Four Common Construction Project Risks (And How To Avoid Them)
Every construction project has risks associated with it. As a construction company owner, this is part of doing business. How you deal with and mitigate these risks will determine how successful your job and business can be.
Business Management: Preparing for Your Succession Plan
When your construction or trade business is running smoothly, and you don’t anticipate any issues, you’re very likely to put off any type of preparations for the future. Why put time and energy into succession planning when it doesn’t look like you’ll need it any time soon? Instead, you could focus on the here and now to really make your business grow. But what if, with very little warning, a key executive or manager decides to leave, becomes critically ill, or announces that they want to retire? Without a succession plan in place, this announcement could throw some major issues into your day-to-day operations.
Predicting & Managing The Top Disputes in Construction
In this SBGP Exclusive Infographic we explore the top 12 reasons for disputes in the construction industry.
Creating a Strategic Marketing Plan for 2022
Marketing is a key part of running a construction or trade company, even though it may be one of the tasks people rarely associate with the industry. Unfortunately, the truth of the matter is that every business, no matter what it does, must have a well-planned and executed marketing campaign in order to remain competitive. If you don’t market yourself correctly, no one will know your company exists. Marketing isn’t something you can just make up on the spot, either. It takes a carefully crafted plan to market yourself in the right manner. Here are some tools and tips to help you create a strategic marketing plan for your construction company.
Leveraging Telematics Improve Jobsite Productivity
Telematics is a combination of diagnostic technology, monitoring sensors, and GPS tracking. While the idea may not be something everyone is familiar with, telematics can be leveraged by builders and trade companies to save money and simplify tasks.
Leveraging Member Benefits To Maximize HBA Recruitment & Retention
A new member recruitment & retention plan is essential for every HBA tasked with the goal to increase recruitment. Properly documenting & communicating the full breath of your Member Benefits are the key to breaking down the last psychological barrier to joining an HBA and a common gap in many sales processes. It really is a sales process, since a potentional member is either going to see value in the benefits that an HBA Membership offers or they will not. Every contractor, sub, or trade company is looking for value that can’t be found outside of a HBA when making the decision to join. These benefits allow potential members to view your offerings and realize more value to their business than the cost of membership.
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Crafting a member acquisition and recruitment plan starts with an audit of the incentives you already have and maximizing their delivery method. Ask yourself these questions:
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- Are my member benefits easily accessible on my HBA website?
- Are these benefits clearly communicated and accurately described?
- Are the value points of these benefits relevant to my membership?
- Are these benefits exclusive and not available to the general public?
- Am I promoting these member benefits across all of my communication streams?
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If you answered no to any of these questions, there is a high potential you are missing out on potential new members to your local HBA.
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Member benefits start on the homepage of your local HBA website where they are clearly visible. Make sure you also have a Member Benefit tab on your navigation bar where these benefits can exist with more detail as well. Continue by promoting these benefits in your HBA blog, Press Releases, Email Campaigns, and Social Media posts. Remember, not all benefits will resonate to all of your membership. That being said, it only takes one or two of your offered benefits to show significant value for someone to remain life-long HBA members.
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It’s 7 times more expensive to acquire a new client versus retaining one!
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If new members don’t know about the full breath of your member benefits, your current membership doesn’t either. The benefits of promoting your incentives and making them easier to find not only helps recruitment but retention as well. More members leveraging the exclusive benefits of your Local HBA will only result in a lower attrition rate every year.
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By downloading our Q4 revenue sharing guidelines in this email, you will have all the tools necessary to include your BPA member benefit on all of your networks. BPA stands for Business Diagnostic & Plan of Actions and is an exclusive and Private Business Planning tool offered exclusively to your membership via our partnership with your state HBA. A BPA from Small Business Growth Partners is developed by focusing on the unique issues of Builders, Remodelers, HBA Associate Members, and how to solve them.
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The deliverable is an extremely accurate and personalized 40+ page, step-by-step and time-based plan for your members and is a $4,200 value.
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Promoting the BPA fills all the requirements of a successful member benefit and can be used to solidify your on-boarding process:
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- Exclusive, not available to the general public.
- Specifically created for builders, contractors and trade company owners
- Value that far exceeds the cost of annual membership
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When crafting your member acquisition & recruitment plan, use these three metrics to determine your strongest benefits and rank them accordingly. Incentives that are exclusive, specialized for your market, and provide more value than your membership cost are the drivers of acquiring more members and keeping them longer.
