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In this episode, we explore the evolving landscape of social media strategies and transformative tactics in the commercial contracting sector. We'll examine the strategic collaboration where marketing, sales, and business development should converge, making "collaboration" a vital force in content creation. Our guests, Matt Graves, founder of Construction Yeti, and Jonathan Cor, founder of Customer Growth, share unique insights and uncover out-of-the-box approaches for securing optimal coverage and selecting the most impactful social channels. Join the conversation as we dive into innovative strategies to up your game in the competitive commercial contracting world.

As governments and school districts recognize the massive need for employees in the construction industry and the phenomenal opportunity that need presents to their students and constituents, many are finally investing time, money, and energy in developing successful CTE programs. Our guest, Catherine Schoenenberger, joins us to share a time-tested and proven methodology she has been overseeing for years.

What is the difference between BD and Marketing, and how should they complement one another? Many construction companies get it wrong, and some don't even incorporate these efforts into their business.

Ronnie Brouillard and Taylor Tobin might have it figured out better than any tandem in the construction industry. These two have been a tandem with the general contractor, Chesapeake Contracting Group for five years, setting a high standard for professionalism in their crafts. Ronnie (BD) and Taylor (Marketing) are in lock-step with their efforts and will show us how to learn from their model.

We welcome them to The Morning Huddle to share their strategies with our audience in a fun and educational discussion.

Transcript:

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00:00
Speaker 1
All right, it's morning huddle time.

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00:01
Speaker 2
Good morning.

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00:02
Speaker 1
I'm not saying it works. I wish you God speed. Godspeed with all of that. I think that's really nice. You know, I'm not sure what kind.

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00:11
Speaker 3
Of success you're gonna have with that.

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00:12
Speaker 1
Today, because the world, my friend, has changed. Right.

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00:16
Speaker 2
A lot of American construction workers, they have different needs. They have completely different needs.

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00:21
Speaker 4
These awards have a huge, like, criteria that you have to fill out. And they usually have a community service or community.

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00:32
Speaker 1
You know, the most productive with a high performance value. And, you know, sometimes it's 11 o' clock at night. Funny, isn't that? Yeah, not. Not for me. Not for me. At 11 o', clock, I am guaranteed to be snoring. So. So. It's morning huddle time. Welcome, welcome. Chad Prinke here.

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01:00
Speaker 2
Welcome.

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01:00
Speaker 1
With Seth Farger standing in for my very good friend Stacy Holzinger, who's in London. Seth, thank you so much for joining us.

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01:07
Speaker 3
Glad to be here. Thanks for clarifying because everyone was going to be surprised to see me and go, whoa, Stacy, you're bald and hairy.

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01:13
Speaker 1
So things have changed. Yes, Just amazing what a week can do. And we've got two of my very dear friends and just absolutely dynamic people who are joining us this morning. Ronnie Bruyard and Taylor Tobin from Chesapeake Contracting Group. Ronnie and Taylor, thank you so much for being here. I feel like this is long overdue.

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01:35
Speaker 2
Oh, thanks for having us. We appreciate it very much.

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01:41
Speaker 1
So. So let's just do a quick check in on what's going on in your life real quick. Seth, you mentioned at the outset of this thing that you're still operating on a different time zone.

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01:55
Speaker 2
What's.

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01:55
Speaker 1
What's new in your world?

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01:57
Speaker 3
I just returned from Alaska. My father and brother a year ago said, hey, we want to go fishing in Alaska. And I have three kids and one more on the way. So planning things a year in advance is hypothetical, but thankfully it worked out. So I just spent five days salmon fishing and UTV driving in Alaska with my dad and my brother. So he's 68, and once in a lifetime opportunity. Highly recommend it get up there if you can. So it was great.

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02:25
Speaker 1
Where did you go?

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02:28
Speaker 3
Which, if you look at a map, is barely Alaska. It's like way, way south and just across from British Columbia. So it's not as, like, way up there. But I mean, from the moment I landed, it is. It is Alaska through and through, mountainous, just peaks covered in trees. There was a salmon run going. So every stream you looked at had was literally moving with fish like it was crazy. Didn't. I saw a bear from about, I don't know, 500 yards away. I would love to have seen one a little closer.

