a form of Loyalty Scheme or Card makes your customers feel like there’s something in it for them.

Let me explain it this way.

I am in fact a landlord.

And over the years I’ve used a LOT of various Trade and Construction companies to help with my electrics, gas, gardening etc.

Now.

Some of these teams I have used once and not been over-the-moon with the service I received so moved on to find others.

For example.

If I’ve had to chase them for weeks to get a date they’re going into the premises or waiting to receive the document they promised me 2 weeks ago.

I have other landlords I know who use different companies at different times depending on prices or availability.

Or sometimes they just forget who they used last to go in so jump on Google or ask their contacts for recommendations.

My point is – life happens and sometimes we get side-tracked by someone else’s offering, forget, or meet someone new at a networking meeting that we think ‘ok let’s just give these guys a go even though I’m quite happy with who I’ve been using’.

The idea of some kind of loyalty system means as customers you are our GO TO, always, because we know we are going to be rewarded for loyalty.

Which means more to us than trying out someone new because a flyer came through the door with a new local gardener just as we were about to start enquiring with you about the back garden.

A little reminder and reason - ON TOP of the fact you provide a great service – to always come back to your business means you get to build long term relationships.

We helped one of our Trade clients – a mobile body shop – with a loyalty card for his business as there is lots of competition for what he does where he lives.

He found this was a great incentive for clients to stay loyal with him.

⬇️ Construction Marketing Ideas You Never Thought of Rundown:

1. Use Scaffolding Banners and Outdoor Signage when on site.
2. Email Team Photos and introductions so clients know who to expect.
3. Send client Welcome Packs.
4. Finish a job by sending client Thank You Gifts.
5. Reward customers for their loyalty.

🛠 Need a little more help nailing your and Construction Marketing Ideas?

Course you do.

First. Let’s work out where you are with all things your Construction Marketing.
Got 3 minutes?

Take our Trades Quiz to discover how you score with all things ‘Off The Tools’.

We have heaps of tips, tricks, and hacks for your Trade and Construction business in our cheat sheets, videos and ideas waiting for you on the other side… i.e., your results page.

So, you can improve your score. And NAIL your Trade and Construction business.

Nice.

Take a peek at these bad boys…

• Going Live: How To Get Over Stage Fright for Social Media Marketing In Your Trade And Construction Business.
• How Paul Built Relationships Between His Clients and Engineers Before Even Meeting In His Construction Business.
• Websites Vs Social Media. Which One Should I Use For My Trade And Construction Company?