Bob Weickgenannt, president of Starcom Design Build, in Columbia, Md., noticed a slowdown in his market in August 2007. He realized that to restore consumer confidence, which had dropped due to constant bad news in the media, he had to meet with potential clients face-to-face. He adjusted his marketing plan to create more opportunities for personal contact, which he describes in this video in front of a small addition his company did in Silver Spring, Md.
Weickgenannt began holding seminars at his office at the end of 2007. In 2009 his company participated in three times as many home shows as it had in 2007. And at the end of 2008, he began hosting open houses again. “We had done open houses approximately seven years ago," he says, "but our lead flow was so strong that we didn’t need them.”
He says the current challenge is that “leads are very unlikely to convert to design contracts and construction contracts. You have to educate [prospects] about buying and so forth and work them very hard to get results." To that end, he's hoping that more in-person meetings with prospective clients will help.