It is true that in every business, the output is extremely important. There is a saying that the result speaks for itself. This is true, but can a business reach all of its target customers and succeed just by relying on the quality of its output, whenever a client asks for its services? In business, marketing strategies are also vital. By employing different marketing strategies, more people will know about the company, and it will be easier for it to reach its desired market. By applying the correct marketing strategies, the company will be able to garner more people who will avail its services and its profit will increase. An increase in the number of clients and profit will give a business a higher chance to growth. With today’s technology, there are various platforms and builder trends that businesses can use to market their products or services, which can also help manage all of its staff and transactions. With the availability of platforms such as social media and builder trends such as construction management software, businesses should be able to utilize their resources better and be more competitive.
It will also be helpful if, in the same software, documents, photos, and videos about the business’ transactions, plans, and projects can be sent and accessed by everyone. For a project manager who is in charge of the work in the field itself, having software that can be used to monitor the crew and their tasks, and that can be used to create crew schedules that can be accessed by the team themselves will also be advantageous. Fortunately, construction crew management software like Pro Crew Schedule can make all of these things possible.
Promoting your Plumbing Business
To promote a plumbing business using different marketing strategies, you should be familiar with the different types of marketing platform where you can get your potential customers.
1. Create Your Website
With the presence and influence of the internet and today’s technology, going online to market a plumbing business will be helpful. By having a website where all of the necessary information that can attract customers about your plumbing business can be available, it will be easier for potential customers to locate your business and be aware of its services. Having a website will also make the business more efficient because it will be easier to communicate with the customers and answer their questions without personally meeting them. Also, with an online website, there are many more things that can be done to market your business. To build a site for your plumbing business, you can look for familiar people with this specific line of work. By doing this, you can better ensure that your business is being properly marketed online and that your business is on par with your competitors.
2. Customer Referrals
One of the best ways to market a business is through referrals. Of all of the possible strategies and techniques used to market a business, especially one that offers services, referrals from customers may be one of the most convincing. If one wants something to get installed or fixed in their property, it is almost natural to ask close friends or relatives about what business they can recommend for the job.
You can ask your clients to share your business and their experience with their friends and relatives and social media. You can give them incentives to encourage them to do it.
3. Become Part of Online Lists
As part of the advantages that today’s technology, you can also have your business listed on directories to promote it. Business listings will make your business easier to find for customers and it will also boost your business when it comes to search engine rankings.
4. Create a Team Together with Other Businesses
To promote your plumbing business and save cost while doing it, you can team up with other businesses. By sharing costs, you will be able to create bigger and better quality advertisements, which will be advantageous for both of your businesses.
5. Marketing through Email
Another way to market your company and to retain your clients is by getting in touch with your previous customers through email. You can greet them through email during holidays, and you can also update them about what is new with your business. Moreover, you can again ask for referrals through this platform.
6. Reviews
Other than social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter, you can ask your customers to give you a review through your business website itself. If potential customers or those looking for your business’s services saw your previous clients’ good reviews on your website, it will further encourage them to choose your business. Although this can be a double-edged sword because a positive review is not the only kind of review that people can put on a website. If potential customers see that there are negative reviews on the businesses site, here is a huge chance that they will be discouraged from availing your business’s services. To prevent this from happening, a business should always provide quality services and treat its clients pleasantly.
7. Plumber Online Community Involvement
Another way to market your business is by joining online communities such as Linkedin, yahoo Answers, and Quora. Through these sites, the chance for potential customers to find your business will be higher. This will allow you to promote your services better. You might even build a relationship with other people who are part of the same industry, which can be helpful in the future.
8. Utilize Social Media Platforms
In this current time, almost everyone is using social media. Either to communicate with their friends and or love ones or to browse and past time. For these reasons, bringing your business on these platforms is a great way to market your business. You can use YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram to do so. You can share your website on these platforms and or share articles and videos about the services that you offer and the job that you do. Doing these things will expand your reach and will help you get more customers.
9. Customer Service
Another best way to market your business is by doing a great job in it and treating your customers or clients correctly. If you did a great job installing or fixing a plumbing system in a client’s home or property, there is a higher chance that they will recommend you to other people that they know and that they will choose your business again if ever they need the services that it offers. Other than the output, part of what you need to consider is how you treat your customers. However excellent is your output or service, if you treat your clients rudely, the chance that they will recommend your business to other people and again ask for your help will be lower.
