Tonight I am happy to publish a guest post from one of our Twitter clan; @Paulsalesman. Below is his take on sales people in our industry and how best for the industry to get it’s message across. It’s a good read, so enjoy!

First the Rant

The double glazing industry as a whole has had this reputation for years of being a real hard sell industry. In my experience this is simply wrong these days.

I have been on the receiving end of double glazing salesman recently and on the whole I must applaud their methods. They come in measure up and tell me a quote will wing its way to me. I used smaller local companies on the whole and I was entirely happy with the service I received.

The only one I had in that fit the stereo type was Anglian Windows, they are still resorting to the tried and true method of calling their manager for the best price. I have been in sales for nearly twenty years, I sold time-share for six months, great training but dodgy as hell. I now sell advertising in the specification market dealing with the likes of Halo, Profile 22 and Eurocell to name a few. I thought this method of sales had died out years ago. I gave the poor salesman a right telling off. I won’t even mention Everest here Oops.

This is a great example of the small business moving with the times much quicker than large businesses. I am passionate about people in the building/construction industry getting their marketing right; with good marketing the double glazing industry can overcome its bad reputation.

Now the reason for this post – Marketing

Most of us do it, but again we need to move with the times. The days of just using local press if you are selling to the home owner or trade publications if you’re selling to the commercial market are long gone.

Marketing to the consumer

Market to the decision maker buying your product, let’s be honest this is usually the women of the house, the man might think he makes the decisions on home purchases but it’s usually the women so market to the women. Now the channels you can use to get the message across are vast. I will outline a few below for you to consider:

  • Local Press – still valuable
  • Your website – a must but you need to drive traffic there
  • Social media – I would recommend Twitter and Facebook and maybe Pinterest if you have some good images, this will drive traffic to your site, it’s a form of word of mouth and there is no doubt it helps
  • Tradesman directories – but be aware that a bad review can impact your business massively as can some good reviews

Commercial market window companies

Where to advertise to get the business is a key question to many businesses selling in the specification market. I would recommend you look at niche publications I posted a blog here (http://advertisinginconstruction.com/category/magazines-advertising/industry-specific-magazines/) that might help. However I would recommend that a good chunk of your budget is spent online. Again I will outline some ideas for you:

  • Blogs – (like this one and no its not mine I’m a guest poster)
  • Social Media – Twitter and LinkedIn especially
  • Online building directories – such as BPindex (http://bpindex.co.uk) and The Construction Index (http://www.theconstructionindex.co.uk) as these are both used by builders, contractors and clients as well as Architects.
  • SEO optimized websites – if you trade regionally optimize your site for local search, ohh and don’t forget mobile lots of people now use there mobiles for online searches.
  • You could also set up your own blog to inform your audience of how great you are but in a professional manner of course, here are a series of articles that will help you. (http://advertisinginconstruction.com/category/online/b2b-blog/)

These are some basic pointers on how to market a double glazing business. I would be delighted to answer any comments.