Residential construction is a competitive game. In September of 2021, construction companies in the United States broke ground on more than 1.5 million homes. That’s just one month in one country, so the potential is huge. But construction companies everywhere are competing hard for these jobs.
So, how do you stand out when the big national companies are trying to take all of the good projects? Construction marketing. With the right strategies in place, you can bring in a steady flow of residential housing jobs.
To help you get started, the Cedreo team has compiled 20 of the best construction marketing ideas for you to try.
Why is Marketing Important for Construction Companies?
Why should you care about construction marketing for your company? To put it simply, if you care about bringing in leads and maintaining consistent, growing revenue, then you have to care about it.
As anyone who currently works in the construction industry knows, it’s competitive. You can’t decide you’re going to just make a few posts for your company on social media and call it a marketing plan. More than 75% of construction companies are already doing that, according to JBKnowledge.
You can’t just do what everyone else has been doing for years already. You have to stand out, and you can do that by trying out all kinds of construction marketing ideas. By trying out new construction marketing ideas, you can do what many companies are not doing and possibly capitalize on a gap in the market. Almost 36% of construction companies are hesitant to try new technologies — including those that are useful for construction marketing — according to Big Rentz.
20 Best Construction Marketing Ideas
The best construction marketing strategy will not rely on a single method. In other words, you can’t simply rely on construction advertising to take care of all of your marketing needs. You need to try several ideas and see which ones work for you. Here are 20 construction company marketing ideas to get you started.
1. Define your ideal customer
A big marketing challenge for construction companies has to do with defining and communicating what makes your company different from the competition. If you can communicate how you’re different — and why that matters — you can build a niche in the market that will keep the leads flowing.
To figure out what sets you apart, start by defining your ideal customer. Who would benefit the most from working with you? For example, do you have relationships with highly efficient contractors that enable you to offer lower-cost home building services? In such a case, your ideal customer might be a family who wants to build a home on a budget.
Think about your past projects: which ones were the most successful, and why? The customers involved in those projects are very likely your ideal customers. By defining the customer you want to target, you can sharpen each of your marketing strategies to build yourself a lucrative niche in the competitive construction market.
2. Create a visual website
Even if you are a small residential construction company in a tiny town, you need a website. You really can’t get away without having one in 2021. Websites show customers that you are a real, established company, and they can be a potential source of leads.
Your website can’t just be all text. It needs to be visual. On each of your key website pages — the homepage, about page, services page, blog page, testimonials page, and contact page — you need eye-catching visuals. You can get those visual elements by taking pictures of completed projects, but if you want to showcase unique project types or home layouts, you may need a quick and easy home design software that allows you to export 3D project images. (If that sounds like something you would like to try, try Cedreo for free today.)
3. Set up your GMB profile
If you haven’t claimed and set up your Google My Business (GMB) profile yet, you’re missing out on one of the best construction marketing ideas there is. The GMB platform allows you to claim your company’s listing, fill out the information and appear in Google Maps and local searches.
In other words, when people search for residential construction companies in your area, your GMB profile will give you a better chance of showing up.
4. Create a profile on customer review sites
In construction, reviews matter. Around 87% of U.S. consumers say they read online reviews before purchasing a product or service from a business, according to Bright Local. That means most of your potential customers are going to read reviews of your business before working with you.
But what if you don’t have any reviews available online? It’s safe to assume that lacking reviews would decrease trust in your construction company for many consumers. So, don’t allow yourself to get into that situation — set up profiles on popular customer review websites.
Some of the most common review sites include Google, Yelp, Facebook, Home Advisor, and Capterra. Each platform requires you to register a separate profile. The bonus of taking the time to set these profiles up is that it increases your online footprint, which can make it more likely that you will generate leads through your web presence.
5. Run a review campaign
With your review website profiles and GMB profile set up, you’re on the right track, but you still have to get reviews if you want to stand out from your competitors. You can do that by running a review campaign.
A review campaign is simply a strategy dedicated to generating as many positive reviews of your construction business as possible. You can do this in several ways:
- Ask your current customers to review your company online.