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02:58
Speaker 1
Perfect distance. That's the perfect distance. You don't want to see a bear from a whole heck of a lot closer. I speak from personal experience on that. Awesome. What about you, Taylor? What's going on in your world?

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03:09
Speaker 4
Not much. Celebrating my dad's birthday this week. Yeah, that's about it.

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03:15
Speaker 1
Gonna be a big party or just.

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03:17
Speaker 4
No. If you know my dad, he does not like a big party, so it'll be probably a crab feast in the backyar, right?

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03:24
Speaker 1
That sounds actually perfect.

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03:26
Speaker 3
Yeah.

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03:27
Speaker 1
Well. Well, Ronnie, you and I have something in common. We just checked in. We're going to be at the same party this weekend.

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03:32
Speaker 2
Oh, yeah. That's going to be a shindig for sure.

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03:35
Speaker 1
It's gonna be a good time. Going up to the. Going up to the. To the canyon. Keller Brothers pig roast.

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03:40
Speaker 2
Yeah. You're in my neck of the woods now.

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03:42
Speaker 1
You're gonna have to be my guide.

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03:46
Speaker 2
No problem.

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03:47
Speaker 1
All right, well, good. So. And I have nothing going on. I'm just sick. So let's dive into today's topic. So we, when were preparing for this conversation, was like, I personally think that there's so much confusion about the difference between marketing and business development and sales in the construction industry. Maybe across industries, quite frankly, but in the construction industry, I see so much. You know, so many companies kind of get this wrong, and it's. And it's rare that a company gets it as right as you guys have. And I think that has a lot to do with the way that the two of you work together and the way that you've communicated about roles and responsibilities. And so today I really want to talk about best practices with business development. Ronnie and marketing. Taylor.

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04:46
Speaker 1
And then, you know, talk about how you delineate how you divide and conquer and how that whole effort is impacting the organization. So with that, Seth, I'm going to ask you to monitor, jump on the LinkedIn feed and monitor the. The comments via LinkedIn and, you know, communicate with the group and make sure that we're capturing great questions that we can bring back here in the last 10 minutes. And I'm gonna just start rolling, talking to Ronnie and Taylor about what they do and how they do it. So, Seth, we'll see you with about 10 to go. Is that cool? Yeah, Very good. See you in a bit. All right, so like I said, so much confusion surrounding these roles. I think there's this trap where marketing is just viewed as kind of like social media.

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05:38
Speaker 1
I don't know what that is, but, like, somebody's gotta update our Twitter feed.

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05:41
Speaker 2
Right.

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05:42
Speaker 1
And business development is just kind of golfing all day and. Right. And so, you know, I think that, you know, it's a wild oversimplification. How do the two of you describe your individual functions and how do you distinguish between them? I'll start with. I'll start with you, Taylor. How do you describe your. Your role in marketing?

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06:05
Speaker 4
Sure. I think for my purposes, the way I differentiate what Ronnie and I do is I communicate the brand globally, and Ronnie really communicates it personally. So he's more the boots on the ground of what we do, whereas I'm more up in the air, I guess you could say. What I love about marketing, and you're spot on when everyone thinks I just do social media, which is a big part of my job. But what I love is I really work across every single department within the company. So from. I work really closely with human resources on recruitment and on internal culture. I work with Ronnie for business development, marketing, collateral presentations. I work with pre construction for proposal development. On the technical side, trade, partner relations. I work with leadership on vision and goals, philanthropic activities.

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07:02
Speaker 4
And then I guess the only one I really don't work with would be accounting. But I just spent a lot of money, so I work with them in that way. Yeah, sure, yeah. But Ronnie and I work probably the.

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07:13
Speaker 1
Closest of the two, so that's such a fantastic description and something that I think I would just. I have to underline for. For the people, for the audience, as you're, you know, paying attention, maybe driving in this morning or what have you. One of the things that I really want to amplify that Taylor said is working across every department in the organization and doing so kind of in connection with, as you understand, the broader organizational goals. So you're integral to the conversation. Not just a department that people are sort of, you know, handing things to and saying, hey, can you punch up a proposal?

