14 Inbound Marketing Tips for Construction Companies – Duralift
So What is Inbound Marketing?
HubSpot’s definition is: “Inbound marketing focuses on creating quality content that pulls people toward your company and product, where they naturally want to be. By aligning the content you publish with your customer’s interests, you naturally attract inbound traffic that you can then convert, close, and delight over time.”
Simply put, it’s any marketing that relies on earning people’s interest vs. buying it, for example; blogs, eBooks, SEO, videos, webinars, e-newsletters, white papers and social media are all types of inbound marketing. Done right, it can dramatically increase your leads, expand your online presence and grow your company.
We have prepared the following guide to help kickstart your own inbound marketing strategy tailored to your construction business.
1. Commit to producing consistently remarkable content
Make it your aim to consistently provide educational content (eBooks, case studies, webinars, etc.) that shows your technical expertise, thought leadership and ability to provide answers when it comes to industry issues and your customers’ common needs. That way, your target audience will know they can use your website as a source of information and begin to trust your brand.
2. Social Media and paid promotion is essential.
Social media has changed marketing from a sales model to a creating buyers model. It’s essential to your social proof, credibility and influence in your marketplace.
Promote your business and attract visitors to your website on social media. Spread the word about completed projects, new content and so on. Above all, have fun with your social media. The more visual your channels are the better, and don’t be afraid to inject some personality into your posts as well, as long as it is consistent with your brand.
3. Send out relevant, engaging email newsletters
Email marketing is your way of keeping in touch with your contacts and leads on a regular basis. You can use email marketing to inform your potential and existing customers of company news, new products, promotions etc. Each email you send should have a clear purpose and call-to-action.
4. Build and optimize your landing pages
Your landing pages are the parts of your website that you direct people to from emails, social media and blog posts. They usually encourage a visitor to fill in their details on a form in order to receive a valuable offer in return.
To optimise your landing page, ensure that the forms aren’t too long and the copy is irresistible. Use A/B testing on the call-to-action to measure the performance of various options.
5. Segment your lists to move leads down the sales funnel
Email marketing performs better and is more relevant when you segment your contact lists into smaller lists. You can segment your contacts using data collected on form submissions (job title, industry etc.) or on interactions with your content such as downloading a specific offer, reading a pricing page on your website or engaging with you on social media.
Segmenting your list in these ways helps you direct the right content to the right people, as you’re better placed to decide what content will be interesting to them, based on what they have viewed on your website or their stage in the sales funnel.
6. Do a superb job on your Search Engine Optimization
If you do your SEO is better than your competitors, you gain a long-term advantage.
7. Create a content and social media strategy that matches your business goals.
A content strategy that aligns with your business goals is like the accelerator on a sports car headed to a specific destination. The effort you spend to outline your strategy complete with tactics, goals and timelines pay big dividends.
8. Combine blogging with your premium content
Combining blogging with premium content is the number one online tactic to fuel your business by creating high-quality leads.
9. Create Human Connections
Customers interact with people they like, trust and connect with. As part of your inbound marketing process, consider telling stories about your employees across business departments. Video testimonials from customers are great if you can produce them, but videos of your own people talking about their expertise, their commitment, or even what they like for breakfast can also be powerful. Stories about causes your company supports, or community involvement are effective ideas too.
10. Remove the navigation on your landing pages
Having navigation on your landing pages can distract viewers from filling out your form and ultimately capturing the lead.
11. Make sure each article has a relevant CTA button
None of these common call-to-action triggers will probably get you the desired result because your target audience is more knowledgeable than ever before. The perfect call-to-action should captivate your target audience, educate them and increase your conversions.
12. Post conversation starters related to new content you just published
Here are just three of the reasons that conversation starters are such a good idea:
You’ll reach more people than just those who happened to be online when you published or posted about your new content.
You can learn more about your readers and what they’re interested in, by monitoring, measuring and analyzing which links they click on.
You can stay active and visible on social media without having to think of brand new conversation topics each time you post.
13. Don’t start any inbound marketing without inbound marketing strategy
There are many things that could fall off the wires without a comprehensive strategy. Around six to 12 months in, if you don’t have a strong foundation on which to build your strategy, you won’t have the proper attribution or reporting, making it hard to scale and see which efforts are going to produce the best results.
14. Include a web link, photo, video or any other form of media to increase reach and engagement
Something that looks good is going to be more attractive, it’s that simple.
