“Can I ask who’s calling?” The receptionist asks.
You have asked to speak to a member of the quantity surveyor team working on their latest project in Surrey. They’ve received about a dozen other calls this morning, all asking about that same project.
You try to think of a way to sound different, that you and the team have some substantial relationship. But you can only honestly say:
“It’s Barry from Industries Plus, just ringing to see how we can be a part of the groundworks is all.” You reply.
You know the whole time that someone screens you before connecting you to the right line.
The receptionist says they only handle project messages through a general info@ email address. You can send your tender there.
The conversation ends, but you’ll try calling back a few more times this week with little to no luck.
Sound familiar?
If your company is still using manual methods to find new construction leads like sourcing from planning portals or scanning news and social media, then you’re always going to be fighting at the gate to get in.
Barbour ABI can get you past the gatekeepers with real, verified, and direct phone numbers and emails to key contacts.
What is a gatekeeper?
A gatekeeper in B2B sales is a person in the business who screens incoming calls. This person is usually the receptionist or personal assistant.
Their job is to filter out cold calls that may be unwarranted or irrelevant to the business. The term ‘gatekeeper’ or ‘gatekeeping’ occurs because they prevent people from through.
How to get in direct touch with a construction project’s key roles
You know Company A is involved on a project as a main contractor, so you look them up online. Their website gives you an office phone number, so you check out the meet the team section to find the appropriate person to ask for. They have dozens of site managers, even more quantity surveyors and they have even more people listed on their LinkedIn profile.
Who will be actively working on the project you’re looking to target? Is it worth the time to call over and over again to figure out who, and if you can even speak to them over the phone? What if you just popped a message via LinkedIn? You might take this approach if this is the only way you’ve ever sourced new work but there’s a better and faster way.
Instead of playing the dreaded game of phone tag with the gatekeepers, advanced construction data can put you in touch with direct and mobile phone numbers.
Barbour ABI provides contact information on all our researched projects throughout the UK. Where other directories may only produce company-wide information with generic numbers and email addresses, our in-house research team confirm individual roles so you know who is working on what.
This powerful data cuts out the time spent speaking to the receptionist (who we’re sure is lovely, but their job is to gatekeep and we can’t blame them) and gets you in direct contact with key decision makers.
The art of contacting key roles at the right time
Whether you’re a building material manufacturer, subcontractor, service provider, or any other business type operating in the construction industry, we hear a very similar theme of problems: timing.
- By the time that role is assigned it’s too late.
- I can’t get onto projects at tender stage but I need to know who’s bidding immediately.
- If I knew when groundworks started I could start calling ASAP.
Whilst reliable construction news sources can provide updates and announcements such as some start dates and contract awards, they’re often reporting on the up-and-coming projects. They’re also hardly able to provide comprehensive cover of the entire UK. Other sources like LinkedIn and company updates can be helpful but are easily missed and also not comprehensive.
The competitive gap exists in knowing confirmed information as soon as it happens.
The Construction Project Leads Platform is designed to show you the exact information you need such as planning stage and automated alerts. Just select the projects you want to monitor and set an alert to be notified about any updates on the projects. Each morning you’ll receive an email with detailed updates on role additions, start and finish date amendments, and stage progression.
The power in knowing if the projects are right for you
Whilst most teams think they have a problem with gatekeepers, the problem usually exists in not being able to see over the gate.
Businesses that still use manual sourcing methods, like planning portals and word of mouth, waste time and resources.
The projects you’ve sourced may sound like the ones you usually target. But with limited visibility into who’s involved, timelines, and updates, how can you truly know?
Most users on the platform start with a large list of projects that should typically be within their target regions and sectors. From there, as the projects progress they’re able to decide what’s worth spending time on and ask themselves some important questions:
- We weren’t able to get our foot in the door early enough, can we start relationship building now or not?
- Our competitor works with this contractor 9/10 times, do we waste time bidding on it for that 10% chance or move on?
- We have capacity for two more projects before end of year, which ones are the most profitable and ideal for our business?
Knowing who’s working with who, when projects are happening, and stage progression builds a sustainable and smart pipeline.
Using contact details and our AI Email Writer as a deadly duo
Having the right contacts and knowing when to start prospecting is already a powerful tool in your team’s kit. However, any good sales team will know how much time email prospecting can take.
That’s why we created our in-platform AI Email Writer.
Set up an unlimited number of prompts designed to create emails for very specific reasons such as:
- Email to contractors
- Recruitment
- Brand awareness
Within the prompt building you give it all the details you want the emails to include, save it once, and it’s created forever.
Users can then go find the projects that are ready to be worked, toggle the roles they want to contact, and select the AI Email Writer tool.
The email and subject line are created for you in seconds. The tool automatically inputs details on the project you’re enquiring about so you don’t have to.
You can view a complete tutorial on how to use the AI Email Writer here and learn how your team can cut prospecting time in half with this industry-leading tool.
Having direct contact information plus a solid email strategy will get you further than you ever did trying to get through the gatekeepers.
Getting started with Barbour ABI
Whether direct phone numbers or emails (or both) are your team’s preferred method of prospecting, having advanced construction data will set them apart from the competition.
Instead of hearing:
“Can I ask who’s calling?”
You can speak directly to the roles responsible for supply chain procurement.
If you’d like to see how Barbour ABI’s construction sales leads works as advanced intelligence for your team, book a free 20-minute demo today.
