Whether you work in operations or as a support team member , are working on a church or healthcare facility, you can benefit from these tips on promoting your construction projects! Working in the construction industry provides opportunities to work on and be around exciting new projects.
Promoting your construction projects allows others within and outside your organization to learn about the construction industry and how it works, increase awareness of your clients and company, show how your project will help the community, and so much more. Below are helpful tips for promoting your construction projects.
Why Promote Your Construction Projects
Promoting your construction project is advantageous for your construction company and professional career. Posting and sharing information about your project allows the community to learn about your roles, responsibilities, experience, and capabilities.
Whether you’re building healthcare facilities that help heal, government buildings that protect and educate, or restaurants for the community to enjoy, you are a part of a team transforming your region and impacting the community. The posted information communicates company capabilities to prospective clients, reinforces skills and expertise to existing owner’s and their construction managers, and helps the subcontractors who may want to help build your next project.
In addition to promoting your company, promoting your project or sharing what your company posts gives you a chance to promote yourself, show off your experience, and teach others about your projects. Especially on a more professional social media site like Linked In, this can be a great way to show the world what you can do!
When to Promote Your Construction Projects
All phases of construction provide great opportunities to promote your project. From milestones like Groundbreaking Ceremonies, Topping Out Parties, and project completion to construction progress, site work, and award wins, construction provides ample opportunities to showcase your work!
Milestones
Each construction project milestone provides an opportunity to promote your construction project! Starting with Groundbreaking Ceremonies when you are beginning a project, milestones like Topping Out Ceremonies, Ribbon Cutting Events, and even job site events like Finish Strong or Subcontractor Appreciation events are exciting moments in your project’s timeline. Share these milestones to inform the community of the progression of your project.
Daily Construction Site-Work and Progress
Construction activities like concrete pours, steel erections, and other things that may seem normal to a project manager or superintendent are fascinating for people who may not be in this industry or associated with that scope of work! For example, Forrester recently completed the Nexstar Broadcast Studio project, where we assisted in the installation of large satellites. We posted this site progress activity on social media and included text and photos to promote this project and explain the tricky logistics involved in rooftop satellite installations!
Project Completion!
Construction projects are a process – they take a lot of time, money, and hard work. When a project is complete, you should celebrate and show appreciation to all involved by promoting your project. Many commercial construction projects are very impactful on the community. Posting and sharing about your project can inform others of the services your new facility will provide and illustrate the terrific work your team (including subcontractors, and engineers, and all contributing entities) has done!
Award-Winning Construction Projects
Many construction industry associations have awards that companies like general contractors or architects can submit for and win, including but not limited to:
Each industry award has different categories, submission qualifications, and judging criteria and each award is generally given for safety, quality, or design. If your project wins a local or national achievement, be sure to promote this to show off the great work of your company, team, and building partners.
Continue Highlighting Older Projects
One mistake companies commonly make is failing to promote their older projects, but this can be a great way to showcase your portfolio’s range. Not only can highlighting earlier projects bring new awareness to your company’s work, but it can also help you build your audience by providing a mix of promotional efforts.
Where to Promote Your Commercial Construction Project
There are many places you can promote your commercial construction project in person, in print, and online!
Include Your Projects On Your Website
An effective way to promote your construction projects is to include the information on your company’s website. Projects could be on your website home page or a separate page dedicated to your project portfolio.
Project information could contain a description of the scope of work, its location, building partners, and other helpful or interesting information. When possible, include information about the project that makes it unique, allowing you to highlight your company’s diverse or specialty skill set.
Marketing and Proposal Development: Winning New Work!
One of the most important ways to promote your commercial construction projects is by creating marketing materials like brochures, PowerPoints, portfolios and proposals. These marketing materials often compile your experience to show why your construction company would be a good fit when trying to win a new project.
Be sure to have good photos of your construction progress and completed project for marketing and proposal development so your company can stand out in front of the next potential client. In addition, if you work in marketing, collect as much information as possible from your project team so that you can compile award submissions, craft project descriptions, and be able to answer any questions when promoting your project during an interview.
Use Social Media Through Organic & Paid Efforts
In recent years, social media has become increasingly popular among most age groups, making it an excellent opportunity for companies to reach wider audiences. That’s why your company should maintain a consistent online presence.
Building well-known social media profiles like Facebook, Twitter, and Linked In provide ways to reach your target audience. Additionally, use external communications resources like Mailchimp to reach a wider audience through promotional email campaigns.
Promotional campaigns allow you to determine locations, keywords, and topics that you should focus on, making it easier to reach those potentially interested in learning more about your work.
Create Consistent Blogs and News Posts Online
When possible, it will also be highly beneficial to consistently create content that highlights your work. That’s what makes a blog or news post so helpful, as it provides a way for you to promote the projects. Your company should create a monthly blog on your website and post about ongoing or recently completed projects at least once per month.
You can promote the blogs on your social media profiles, as this can help increase the audience that you reach. Additionally, a blog provides the opportunity to provide essential information about projects that are particularly unique or interesting.
Ensure Your Online Information Is Available
One of the easiest and most convenient ways to promote your construction company is to ensure that your information is available when conducting an online search. It will be crucial when anyone searches for your company online and wants to contact you for more information.
In addition to including information on your website, ensure your business panel through Google is all up-to-date and has your phone number, hours of operation, address, website link, and other important information. Make it easy for anyone to find the information they want about you!
What to Include When Promoting Your Construction Projects
When promoting your construction project on social media, include content other than words in your post! Adding a photo, video, gif, or link will make your post more interactive and engaging, and memorable to your followers.
Make sure to tag your building partners like your owner, architect, or subcontractor partners so they can be easily found, notified of the post, and hopefully share with their network connections! Including alt text with your photos can help make sure your post is SEO friendly.
When promoting your project in an industry magazine, print, or digital advertisement, make it visually appealing and eye-catching by including photos of your projects or team members. You will also want to feature a link to your website if it is a digital advertisement to drive traffic to the correct place.
How Can YOU Help Promote Your Construction Project?
Marketing and Public Relations professionals within the construction company often promote construction projects and companies, managing general contractors, architects, and subcontractors’ social media accounts, web presence, and advertising campaigns.
However, ALL professionals working for construction companies can do their part to promote their construction projects. Marketing and PR professionals rely on operations team members, like superintendents and project managers, to get the content they need for social media, promotion, and marketing materials.
If operations team members don’t want to take photos or videos themselves, they can inform their marketing group of anything happening on-site so they can come and get content to share.
Conclusion
Promoting your construction projects is highly beneficial for you and your company. Remember to share new and updated content, share consistently and frequently, across varying and different platforms, and in different media formats. Sharing and promoting your projects will ultimately help increase awareness of your competencies, experience, and industry services.