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07:58
Speaker 3
Right?

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07:58
Speaker 1
Though I'm sure that happens. It's. It's. There's a. There's an aspect of this. It's really strategic where you are working across and connecting with every department. I think that's fantastic.

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08:07
Speaker 2
And I.

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08:08
Speaker 1
And I bet you the percentage of marketing people out there who are getting that kind of engagement from the rest of their company is probably. They're probably marketing people watching this, right? Now, like, record, send to boss, like, immediately. You know, I would be so. I know. I know just the feeling. Okay, so, Ronnie, describe. Describe your. Describe business development to us and kind of how it differentiates from what.

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08:35
Speaker 2
And I'm glad that we're using this opportunity to differentiate the two, because I think it's important because I think it. I think it kind of gets confusing and muddled. First of all, I'm tremendously blessed to have a wing person like Taylor. You know, I mean, it's a great dynamic. It was a revelation when I started working here and. But my focus is obviously, I'm probably going to be the first person that people meet from Chesapeake. So it's up to me to really kind of focus on building strong relationships and just kind of promoting that company brand core values, which you'll see behind me here. You know, everybody at Chesapeake, I think, lives and breathes those core values, but it's also the interface with the client and the building of those relationships. But Taylor is instrumental in helping me promote that brand on.

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09:29
Speaker 2
On a global level. As she mentioned before. It's that taking that relationship from an introductory level and just kind of following up and building on it until it turns into some opportunities and then kind of lifts us up from a revenue standpoint. And it's just a. It's a fun. It's a fun job to do if you're extreme introvert like myself.

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09:52
Speaker 1
Introvert. Yeah. So. So the. What I took away from that, Ronnie, is two big things. One is that you are often the. The tip of the spear, if you will, as it relates to boots on the ground. Yeah. Aerodynamic.

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10:15
Speaker 3
Right.

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10:16
Speaker 1
As it relates to boots on the ground and making new relationships really out there, meeting strangers and spreading the word and being a good representation of the brand. So that's one. And then the second is care and nurturing of the relationships and the opportunities that can come out of those. So that the. All of those efforts from marketing and business development, whether it's the two of you or other people inside the company. Right. Because they're doing it too, on some level, gets con. You know, converted into revenue that ultimately that we see a return on investment for that effort.

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11:00
Speaker 2
Right. And you can do all the networking you want. And I highly recommend, I mean, if you're going to be a business developer and you're going to be serious about it, you have to get in that mindset that you have to do the work, the legwork, and that means identifying those organizations that are going to support the markets that you're trying to penetrate and you have to just go over and over again. So where a familiar face turns into a friendly face, which leads to a conversation, which leads to maybe a meeting off site. But there has to be a follow up there. And I'm glad you. Again, I'm glad we're talking about this because we recently did internally at Chesapeake Contracting Group.

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11:42
Speaker 2
We did an introduction to business development and how to build your professional brand with the intent on making everybody in the company, regardless of their position, a business developer. And get in that mindset to promote the company, ask the questions of the client and really just get invested in the success of the yourself and get access. Get invested in the success of the company as a whole. And I think we're on the right track. I mean, we always, there's always room for improvement. My gosh, I know I'm learning new things every day and I've been doing this for close to 40 years. But then you start working with people with Taylor in the company, and Taylor's just one person in Chesapeake that's an amazing professional at what they do. I mean, the company's chock full of them.

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12:26
Speaker 2
And yeah, it takes us forever to hire, but I'm glad it does. It pays off.

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12:31
Speaker 1
You guys are kind of happy where you are. I can tell. That's enough of that. All right, everybody. Not everybody's so damn happy.

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12:40
Speaker 3
Sorry.