- Reach out to past customers to ask them for a review.
- Offer an incentive to leave a review, such as a discount on part of your construction services.
- Post on your company’s social media profiles to ask for online reviews.
If that sounds like a lot of effort for something you’re not sure will work, consider this: 94% of consumers said that positive reviews made them more likely to use a business, Bright Local found.
6. Use hoarding signage
Everyone knows that construction advertising is expensive. But not all construction advertising ideas will break the bank. A particularly cost-effective option is hoarding signage.
This is advertising for your company that you place on homes you are currently building. You don’t have to pay for anything more than the cost of the signs you put up, and as people drive or walk by, they can see both your company’s name and the great work you’re doing.
7. Join major industry associations
Sometimes, successful construction marketing comes down to who you know. And there’s no better way to meet potential customers and partners than joining a construction industry association.
The National Association of Home Builders is a particularly good option for residential construction companies, but you shouldn’t forget about getting accredited with the Better Business Bureau, too. These associations add credibility to your company name, connect you with people, and often offer access to low-cost marketing for construction companies.
8. Launch Google local service ads
One of the best new construction marketing ideas comes from Google. It’s called Local Services Ads. These are ads that appear at the very top of Google results and showcase local service providers, such as construction companies.
These ads can be expensive, but the benefit is that you only pay for the leads you get. Unless someone calls or emails you inquiring about your services, you don’t pay a cent.
9. Re-engage past customers
Residential construction companies often rely on one-off jobs. After all, once the house is built, what else is left to do? That’s a good point — at least for a while. But after a few years, many of your past customers may be looking to build another home. You have already worked with them and shown them what you can do, so why not reach out to them now and then to see if they could use your services?
At the worst, they will say no thank you. But you might be surprised to find that some people will say they would love to work with you again or refer you to someone they know who is looking to have a home built.
10. List your business on lead gen sites
In addition to review sites, you should list your construction company on sites designed to generate leads for residential home builders. Consumers often look to these sites for ideas when they are searching for a construction company, so putting your business on these websites is a worthwhile construction marketing idea.
Some popular construction industry lead generation websites include the following:
- Construct Connect
- Home Advisor
- Dodge
- The Blue Book
Most of these sites charge a small fee for you to list your business with them, but the payoff can be enormous.
11. Incentivize referrals
In the digital age, word-of-mouth referrals often get overlooked among marketing ideas for construction companies, but you can still generate a ton of leads through referrals. One way to encourage more referrals is to add an incentive.
In other words, you should give people a reason to refer others to work with your construction company. Usually, the referrer will be a past or current customer, and the incentive will often take the form of a discount on your services. So, if your customer refers someone else to you for a home building job, you can offer, for example, a 5% discount on the total price of the referrer’s project.
12. Sponsor local events and teams
In construction advertising, one of the main goals is to get your brand to stick in more people’s minds. That means your company name and logo should go pretty much anywhere you can get them.
Finding places that will display your brand can sometimes be a challenge, but have you considered sponsoring local events or sports teams? Often, if you sponsor a local event like a race, fundraiser, or talent show, you will have the chance to display your company’s name and logo on the list of sponsors at the event and marketing materials leading up to the event. By sponsoring local sports teams, you can even get your brand onto jerseys and other athletic equipment.
This will cost you some money, of course, but these types of sponsorships are often more affordable than most traditional construction advertising ideas.
13. Leverage video marketing campaigns
Consumers are spending more time watching digital videos every year. Between YouTube and social media, many of the potential customers for your construction business are spending hours every day watching videos. That means you have a chance to get your brand in front of them by creating a video marketing campaign.
The videos you create should showcase your services and company, and you will need to share them on YouTube and social media and likely pay to have them shown as ads elsewhere.
Source: Statista (“Daily time spent with video content among adults in the United States from 2013 to 2023, by device”)
14. Feature your employees
Your construction company has become what it is today because of the people behind it — you and your employees. That means these people deserve some recognition. But there’s an added construction marketing benefit of featuring your employees on your website, social media channels, and other platforms: it keeps your brand from being just another faceless construction company.