The Importance Of ‘Check-In’s’ For Member Retention
Why are regular check-ins important for HBA retention?
Member engagement and consistent interaction lead to greater fulfillment and commitment to your local HBA. Retention is critical to maintaining and building a successful organization. So, you want to keep your members highly satisfied and your turnover to a minimum.
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What’s your first step? By identifying the problems that your membership is facing through having consistent check-ins. This will also help you get ahead of issues that are affecting silent members to make changes that benefit the entire HBA. In our last article, we talked about crafting a recruitment & retention plan. Check-ins are a critical step to get feedback to help determine exactly what value points your members are looking for in your local HBA.
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Remember, It’s 7 times more expensive to acquire a new member versus retaining one. Member retention not only saves you time and money, but improves HBA engagement and solidifies your local as a valuable community of information for builders and associate members alike. Ultimately, placing a focus on member retention means investing in member satisfaction.
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Meeting member expectations and monitoring satisfaction
Once you’ve on-boarded a new member, you have to continue to ensure their satisfaction within your local HBA. One great way to monitor member satisfaction is through regular check-ins or 1:1 meetings.
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In addition to creating space to air out potential problems, it is also a forum to give feedback, encouragement, and praise the success of your members. Here are just a few reasons why quality check-ins lead to greater retention:
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- Helps to set expectations
- Members feel seen, heard, and valued
- Check-ins create a sense of trust with HBA leadership
- Members feel part of a greater whole
- Create opportunities to resolve conflicts early on
- Members are engaged and connected
- Ongoing communication and direction
- Promotes continuous learning
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Communicating directly with your members through HBA leadership can also help you quickly identify and resolve issues to ensure higher member satisfaction.
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In addition to feeling valued, members also want to know that they are a part of a mutually beneficial organization. With regular check-ins, they can identify the value points that they are looking for with their membership. Check-ins allow you to get direct feedback on the changes that need to be made to improve your HBA while giving you the opportunity to educate members on the benefits of your local they may not know about.
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Note: The #1 Reason someone stops doing business with a organization is Perceived Indifference.
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Clear and transparent communication is often overlooked in organizational planning and policy. What happens in the leadership meetings is not always disclosed to members. Therefore, giving members an honest look at the goals and creating transparency leads to a sense of belonging and trust. Regular check-ins offer opportunities for any member to ask questions, establish a regular expectation of honest communication, creating an open-door policy that will make members feel valued and heard. Ideally, you should have a 1:1 once a quarter with your members.
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You might be thinking, inviting members to participate in 1:1 meetings seems like a LOT of work! Don’t worry. Only a small percentage of your members will take advantage of the invite (at first) so it won’t be a big time committment on your end. We recommend to do it annually with members from their anniversary date of joining your Local HBA. This way, you can stagger the meetings, and set up the annual check-in at the time of on-boarding. You might even want to set the meeting a month before their anniversary date, so you can address any concerns they have if the member isn’t sure if they would like to renew. For many, just the thought of knowing you are willing to meet with each member annually will should your level of committment and trust of the value that your Local HBA brings it’s members.
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What is the long-term value of 1:1s?
Regular check-ins can improve member satisfaction and dramatically increase local HBA retention. Studies show that member satisfaction is deeply tied to feelings of contribution, usefulness, growth, and personal development. In addition to member satisfaction, you will also be aware of any potential conflicts, so that you can make adjustments or change course when necessary.
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Allowing members to present challenges, ask for support, and better understand how they fit into your local’s bigger picture can be highly engaging and fulfilling. While every local HBA may have its own approach to 1:1 meetings, establishing trust and open communication is guaranteed to increase member retention, and thus, organizational success.
Hacking A Construction Company [And How To Prevent It]
Did you know 85% of domestic hacking activity originates within the USA, with 56% coming from the same state, and 35% from the same city as the victimized company? While tech adoption continues to spread through the industry, construction is now ranked as the #1 target for ransomware attacks. Ransomware is a form of digital blackmail which targets vulnerable businesses, disrupting critical processes, and potentially halting business.
Construction Email Marketing 101 (Part 2)
Our last article focused on how you can craft an effective email campaign, but why are these campaigns essential to your construction or trade company? The key is to know how to utilize them properly and create something your clients or potential clients want to open and read. Here are a few ways you can make your email newsletters work for you.