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12:41
Speaker 1
I respect the heck out of it. I'm really, I'm proud of you and I'm proud of the company for that. I. So, you know, one of the things that I, I try to put myself in everybody's shoes. I've certainly been a business developer, you know, on some level myself. Ronnie, what do you. I think the hardest part, I think the hardest part of the job for somebody who is really good at being out there shaking hands, kissing babies, meeting strangers, you know, that part of it is the follow up, the organization, the structure side of things. I don't know if you had two or three pieces of advice for somebody who is maybe wired like you, likes to be an extrovert, likes to be out there pressing the flesh.

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13:33
Speaker 1
What, what secrets are there to staying in control of the follow up and the data management?

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13:41
Speaker 2
Wash your hands often, right.

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13:47
Speaker 3
Fail.

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13:48
Speaker 2
Don't never be afraid to ask the client what it looks like for follow up. And instead of, you know, I like to say, you know, how do I stay in front of you without being a pain in the rear and.

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14:00
Speaker 1
Or being a pest rather than guessing, you're literally just getting the test don't be afraid.

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14:06
Speaker 2
Everybody's adults. Don't be afraid to call it out and establish those boundaries. Ask them if does that look like six months, six weeks? Does it, Is it eight weeks? What is an appropriate time to stay in front of you and let you know that I'm still interested in your business? Another one is just, you know, understand the value of the relationship and what it means and don't be afraid of rejection. I always tell people and I like to, I really like to connect with up and coming developers and because I know the obstacles into getting a project built can be insurmountable at times. And the important thing is tenacity. Stay with it. What can I do to be a resource? How can I, you know, just tell me how I can help you and this it.

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14:55
Speaker 2
And I always like to tell people this and they probably are tired of hearing me, but this is a karma business and I like to give without the expectation of return and I always try to instill that in our employees, man, go the extra mile but, and just do it because it's the right thing to do and because it's kind and you know, I am one of those people that hopefully, you know, I'm going to put myself out there. And you know what, there may come a time when you need a hand or you need a good word and that person is going to be there for you. And that's my mantra, I guess.

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15:31
Speaker 1
I just got an email this morning, funny enough, I just got an email this morning from somebody who is working at a client of mine as a result of, you know, they ended up finding themselves out of work and a couple of, you know, a couple of weeks later I ended up finding out about it. I ended up making a connection and it's a year later and they're working and he just, he sent me a note, he said, hey, a year in, I just wanted you to, I almost want to like read it verbatim. But he said, you know, life is timing and relationships, you know, and that was exact. I mean that's the quote as I look at it, you know, warmed up my morning for sure. And, and it's. Here's what I love Ronnie, about what you just said.

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16:13
Speaker 1
That, that I totally expected you to give me some like really technical BD style, like go pro BD style answer where you were like, you know, set aside two hours a week to do X write number this number of emails a week and then send out handwritten notes to this number. All that stuff is happening. I know it is because I know you're a machine. But. But what. What I love is that the emphasis isn't on some sort of, like, metrics, and. And the. The emphasis is on relationships. And it's like, I just do what I think is appropriate for all those relationships. And if you care enough, you're.

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16:52
Speaker 3
You're.

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16:52
Speaker 1
It will bother you if you're not staying in contact with these people. And I know that is such a more sustainable and genuine way to go about business development. Follow up. That was awesome. I'm like, I don't know if you saw. I'm sitting over here scribbling notes for myself. Like, that is. That's wonderful, Ronnie. That's fantastic.

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17:11
Speaker 2
So.

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17:12
Speaker 1
So I. I want to hear about Taylor, how you support. How. How does marketing and business development. How do marketing and business development play together? How. How does. And. And then I know you actually do get involved a little bit in. In some of the networking activities and things along those lines. I'd like to just sort of hear about why you do that and pluses and minuses, things like that.

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17:34
Speaker 4
Yeah. So I view marketing as a support role to Ronnie. Any of the materials, any of the presentations that he needs, I'm the one who does that. What I think works so well with Ronnie and me and why we have such a great relationship is he really respects the amount of time it takes to do that. I think the quickest way to make a marketing professional mad is to say, like, oh, it'll just take you two seconds. The goal is really effortless, but it's not always effortless, and it takes time. And so that's something I always appreciate with Ronnie is he always says, is this enough time for you to get this back to me? So that's really the way that Ronnie and I work together. I. Ronnie loves to tell the story that when he first started, I hated going to networking events.

