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Chad Prinkey is the CEO of Well Build Construction Consulting, a company based in Baltimore that offers strategic consulting, facilitation services and round tables for construction executives. Opinions are typical of the author.
Buyers of all kinds have been using the term “apples to apples” for several decades; However, the term is not realistic for the selection of contractors due to the inherent differences between products, such as apples and services, such as construction.
And yet, how often do you face buyers who say they compare apples with apples with each other and your competitors? How often do you use this exact sentence when you talk to your SUn and suppliers?
Chad Prinkey
Permit granted by well -built construction consulting
During buyers “there is nothing like apples”, it will probably not work, but you have to be ready to manage such informed statements, while working to prove that you are an orange.
Be better questions
As I described above, the low supply attitude creates an adversary environment for all involved. The main contractors often fight with the owners for delay claims and their subcontractors on change orders.
SUMs fight with the orders of change and the orders of change and one another. The owners are under a constant fire from all sides and try to avoid expenses.
In the meantime, everyone tries to preserve their little margin and take advantage of any opportunity to take advantage of the situation to get a little more benefits. This current reality has a significant added adverse effect to erode confidence between all parties, which makes it difficult to convince an evil client that you are really different.
Builders of construction, especially professional buyers such as developers, government organizations, premiums and large corporations, can be quite skeptical of companies like yours. However, some buyers have made significant progress in seeing their construction providers as partners, which is beneficial for the industry.
In addition to finding these buyers, you must make others buyers with the test you are amazing.
Where to start
Being a better company is the prerequisite for the sale of value on the price. Honestly, can you say that you are different and better than your competition today? If not this is your starting point.
No one is perfect, but there are higher service suppliers in our industry today and, if you want to gain more margins, you have to be one of them. The conundrum for many contractors is that it needs benefits to become higher service providers.
The benefit is what allows us to invest in better training, tools, personal and technology. It is a classic situation of versus-your chicken. Higher service providers are like this because they have more capacity to invest (chicken) or their higher service allowed them to get better benefits (egg)? Let me establish this age debate once and for all: it is the egg.
Although it is true that the increase in profits facilitates reinvertiment, at some point each company decided to commit first. So many things that contribute to excellence cost little to implement.
Can’t afford a training department? Do it yourself until you can afford one. You don’t have leading technology? Make an excel and bootstrap class until you can buy it.
What is basic is that so many sales problems are solved or, at least, easier to solve, quintessential operational. Being more efficient, safer and coherent are key sales strategies, and these goals must be fulfilled if you ever create benefits to reinvest.
Break some rules
With your operational force on your side, you can introduce selling environments confidently that the buyer made a huge mistake for not hiring your company. This confidence is power. If you were sure that your company was the right selection for the project, how would you act in the following scenarios?
- Requests for Offers of strangers.
- Requests for pre -construction services without contract or even verbal commitment.
- The BAFO rounds designed to promote the lowest price in leveling offers.
I hope your respective answers are:
- Call, present -vou and suggest a meeting to explore your form for the project.
- Decline to provide FreeCon without commitments in advance.
- Contact the person in charge of the decision and ask: “Price separately, who do you want in this project and why?” Then negotiate the project directly.
When it is demonstrably better, the customer needs more than you need. Include -you are in your operational excellence and gain more target work on the margins you deserve.
