5 roadblocks to a healthy construction project pipeline

Your construction company is built upon strong customer relationships. After all, repeat business and referrals are driving forces filling most sales pipelines. But as your company grows and more individuals on your staff are interacting with current and prospective customers, you can lose sight of those critical relationships. Silos of information begin to form. Frustration builds. And customer satisfaction takes a hit.

How do you know when it’s time to take a more customer-centric approach to your business? Here are five roadblocks that could be hampering your customer relationships and ultimately your sales pipeline:

1. You are not communicating regularly with your customers and prospects in order to be top-of-mind when a new project comes up.
2. Bid follow-up is falling through the cracks.
3. Your employees don’t know how other staff members are working with your customers and sales prospects (for example, your field superintendents are in the dark about upcoming projects until they receive a work order).
4. When a customer calls in, only one or two people have enough information to help them.
5. Employees have retired or left your company and took their marketing, sales, or other important contacts and relationships with them.

Removing the roadblocks

To improve the quality of each prospect and customer interaction, some construction companies are adopting customer relationship management (CRM) practices and technology. CRM software provides a 360-degree view of your company’s interaction with past, current, and future customers by centralizing the data so it can be shared—security permitting—across your organization. How can you best use CRM technology?

• Identify your best opportunities
  Gain knowledge on which customers are the best fit for your business and then focus on building great relationships with them.
• Maintain client data
  When an employee leaves your company, keep precious customer contacts and engagement history.
• Build a consistent approach to winning work
  Standardize workflow, guide repeatable processes, and ensure consistent marketing, sales, and customer service delivery.
• Gain visibility
  Monitor your business development pipeline to see trends, measure ROI, and ensure you are on track to keep your project pipeline full.
• Be mobile
  Access client and pipeline information anytime and anywhere from your mobile device.

In short, taking a more customer-centric approach—with assistance from CRM technology—can enhance your marketing, sales, and customer service efforts. And that leads to new clients, loyal customers, and repeat business that will fill your project pipeline.