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18:25
Speaker 4
It was not my thing. I just really enjoyed my little marketing bubble. And while that's still the case, I don't hate networking like I do, especially with Ronnie as your wingman. Everyone knows you in the room. But now I really like to go. It's the one time, other than individual meetings, where I can speak with owners and clients and consultants and trade partners and learn directly from them what's important to them. And as a marketer, you're always wanting to communicate what matters to your audience. And so going to those networking events and having those conversations has been really vital for the way that we communicate what we do and what matters to an owner, what matters to a trade partner, what matters to an architect, that's really important. And I appreciate those conversations at networking events to give me that insight.

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19:25
Speaker 1
The difference between marketing content that is clearly designed by somebody who understands what the customer care about, who understands their world, who's really talked to them, and beyond just getting to know them, but really talk to them about their business and. And marketing content that is a guess at what they think matters is noticeable. And I think what you're doing there, that it's. I. It's funny. I think you're mostly doing it because Ronnie makes you. But. But the joke. No, I don't mean makes you. I mean, maybe makes you feel guilty if you don't. But I. But I think that investment in really learning about the industry, I mean, how long have you been with Chesapeake?

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20:18
Speaker 4
5 and a half years, right?

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20:19
Speaker 1
You. You can talk about the construction industry like somebody who's been in it for 10 plus. And the. The. For a marketing person, that's craziness. Like that tends not to happen. So anyway, kudos on that. I think that's exactly why that your. Your marketing is so on point, is that it's. It's. It is tailored pun not intended to your audience. So, you know, there was a little bit of reference to this earlier. How does the rest of the organization contribute to your success in your role? Because I gotta tell you, I mean, I got story after story where I'm like, I see, you know, fill in the blank with AEC firm, right? And they're like, well, we need new business. So we hired a business developer. We ran out of the need for new business. We fired the business developer.

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21:13
Speaker 1
We hired a business developer, the marketing person, because they were supposed to bring in business and they didn't bring in business, so we fired them. And I'm like, it really sounds like you're putting them out there on an island where that's just their job. I don't know. The rest of our company has no responsibility for actually winning work. It's just the two of you. Go figure it out. I know that's not how it works at Chesapeake, but I'm interested in how it feels to each of you.

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21:35
Speaker 2
What is.

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21:35
Speaker 1
What is it like? You know, how does the rest of the organization support your success in your roles?

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21:44
Speaker 4
Johnny, Ronnie, I'll jump in, and then you can go after me. I think something that Chesapeake really says all the time is we don't chase projects, we chase relationships. And so everyone having that mentality at the company makes you want to do what's right for the relationship and not for the project. So Ronnie and I don't feel this, oh, we have to bring in all this work and we have to go get all these projects. It' that's not where our headspace is at all. And that is really beneficial in the long run. But what I will say is I always think that our superintendents, our operations team, they are so vital to the success of the relationships that we have. I can say how wonderful we'll build your project and how great our team is and how awesome our culture is.

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22:38
Speaker 4
And then you go on the job site and it's not that. And so how quickly you can lose trust when you're marketing one thing and your team is doing another. So our operations teams, our accounting team, everyone is so important in making sure that the relationship maintains is great throughout the course of the entire project.

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23:02
Speaker 1
And important key, yeah, you're out there making promises to your customer. But, but what you're saying is, you know, sure, everybody gets involved. We do have this over development mindset, yada. But, but more than all of that, it's like everybody truly is cash in the, you know, they're acting in the way that we're promising we're going to act. And so fundamentally there's nothing that anybody can do more than actually be consistent with what we say we are.

