ForConstructionPros.com

A change in the way national commercial and industrial companies approach the management of their properties has lead some paving and pavement maintenance contractors to reevaluate how to approach their market.

To some extent this approach involves marketing, but in a more profound way it affects the way contractors relate to their customers and prospects—-and also how contractors relate to one another.

A number of factors are behind this change.

• National Big Box stores and major retailers have streamlined their management operations while at the same time recognizing the value of regular, often planned maintenance of their properties.
• The maturing of the pavement maintenance industry itself has resulted in established mature businesses being sold to people with a business background (but not necessarily a background in pavement maintenance).
• The prevalence of so many businesses on the Internet, which has made finding a contractor (or a customer) a 24-hour-a-day process that takes only a few keystrokes.
• The recognition by contractors of the fight for market share and efforts to retain or increase their share.

But regardless of the reasons, paving and pavement maintenance contractors are working in a variety of innovative ways to identify and bring their message to their customers.

“The customer wants to see more professionalism, rather than ‘Joe’ pulling up and handing him a quote on a business card,” says Mike Musto, president of 1-800-PAVEMENT. “Marketing helps give credibility to a company and to the industry. It adds to the professionalism.”