Greetings!
Welcome to this month's edition of the Marketing Newsletter. The focus for most of the newsletter is the state of the construction industry. As the extended Market Activity report shows, there have been plenty of releases concerning the state of the market, some good some bad. To help understand future changes to the housing market we have details of the government's proposed Localism agenda which will have impacts upon housing policy.
A revised edition of my white paper on Specification Selling may also give you some ideas to develop your sales activites.
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| Construction Market Activity |
The conflicting headlines continue - is it a start to double dip recession or confirmation of the recovery?
On the positive side figures published by the Office for National Statistics show an 8.6% growth in construction output from April to June this year. The Civil Engineering Contractors Association say 27% of their members reported an increase in workload over the same period last year.Glenigan are forecasting a 10% growth in office starts for the second half of the year and there is a growth in activity from the supermarkets. A number of leading companies have announced improved turnover and profits including Taylor Wimpey, Mears, Balfour Beatty and Travis Perkins.
Less encouraging is the Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply's report that growth in construction activity slowed in July following 5 months of steady increase. But note this is a slowing, not a fall. RICS reported that most sectors saw a drop in workload, the exceptions being private commercial and residential which were broadly unchanged. Glenigan also noted a decline in projects starting on site from May to July compared to the previous 3 months.
Also concerning is the predicted fall in house prices and demand. In their August property survey Rightmove show a fall of 1.7% for the month with a rise of 4.3% for the past year. But there are very mixed opinions about this. In a recent piece in the Sunday Times they had 6 experts predicting house price movements with guesses (and that's all you can really call it) ranging between a house price fall of 4% to an increase of 5% by the end of 2010 and for 2011 expectations ranged from a fall of 5% to an increase of 3%.
In general, housing remains an area of uncertainty, with more councils freezing plans for large scale developments required by the previous government's Regional Spatial Strategy. The National Housing Federation estimates that plans for 85,000 homes in England have been dropped because of this change in policy. To try and ensure planning approvals for new homes Grant Shapps, Housing Minister, has announced the promised New Homes Bonus which is to be introduced early in the spending review. We have also seen the Homes & Communities Agency releasing previously stalled Kickstart projects with 16 schemes in London, worth £51.7 million, now able to proceed.
The Federation of Master Builders is also reporting a continuing decline in workload for the 10th quarter, although they say the rate of decline is slowing.
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| Government Housing Policy |
The Coalition Government has already announced the abolition of the housing targets that were part of the previous government's Regional Spatial Strategy. This announcement lead to a number of councils immediately scrapping planned developments. Grant Shapps' announcement of a New Homes Bonus is an initial response to this which will see the first incentives paid to Local Authorities by April 2011. The government has published its Structural Reform Plan which details how it intends to move towards localism. This will become law with the Local Government Bill scheduled for October 2010 and the Localism Bill in November 2011. This legislation covers the devolution of many aspects of power to local government, of which housing is just a part.
On the subject of housing it states that it will "Meet people's housing aspirations by streamlining and speeding up the planning system, providing local authorities with strong and transparent incentives to facilitate housing growth, as well as making the provision of social housing more flexible." Included in this is a plan to "Develop and put in place options to help social tenants own or part-own their home" which is due to be finalised by April 2011.
Both the Draft Structural Reform Plan and the July implementation update can be downloaded from the CLG website.
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| Specification Selling |
The process of selling to specifiers is an expertise I have built up over many years. I gained first hand experiencing working in the sales team of a product manufacturer, then as National Sales Manager. Subsequently I have formed specification sales teams on a couple of occasions. However it is our activities as a market research agency which have given me greatest insight into the process as a result of conducting numerous research projects into the process of specification. A few years ago I wrote a white paper on the subject, which I have now updated and is available for download from my website.
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| Forthcoming Events |
| Have you considered entering the Construction Marketing Awards? They recognise Strategic Marketing as well as best use of the key marketing tools including Advertising, PR, Technical Information, Events, Exhibitions, Websites and Digital Media. These are a good way of gaining recognition for yourself, your team and your company.
For those based in Leeds there is a CIMCIG event Construction Procurement being held on 7th September 2010. Or Marketing to Architects in London on 22nd September. |