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23:30
Speaker 2
And it goes back to our core values and you know, to build on what Taylor was saying. First of all, working with ccg, we have leadership that really understands what building a relationship means and how long it could take six months, it could take two years. But the important thing is it's everybody's role. From what I do, I think it's great because I don't have to do any talking in presentations. I'll do an introduction and I just sit back and let our ops be. Our operations people do the talking because they're so good at what they do and I have so much respect for them. You just, you let them just give them all the rope and they're gonna run with it.

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24:15
Speaker 2
And they're the ones that impress upon the client or prospective client what our approach is, what our core values, what our value add is, particularly from a pre construction standpoint. And I think a lot of our clients and people that I interact with, I think they're going to tell you that we qualify our clients as much as they're Qualifying us. I mean, look, everybody on this broadcast is probably crazy busy right now and they understand the human capital is the most critical thing in our workplace today, in our industry. I don't know so much from other industries. I know in the construction industry, not just people, but the right people that are going to fit into your company culture are going to understand and live those core values. I mean, that's kind of what it's all about for me.

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25:07
Speaker 2
But I get to be the, like we said earlier, I get to be the front, the tip of the spear, so to speak, and bringing those people and developing it and developing an interest in Chesapeake and what we do and more importantly, how we do it, that really is the difference maker in my world. And when we go to a project, like the biggest marketing or busy business development tool I have is project tours. We go on a project tour, we give the team the heads up. You go on there. It's crazy. It's how workmanship, like the quality, the safety that everything is tight and there's a pride of ownership there and a pride of workmanship that transcends, you know, and it just, it's an awesome thing to see.

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25:52
Speaker 1
So, awesome thing to be a part of. I will, I, I, I wish we had more time. So Seth has been engaging with the audience and I'm sure has some comments and questions and things to bring to the surface. Before he does that, I just want to summarize two key thoughts that I'm having coming away from this. One is obviously there's a mutual respect and a chemistry between the two people who are the front lines in the go get and the create a new opportunity side of your organization. And that's key. But the organization, every question that we just answered, that you just answered around how does the team best contribute?

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26:45
Speaker 1
I really, I think the greatest answer of all is to be an organization that we can be proud of and that we can have a thousand percent confidence that when we make a promise, when we bring in a new person, that when we highlight or showcase what we're doing, we're going to be proud. And so it's not much more complicated than that, but it really does require everybody to uphold the standard. So with that, Seth, what do we have from the group? What do you feel like these two.

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27:24
Speaker 3
Should be hearing and answering specific questions? But something that I think people touch, he touched on Ronnie, that I'd love you to follow up on is you said your response was going from meeting someone, being familiar to friendly to having a Conversation and then a follow up and sort of that flow. Give some practical advice to business development managers or BD folks that handling the rejection, the things that come in that whole process from being fielded because it's easy to get hung up on or to get discouraged and just I'm not calling back. And someone rightly pointed out that timing is everything and don't count a no as no for good. It might just not be the right time. So anything that you can practically give to people along those lines.

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28:13
Speaker 2
So if I, I guess the most important thing is for from my perspectives and that of Chesapeakes is that it's about a fit. And a lot of people that's an easy word, but it's the most important word. Just determine if you're a fit and if you're not a fit, be adult enough to say and put that agreement up front that if we're not a fit, I give you permission to tell me that you don't think we're a fit. And I would like your permission to tell you that we're not a fit.

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28:46
Speaker 2
Because at the end of the day you can do all the follow up all you want, but if your companies aren't in alignment from a core value standpoint, from a marketing, from a market approach standpoint, if it's not a fit, it's just, it's going to be, you know, it's going to be wasted time. That said, you can still be a resource for that person because who knows, they might go work somewhere else for another company and they're going to remember how you were with them. They're going to remember and the company they go work for might be that fit for you. So it's important to really nurture those relationships.

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29:25
Speaker 1
So maybe the recipe for dealing with rejection in a business development seat has more to do with not thinking about, how about this, with not wanting the sale as much as you just want whatever should happen to happen. And if the, and if the answer is that we shouldn't work together, that's okay. You know, it becomes really easy if we set it up that way. Hey, it's not a fit, that's okay. We identified it's not a fit. Let's do this other thing. But that in your mind, that's not rejection. If you. If we discover that it's not a fit.