10. Local Community Involvement
To better promote your plumbing business, getting involved with your local community is a great way. To get yourself involved in the community, you can join local charity drives, events, and sponsor local teams. Moreover, if there are disasters and or problems where you can help, it will be best to do so. It may not be every day that they need your business or services. But if they know you, they are familiar with what services you offer in your business, and you have a positive image within your community, there is a high chance that they will choose your business if ever they need its services. Although, of course, the motivation to do these things should not be for profit. But if you can help your community and choose to do so, they might return the favor and support you.
11. Branding and Signages
With logos, slogan, stickers, and paint, you can also endorse your business using your vehicles. In the previously said materials, you can put your offer’s kind of service and the number that people should call if ever they need your help. You should also make sure that the way you use these materials is noticeable to utilize their function. By doing this, more people will be familiar with your business and what you do because vehicles are commonly used to go to different places and are seen by other people.
12. Other Forms of Promotion
You can also utilize brochures, pamphlets, and coupons to promote your business. It is also best to create partnerships with apartments and offices for this will help ensure that they will contact you whenever they need your services again. Besides, you should offer discounts if necessary, to promote your business.
Key Takeaways
There are plenty of ways to promote a business, especially today with the internet. Different platforms have emerged online, making it easier to reach potential customers and even expand your business’ target market. For a business to have more customers, people must be aware of your business existence. And when they choose to avail of your business’ services, you should make sure that they will experience and receive quality output.
How is project management software influencing the construction industry? Do you have to go on cloud or on-premise? How to find the best project management software? All these and more will be discussed in our new blog here at Pro Crew Schedule.
Technology is greatly reshaping the construction industry. From full manual work, we now see construction sites embrace the power of automation and mechanization, which have greatly improved the speed, accuracy, and efficiency of the workers. But it’s not only in these big systems that we can see the impact of technology on a construction site. On the inside, there is this little boss that manages the whole operation and construction firms are now convinced that they too should employ one in their business.
Growing Construction Project Management Software Market
Just recently, Technavio has published a latest market research report titled Global Construction Management Software Market 2020-2024. It says that the construction project management software market is expected to grow by USD 724.88 million during 2020-2024
There is an increase in the demand for large-scale project management and large-scale construction project management solutions. This is encouraging organizations to increasingly adopt construction project management software as it helps in maintaining a regular follow-up and managing resources by automating the process.
This automation of operations not only boosts productivity by minimizing the response time but also increases connectivity so that organizations can handle project-related inquiries easily and effectively. Thus, the increasing requirement for large-scale project management is expected to drive market growth during the forecast period.
Other factors that contributed to the decision of most construction firms to shift from manual documentation and monitoring to using a software include:
- Collaboration on Projects
Fortunately, project management software creates a platform for construction workers to collaborate on projects. The software allows them to discuss outstanding work, share documents, and set timelines.
- Budget Management
Project managers can now use construction software to compare the working budget to the actual cost and try to align it accordingly.
- External and Internal Communication
Construction project management software develops a funnel for workers to communicate internal matters concerning a project. It can also be used for communicating with clients or any other external stakeholder.
- Document Sharing
Whether in an integrated third-party system or internal tool, document sharing enables construction workers to have access to wireframes, comprehensive documents, and specifications. As a result, communication in a construction site will be seamless and transparent.
- Monitoring
Project management software can provide insights into whether a project will complete on time or past the deadline because of its real-time activity monitoring feature.
- Optimized Decision-Making
Project management tools enable contractors to make the right decision. It lets them decide on all details in a centralized place. In short, project management software makes the decision-making process more accurate and enhanced. It also allows for data-driven decisions. Poor decisions in a construction site can affect budget allocation and planning and ultimately result in wastage of a lot of resources.
- Real-Time Updates
Traditional project management tools would only provide a static view of a construction project. However, advanced scheduling software provides construction workers with real-time updates to allow for improved collaboration and efficiency. Real-time updates in a construction site also help improve communication and cooperation among team members. Project managers can now use construction software to monitor the progress of various tasks from their office and provide quick updates in real-time. With this software, contractors don’t have to call, email, or meet workers on-site face-to-face. Project management software programs update all relevant parties of any change as quickly as possible.
