Green Means Go
Green building is quickly going mainstream in the minds of consumers, and as energy prices rise it will soon become more necessity than trend. Here’s how to get proactive:
- Many of your customers are as wary as you are. Become a source of knowledge and chances are you’ll be the expert of choice when the rest of the pack catches up to the early adopters.
- Learn what makes products green. Promote the green attributes of the products you already sell.
- Stock green alternatives to the products that aren’t.
- Understand and pass along the non-product concepts of green building, such as efficient design, site layout, waste management, and durable building.
- If your local home builders association has a green building program, get involved, become a sponsor, and be visible.
–Katy Tomasulo
Feed Opportunities, Starve Problems
Put your superstars in high-growth opportunity slots, not in positions to fix current problems. You should be channeling 20% of your resources toward future opportunities and putting your best people there. Exploit potential high-growth areas. Look at where you are getting unexpectedly good results and hone in on that to drive those markets, regardless of what they might be.
–Jim Harris
Work Hard at Working Smart
You might be welcoming the slowdown as a chance to take a breather and get ready for the next surge, but there’s no guarantee you’ll get the business when the turnaround finally arrives. So don’t stop hustling; use this time to think of new and better ways to serve customers to ensure you’ll be the one they continue to turn to for products. Schedule meetings with staff–the entire staff–to brainstorm new ideas for better services. Learn the right way to prospect, get over your fear of cold calls, and get proactive. Survival will come down to which dealers are more willing to fight for customers. No matter how big you are or small you are, hit this shaky ground with your legs–and brains–pumping.
–Craig Webb
Make E-Mail Where It’s
Just because you don’t see builders and remodelers strapping BlackBerries onto their belts doesn’t mean they’re not plugged in; a survey this summer by ProSales’ parent company found 90% of the builders surveyed and 80% of the remodelers had purchased more than $300 worth of goods online in the past year. With activity like that, the odds are high that most of your customers have at least one e-mail address, and that means they can be reached easily by you, at no cost, whenever you have a product to sell or an invitation to send. If e-mail isn’t at least a minor part of your business life, make it.
–Craig Webb
Widen Your Culture
You might not have noticed an uptick in the number of Hispanic customers in your stores, but maybe that’s because they’re reading the bilingual signs at The Home Depot. It’s an impossible trend to ignore: 27% of people employed in the construction industry are Hispanic and close to one out of every 12 construction-related companies is Hispanic-owned. Here are some tips that will help you reach out to this growing market:
- Many Hispanic entrepreneurs are new to the business and as such may still be restricted to cash sales, so consider bringing back the register.
- Direct translations of materials can lead to mixed messages. Design materials with the audience–not just the language–in mind.
- Hire a marketing firm with expertise in Hispanic communications.
- While a huge number of Hispanics do speak English, you can get extra business–and a few cultural insights–by having people on staff that can communicate effectively in English and in Spanish.
- A foreign language doesn’t mean foreign ways. Hispanic contractors are much like the rest of your clientele. They want a reliable supplier with on-time delivery and knowledgeable staff, and Hispanic cultures typically prize loyalty and are focused on family.
–Katy Tomasulo
Mulch Markets
Landscapers will tell you that their market begins to blossom when housing starts cool. Why? Because once homeowners are built up and moved in, they regularly turn to their yards as the next place to spend their hard-earned cash. This might be a good time to think about offering landscaping materials and even some backyard shrubbery. Doing so may seem to go against the industry saw that if you carry plants, you’re not a real lumberyard. But carrying a bit more green in the yard could help you stay in the black in the years to come.
–Joe Bousquin
Don’t Panic!
Create a plan and stick to it, even during the slump. The temptation during a downturn may be to offer sales promotions or discounts. But other tactics that don’t cut into revenue may be just as effective.
–Jim Groff
Make It Happen
Even people who sell information technology systems admit that installing IT can be like trying to change the tires on a car while it’s moving; why go through the trouble when the car is rolling along fine? Well, now that car is slowing down. Thus, this might be the right time to see how new tech tools can rev up your business practices and productivity.
–Chris Wood