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29:59
Speaker 2
That's exactly right. And another point I would like to. Another point I want to illustrate is if you're going to send if you're a business developer or you're a marketer or, and you, or you're sending your people to a networking event. Coach them, set them up for success. Don't just send them among the wolves to fend for themselves. Get an attendees list from the organization, whoever that organization is and they should be, you know, glad to give you that attendees list because why are they there? They're a networking organization. Pick three to five people in it, write their names down, write their companies down and put them on a little piece of paper. That's your hit list.

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30:41
Speaker 2
You're going to go into that networking function and you're going to be you have a targeted strategic approach and then ask whoever you've sent into the wolf den to just kind of give you a summary back about what their experience was at that particular event. Did it have value? Who did you meet and follow up? Regardless of what they do follow up because they person they're strategic partners which we call, you know, a strategic partner could be anybody, but it's people that are going to provide you or provide an introduction perhaps, or perhaps you can provide an introduction for them. That's kind of the point of the whole networking thing.

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31:23
Speaker 1
Taylor, what your look like you're about to say something.

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31:26
Speaker 4
Well, Ronnie never touched on this, but I never met another person who like lives and breathes their CRM system the way that Ronnie does. He is in there tracking everything. And especially when you have other people involved in business development, in our case leadership all being on the same understanding and playing field is so important and I think tactically that's something you can take away is that if you're not utiliz CRM, it's been so vital, I think to the success of the way that we build relationships, knowing who has who and Ronnie's really good about that and he didn't touch on that.

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32:08
Speaker 2
So I was.

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32:10
Speaker 1
How many hours a week should I be planning to mess around with my CRM, Ronnie? How many hours a week do I need to budget?

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32:16
Speaker 2
How many hours a week, how much content do you have to put in there?

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32:20
Speaker 1
If I'm working, if I'm working like you're working, how many hours I live in it.

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32:26
Speaker 2
That's the first thing I turn in all every day I turn on the CRM and you know, I just constantly making sure the updates are being done. I'm doing my updates as I should be doing them and just keeping it tight.

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32:40
Speaker 1
But if you're taking notes on a.

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32:42
Speaker 2
Call, I'm Three hours a week in it. At least I got it. At least.

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32:45
Speaker 1
Yeah, I was just gonna say it's like if. If there's the. There's the. If you're taking notes on a call, you got your CRM up. If you're making phone calls and you're following up with people, you got your CRM up. If you're sending emails, you're doing it through your CRM. And then there may be some, you know, typing in notes of other things that happened at networking event. This, that, the other thing.

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33:02
Speaker 2
If there's a new article, say if there's a newspaper article that has attracted me to a certain client, I'll. I'll copy and paste that article into the CRM under that client. But also if I go to a conference and I got, you know, 40 business cards, but I've got 10 of those that are really potential.

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33:22
Speaker 1
Yeah.

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33:23
Speaker 2
For us, then I have to put all that information in there. And of course, it's the research involved, you know, to determine if that client is a fit, at least superficially, until you get to the nuts and bolts.

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33:34
Speaker 1
Of what they're about. And I'll reiterate something that you said earlier, which is, as long as you're in the mindset of building relationships with the humans on the other end of that and you recognize the CRM as a tool that's going to help you to do that, it's not some death march where you got to open up your CRM and do it. It's. It's something that you.

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33:52
Speaker 2
It's.

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33:52
Speaker 1
It's your friend. It's your tool. What do you use for CRM? What's your tool?

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33:55
Speaker 2
Insightly.

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33:57
Speaker 1
Insightly.

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33:58
Speaker 4
Yeah.

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33:58
Speaker 2
And slightly. And, Taylor, thank you for the. Thanks for the kudos, but Taylor's like the guru of insightly. Everything I know about slightly, I've learned.

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34:08
Speaker 4
From Taylor because I'm young.

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34:12
Speaker 1
You should have seen Ronnie trying to log on today. I just want the record to show it was, you know, what kind of show it was.

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34:23
Speaker 2
Taylor literally got me on FaceTime and walked me through it. Thank you.

