What if I told you there’s a fast way to grow your construction business from nothing to millions? It all starts with a good construction business plan.
Many entrepreneurs think they need much money to begin, but the construction industry is different. You don’t need a specific financial investment to get started, which is excellent.
Also, there’s no right way to write a construction company business plan.
Last week, I spoke with some construction friends, and we had a great discussion about how to grow a business. We explored different strategies like estimating costs, measuring quantities, and negotiating deals.
We came up with some useful ideas from our brainstorming session to help boost your construction business. Let’s go over those ideas and see how they can benefit you!
5 Pillars Of Construction Business Plan
- Develop a system to get a lot of clients and projects
- Develop an estimating team that can help you bid more
- Develop a follow-up system for negotiation and sales close-up
- Set up a project management team for smooth operations
- Build your field team to perform more efficiently
Let’s delve deep into these five steps of a successful construction business plan more thoroughly:
1. Determine Your Lead Generation Strategy for Construction Business Plan
How do you find leads for your construction jobs? You need to gather leads before you start working on a project and estimating materials. But how can you do this?
First, get a solid understanding of your field. Next, sign up for online lead-generation services like Bluebook and iSqft. These services can help you attract more clients reliably.
If you want to improve your efforts even more, consider the Select 12 Cluster (S12C) strategy. This means listing the 12 most promising clients you have picked to help your construction business. You can use Google to help create this list. After that, reach out with personalized emails, phone calls, or visits.
But you don’t have to visit them in person to get leads. The goal is to make them aware of you—not just any contractor, but you. Show them that you can provide great value and solid advice. Building good, professional relationships with potential clients is essential for your construction business.
The S12C strategy aims to help you nurture these relationships so that they think of you as their go-to contractor when they have construction plans.
So, just to summarize:
- Invest in lead-generation sources
- Build a S12C strategy
2. Establish Your Bidding and Estimating Process
Once you have secured leads for your construction projects, the next important step is streamlining the bidding and estimating process. This will help you focus more on selling your jobs effectively. You have three main options to consider:
- Hire a Full-Time In-House Estimator
Bringing in a full-time estimator can significantly reduce your workload. This allows you to have a dedicated team member who understands your company’s needs and project standards.
- Engage an Estimating Service
You can choose to use a professional estimating service for each project. These experts can handle your estimates and ensure accuracy without needing permanent staff.
- Estimate Yourself
While this may seem cost-effective at first, it can be very challenging. Doing estimates alone can take up a lot of your time and energy. You might spend hours preparing a detailed estimate, only to discover that the client chose another bid because it was cheaper than expected.
Successful contractors know the value of having a strong team and delegating tasks. If you are working alone, delegating responsibilities as soon as possible is crucial. This lets you concentrate on bidding for projects and landing more contracts.
In the long run, this strategy is essential for a successful construction business plan. To improve your efficiency, think about partnering with a construction estimating company. You can upload your project drawings and receive a precise estimate within 12 to 24 hours. This saves you time and reduces the need for extra staff, allowing you to focus on other important areas of your business.
3. Create a Sales Team that Closes Jobs
Once you have a solid lead generation system and an efficient bidding process, it’s time to sell your service effectively. Closing a deal involves more than just a transaction. It requires genuine passion, patience, and timing.
Investing in your clients can take several forms. This includes consistently delivering great service, allowing trust to build over time, and choosing the right time to discuss their needs or decisions. Following up with clients is a key way to strengthen this connection, and you can do this automatically or manually.
Automatic follow-ups use a Customer Relationship Manager (CRM) system to help manage your communications. This technology allows you to send automated emails to specific people at set times. It ensures your message reaches the right audience without the constant attention required.
In contrast, manual follow-ups give you a more personal touch. You can pick your audience and write individual emails tailored to them. This lets you choose when to reach out, making it more impactful.
Before bidding on a project, it’s important to meet potential clients in person. This initial interaction helps you understand if you have a good working relationship and allows you to explain clearly what you can offer. Taking these steps can increase your chances of closing the deal and building a lasting client relationship.
4. Set Up Project Management Systems
Closing deals may lead you to believe that project competition is a matter of little time. However, the real challenge appears when you suddenly face multiple projects. This moment really tests the ability of home builders and contractors to manage their subcontractors effectively.
It’s important for construction company owners or home builders to focus on leadership and sales. Spending too much time on-site and worrying about every little task is not helpful and won’t increase your projects.
Instead, you should delegate responsibilities as soon as you secure a new project unless you enjoy being supervisor on-site. Efficient delegation boosts productivity and allows you to focus on growing your business. To help with this, investing in essential software tools can streamline project management and keep everything running smoothly.
Bid Management Software
This is quick and easy to employ, rather than asking people to remember the due dates of the project. If you want to utilize it, look at SmartBid and AccuBid.
Project Management Software
This software helps to keep all the employees involved in a home building or construction project on the same page. Some exceptional project management software are Procore, CoConstruct, and BuilderTrend.
Accounting Software
This software helps to keep track of all the financial expenses of the home-building project. Some famous software in this category are QuickBooks, ZipBooks, and Stripe.
Estimating Software
This software helps you to create an accurate and precise cost estimate for your home-building project while considering all the costs of materials, labor, and overheads.
5. Find a Field Operation Team
When you have set up the project management systems, it’s time to arrange a field operation team for your home-building project. Keep in mind that it’s the team and collective effort that can build or destroy any project. Don’t forget that this team is being set up for the field and not for the office.
As per your requirements, you need to have a look at how many people you require and how to select the right people for your project.
General Superintendent
This is the primary field operation manager. They look after all the projects that the company is currently working on and track their progress.
Project Superintendent
This is the primary operation manager of single projects. They pay attention to single jobs to ensure that the project is well-aligned and navigated to success.
Foreman
This is the further subdivision of the project superintendent. You can call them the supervisors on layperson terms.
Workers
They are the actual fuel of any home-building project. These are responsible for the actual work on the field. Hire them, train them, and put them to work.
Conclusion
Here’s how to create a construction firm business plan for a successful construction company. The construction industry can be challenging, but having a solid plan and executing it well can make things easier. We hope you found this information helpful and valuable.