Sharing your employees’ stories, background information, accomplishments, and similar items makes your business more personable. That means people are more likely to trust your construction company.
15. Build strategic local partnerships
As you know, it takes a lot more than just one company to build a complete, move-in-ready home. Your customers may routinely work with landscapers, roofers, interior decorators, and similar businesses before, during, or after construction. Meanwhile, many of your customers are coming to you after buying a piece of land with the help of a real estate company.
All of those businesses would make fantastic strategic partners that could help you generate more business for your company. Here’s how a strategic partnership like that would work: you reach out to the complementary business to suggest a partnership in which they refer their customers to you for home building services and you refer your customers to them for whatever they do, whether it’s landscaping, decorating, roofing or something else.
From there, you and your partner company can offer each other financial incentives for referrals that come from the partnership. That way, everyone wins — your company, your partner, and your customer.
16. Showcase your work on social media
Sadly, the social media profiles of thousands of construction companies go to waste every single day. They just sit there doing nothing for the company when they could be bringing in more leads.
Social media provides some of the best construction marketing opportunities available today. One of the best ways to capitalize on this opportunity is to share your company’s work on social media. Take pictures and videos of completed homes and homes in progress and share them. People love visual media, and many social media platforms will prioritize posts that include visual content.
By doing this, you are inserting yourself into the minds of your social media followers. That way, when they eventually want to build a home, you’re more likely to come to mind.
17. Promote free quotes
Who doesn’t love getting something for free? Everyone loves it, and that’s why offering something for free is one of the best marketing strategies there is.
In the construction industry, one of the most powerful free offerings is a quote. Offering free quotes allows you to immediately stand out from your competitors who charge for them. Then, you’re more likely to have people ask you for free quotes, and that means you have them on the hook — they’re potential customers, and they’re already working with you for the free quote, so why not go ahead with the complete job?
Don’t forget to promote the fact that you offer free quotes. Make sure it’s clear on your website, put the details on your industry and review site online profiles, and let your social media followers know.
18. Use 3D home design software to sell the vision
Some of the best construction marketing ideas are about actually closing deals rather than generating leads. This is one of them: use 3D home design software to show potential customers what their completed home could look like.
Software like Cedreo allows you to quickly create photorealistic home designs that bring home ideas to life. This sparks an emotional connection to the project for your clients and helps you close more deals.
19. Use blog content to answer buyer questions
Ranking for relevant search queries in search engines like Google is one of the best long-term construction marketing ideas. And one of the best ways to do that is to answer questions your customers often have through blog posts on your website. People usually type their questions into search engines to look for answers, and if your company is providing the answers, you build trust with potential customers.
To figure out what you should blog about, take some time to brainstorm about the questions people might ask. Another free resource for finding questions to answer is the People Also Ask box inside Google results. To get ideas from People Also Ask, Google a search term related to your business and scroll down until you see the People Also Ask box. These are all great questions to answer.
Here’s an example of the People Also Ask box for the search query “cost to build a home”:
20. Set up conversion tracking
After you have set up all of the above construction marketing ideas, you need to know which ones are working. That way, you can determine which ones you should invest in more and which ones you should stop.
The best way to find out which strategies are working is to set up conversion tracking. This allows you to know which marketing channels are causing people to “convert” from passive viewers into leads.
To do that, you need to track the source of phone calls and form fills on your construction advertising channels. Several platforms will do this for you, but they all tend to use dedicated phone numbers for each marketing channel so you can know where contacts are coming from.
Get Visual and Close More Leads
There is no shortage of construction marketing ideas to try, and there’s a good reason to try all of them. From directories and review sites to traditional construction advertising and partnerships, you have plenty of sources of potential leads. All you have to do is tap into them.
No matter which strategies you choose, 3D home design software will make it easier to close deals with the leads you generate. Bring projects to life before your customers’ eyes, create an emotional connection and grow your business with photorealistic designs of your future construction projects.
Ready to give the best 3D home design software a try? Try Cedreo for free.
