Bringing in New Clients - Civil Site Development

[entp]

Hi,

Has anyone here ever written a business plan or done marketing work to bring business in to an engineering firm?

I'm considering working for a tiny structural firm that is looking to start a civil group to do civil site development. I have design and project management experience, but I've never done marketing before.

They want me to bring new clients and new work in, and I don't mind spending time on marketing, but I've never done it before, and don't know the best way to go about it. I'm also somewhat new in the vicinity, so can't just rely on business from clients who knew me from my previous companies.

Any advice about what to do, or anecdotes about experience would be greatly appreciated, thanks!

 

[GeoPaveTraffic]

Unless there is more work than the current firms can do, and do well, you have a very hard task. That said, I would start with the current clients of the firm, i.e. who do they do structural work for? Note that some of these may be civil firms who will no longer be clients once you start compeating with them.

Then get into every professional orginization in the area, go to every meeting, take a potential client to lunch at least once a week. If you do all of this, and manage to do a very good job on each project you do get, after 6 to 12 months you should start to see a pay off with new projects coming in.

It takes a long time to develope new clients. Unless the firm has a number of clients looking for more of a one stop shop, or there are not enough civil firms in the area, or you are just a gluton for punishment, I wouldn't do it.

Good luck.