Construction market hot spots? We have long been familiar with the concept of the BRIC countries – Brazil, Russia, India and China – being leading growth economies. The person responsible for naming the BRICs – Jim O’Neill, retired chairman of Goldman Sacs Asset Management – is now credited with establishing MINT (Mexico, Indonesia, Nigeria and Turkey) as the countries to watch. It is very tempting to conclude that they are just a set of convenient initials and it is a result of some good marketing on his behalf! With the […]
Read MoreDue Diligence There is much emphasis on the term “due diligence”, which can cover a multitude of sins. It essentially embraces the activities that are taken to ensure that a subject company (usually a target for acquisition) is appropriate and that there are no hidden “nasties”. Typically it is associated with the legal and accounting professions and the focus is on figures (especially their large fees!). It is difficult to be precise about the costs involved, but they can easily exceed £100,000 for even relatively small deals. However, there is […]
Read MoreFocus your Construction Marketing Construction marketing for too long has been reactive, with firms being reliant on “winning” specific projects. Too rarely do the participants actually focus on clients/targets, their business needs and how they can develop effective relationships with them. Properly used, digital marketing represents a great opportunity for the industry to both keep in touch with clients and also raise their credibility. However, Mark Durkin (Professor of Marketing at University of Ulster Business School) has raised concerns over the way that “Digital customers are revolting.” He has stated […]
Read MoreIt looks like we are finally going to see sustained growth in the UK construction market, after a very difficult period since the financial recession first hit in 2008. It certainly has some way to go – total output in 2012 at £83 billion (in 2012 prices) was still only at the same level as 2002 in real terms. However, growth of around 2.4% in 2013 is forecast by leading body Construction Products Association to be followed by 4 years of c4% p.a. growth to 2017. Led by private house-building […]
Read MoreNapoleon got it wrong. We really are a nation of small businesses, not (just) shopkeepers. According to the government, 99.9% of the 5 million UK businesses are SMEs (small and medium-sized enterprises), employing less than 250 people. It gets even better – 99% of businesses employ less than 50 people. In total, 75% of private sector businesses do not employ anyone beside the business owners. In some sectors, SMEs represent more than 70% of total private sector employment – including construction and real estate – while for manufacturing it is […]
Read MoreWho’d be a forecaster these days? With the UK economy in Q3 showing 0.8% growth, construction led the way with a 2.5% increase. But despite this, construction output will be down by around by 1.5-2% this year before growing by c2.5% in 2014 and by 4% in 2015. As has been making the news, housing is leading the way. Boosted by government incentives, house-builders are busy and prices are rising as we try to make up for the severe shortfall in housing provision. Beyond housing, the other key area for […]
Read MoreLatest research from McKinsey & Company shows that – as suspected – there is a marked apparent divergence between the core messages companies communicate about their brands and the characteristics their customers value most. They found that a number of the most important themes for customer perceptions of brand strength—including effective supply chain management and specialist market knowledge—were among those least mentioned by B2B suppliers. Honest and open dialogue, which customers considered most important, was one of the three themes not emphasized at all by the companies in their sample. […]
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