Also, as per Technavio, the application of lean management in construction management will have a positive impact on the market and contribute to its growth significantly over the forecast period. This research report also analyzes other significant trends and market drivers that will influence market growth over 2020-2024.
Among these trends, the research concludes cloud-based project management software to greatly impact the growing software market in the construction industry. A senior analyst at Technavio says:
“Other factors such as the increasing popularity of cloud-based construction management software, and the integration of construction management software estimation and accounting software will have a significant impact on the growth of the construction management software market value during the forecast period.”
This statement leads us back to our previous blog “Cloud vs On-Premise Construction Software – Which is the Better Route?”
Reiterating it again, cloud-based project management software brings more benefits for a wide-scope industry such as construction. The Cloud has become an everyday resource that helps enable our daily routines.
Consider how things such as electricity, water, natural gas, telephone service, and television are provided by companies that specialize in delivering those services, and you can begin to wrap your mind around the parallels with cloud computing. Utilities and telecoms provide services on a scale “that makes it economically feasible for large numbers of customers to consume at a lower price. And, the customer doesn’t have to buy, build, and maintain all the equipment required to provide the service. Simply put, this is what cloud computing does for the digital age. And just like the power grid that delivers electricity to your house, the Internet delivers these cloud computing services to your home, business, mobile phone, or car.
Cloud-based Project Management Software in Construction
The construction industry is a very traditional sector, albeit one that is embracing new technology faster now than at any time in its past. Like many industries, the construction industry is now consuming IT services and solutions at an accelerating rate, needing to acquire more and more computing power, with bigger and faster servers to run the latest business critical applications.
Although costs of servers may have reduced in recent years, the need to keep servers and software updated incurs significant capital costs and construction firms are finding they have to recruit and retain highly skilled IT staff to keep their existing infrastructure and applications working.
This isn’t necessary, though, in the newer cloud-based project management software. Services like Pro Crew Schedule have been made simpler so that everyone in the firm can use the software without any problems even in the absence of an IT expert. The software has been made simpler to install and navigate around and non-techy crew members can easily find their way around the features.
Some advantages that cloud-based project management software has over on-premise include:
- Easier Deployment – While there are different forms of cloud computing (such as public cloud, private cloud, and a hybrid cloud), in a public cloud computing environment, resources are hosted on the premises of the service provider but enterprises are able to access those resources and use as much as they want at any given time.
- Fewer Costs Involved – Enterprises that elect to use a cloud computing model only need to pay for the resources that they use, with none of the maintenance and upkeep costs, and the price adjusts up or down depending on how much is consumed.
- Higher Security – Security concerns remain the number one barrier to a cloud computing deployment but these days IT experts have come up with stronger security features to protect your data stored in the cloud. Encryption technologies are now more modern and harder to hack. The login process has also been made stricter with multi-login or authentication process.
Selecting Cloud-Based Project Management Software
To select the right software, you should first and foremost understand your own business needs, as well as its challenges. How do your processes work now? What would make them better? How connected are your office employees, project teams and field crews? Where do delays typically occur in your processes?
To help you assess your business’s needs and consider every construction software solution, we’ve put together some tips on choosing the right tool which you can read on “Guidelines in Choosing the Best Construction Software.”
Generally, you should ensure that the cloud-based software you pick has these features as basics:
- Scheduling
As simple as scheduling features may be, they remain very helpful for contractors who need to organize their days most efficiently and keep track of their team’s activities. Scheduling features allow contractors to also assign tasks to their team members, track task progress and assign different levels or priority to each task.
- Team Management
Team management features overlap with scheduling options. However, when you look at specific team management options, the best offers focused management of team activities, progress, status, and time tracking. They also allow for more coordinated teamwork and keeping teams notified of changes to a job.
Certain contractor software solutions also offer GPS tracking of the team, allowing you to know at all times where your team members are located.
- Project and Document Management
Some contractors prefer a separate project management functionality, allowing them to adopt a bird’s eye view of their projects, yet also to zoom in and keep track of even the minutest details.
Conclusion
Construction project management software have, indeed, revolutionized the construction sites. By making the workplace digitized, information dissemination has been automatic and updates are done in real-time. This breaks the barriers between the office and the site, making work more efficient, the productivity rate higher, and errors greatly diminished.
