AEC marketing:
10 steps to
By Matt Handal
Special to Florida Construction News
Many years ago, in response to an
article I wrote for the Society for Mar-
keting Professional Services (SMPS)
Marketer magazine, I was emailed by
someone who was starting out as an
AEC marketer for an electrical de-
signer/contractor in the Midwest.
(NOTE: we refer to marketers in the
architecture, engineering, and con-
struction industry as “AEC mar-
keters”). He asked me how you gain
the respect of engineers and get
them to listen to your marketing
ideas. He was trying to figure out “in
essence, how does a 21-year-old con-
vince a strong AEC firm that there are
areas to be improved?”
What follows is a slightly-edited
version of my light-hearted, yet frank,
response to him. My “10 Steps to
Making it BIG in the AEC Marketing
World” still hold true today and can
help just about any marketer.
Mike: First, congratulations for having the
audacity to approach someone of my
stature and accomplishment. As I
stand here in my darkened office,
peering at the dots scurrying around
the city below, I often wonder to my-
self…”was I once one of them?”
You see Mike, after you have
achieved a certain level of success in
the AEC marketing world, it is hard to
remember what it was like starting
out. But I will do my best to recount
how I became what I am today.
Maybe you can learn from my jour-
ney. So climb up here on my lap. Ok,
this is a little story that I like to call
“10 Steps to Making it BIG in the AEC
Marketing World.”
8 – SPRING 2018 — Florida Construction News
success 1. Prove yourself to the
technical staff
As an AEC marketer, (or proposti-
tute) or whatever you would like to
call yourself, you are going to have to
prove yourself to everybody.
How do you do that? First, you
have to realize that your job is to sup-
port the people in your firm, not just
in your marketing position…but as a
member of the team. So, look for op-
portunities to do that.
You need to walk in their shoes
and learn everything you can about
what they do. For example, I served
as the marketer for an AEC designer
and would “tag along” to project sites
to help them survey projects they
were going to design renovations for.
That’s the first time I stuck my head
up in the drop ceiling. I was also al-
ways around to help out when a proj-
ect was going out the door.
I would involve myself as much as
possible. By doing so you learn what
it is they are doing, meet their clients,
and earn a little bit of their trust. For
me, it would even get to the point
where 6 p.m. would come around and
clients would call me asking, “Where
are our drawings?”
True story, one time I walked back
to the engineers and I saw a project
manager spot me and run out the
door with drawings under his arm. I
wasn’t his boss and had no control
over him, but he knew that I was
walking back there with the client’s
interest in mind and took me seri-
ously enough to respond accordingly.
2. Always think in terms of what
you can do for others to help to
make them successful
Live your life with other people’s
goals in mind. You will feel better
about yourself than if you live a self-
centered life. If you take actions to
make others look good, they will
know that you have their best interest
at heart. That’s when they open up to
you. Once they know that you are truly
looking out for them, they start taking
your advice and looking to you if they
have a problem. Don’t approach po-
tential clients or coworkers looking for
something from them. Be the guy
that people come to when they need
something. Go out of your way for
people and always be 100 percent up-
front and honest.
3. Read the SMPS Markendium,
then read it again
This comprehensive resource has
replaced the Marketing Handbook for
the Design and Construction Profes-
sional, which you can still find on
Amazon.com. This SMPS resource is about $159
($123 on Kindle) and I wish I bought it
before I knew all the stuff in it. It
would have saved me a hell of a lot of