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34:26
Speaker 4
We figured it out. We're here.

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34:30
Speaker 1
All right. So, Seth. Yeah, I was just going to say. What else? We probably have time for one more here.

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34:35
Speaker 3
One more quick question, Taylor, for the marketing people in the room. You said you referenced that, like overseeing. Give us a quick rundown of the things that fall in your wheelhouse. Because people think, oh, marketing is just social media or branded T shirts to make sure people in the field have stuff. Give us a quick rundown of all the areas that you oversee as the director of all things marketing.

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35:02
Speaker 4
How much time do we have? I know I kind of touched on it earlier, but I really am across all departments. I do a lot. I don't think people realize how involved marketing and human relationship work together from a culture standpoint. All of our internal events, all of our internal marketing recruitment that all we collaborate so closely with human resources externally, all of our groundbreaking, all of our topping out ceremonies, all of our trade partner events, our external newsletter, our social media, our branding that all falls under the external marketing wing. I work pretty closely with business development and pre construction. I say them together because usually when I'm working with Ronnie to build a presentation or to create marketing collateral that then hopefully leads into a proposal.

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35:57
Speaker 4
And I'm working on team resumes, I'm working on our brochures and our packages for the work that we do. So I really do go everywhere and I work with everyone and that's what I love the most about my job. But it also gives me a really amazing insight into all that we have going on so that I can market it and I can talk about it and I love that. So that's probably a really high level overview of what I do, but I think it sums it up.

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36:27
Speaker 3
Yeah, that's great.

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36:29
Speaker 1
Awesome. All right, guys, I'm going to bring the discussion to a close. As much as I'd love to continue, Taylor and Ronnie, you two are superstars. Thank you so much for coming on, sharing how things really work in your world. And I think, you know, if the whole environment in the construction industry can learn to have more professionalism and you know, a more unified company approach to business development and marketing. I think, I don't know. Chesapeake's experienced a little bit of growth over the past few years. Right? Like it's turned out okay.

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37:06
Speaker 4
Just a little.

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37:09
Speaker 1
I know it has made an impact and you know, not just on the go get work side, but on the go get amazing people side, which you.

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37:19
Speaker 2
Want to work for an amazing company. Reach out to Taylor. I had to go there.

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37:28
Speaker 1
Like, yeah, I don't blame, look, I, you can never fault Ronnie for not having the guts to ask for what he wants. And I, I respect the heck out of it. And I'll just say, you know, you guys are a great product of a great organization. So thank you so much for joining and I will Seth, you and I want to just wrap up a couple of things before we jump off. Taylor and Ronnie. Any final words?

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37:54
Speaker 4
No, thank you.

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37:54
Speaker 2
Thank you so much for having us on. Give us a platform. Chad. Seth, it was a pleasure to meet you.

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38:00
Speaker 3
Likewise.

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38:01
Speaker 2
Taylor will meet for beers later today. And then.

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38:08
Speaker 1
At the end of the day as a business developer, it was good. All right, guys, thank you.

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38:15
Speaker 2
Take care.

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38:16
Speaker 1
Yep. Seth, thank you so much. You did a fantastic job today. I think, you know, engaging with the group on LinkedIn. I think I even saw that Stacy was on the LinkedIn chat from Jolly old England. Stacy, we miss you, but thank you so much for teeing us up with Seth. I just wanted to say a brief word, Seth, if you would tell us 30 seconds about your business.

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38:40
Speaker 3
So, yeah, my business is essentially marketing for construction companies. I've branded as construction video pros, though. I'll kind of do everything from web design to social media management. But content is my specialty. The storytelling, photography, videography. Far too many companies. A lot of what Taylor discussed is in recruitment, just sharing the company story, the branding, and so using video and great imagery to share a company story. And that's used for internal videos to help train their people and showcase external videos to recruit, tell people stories. Why do you like to work here? What do we do different? And then also build authority. The worst four words you can hear from someone that looks at your company is I had no idea. Meaning when they finally saw who you are and what you do. Like, wow, I thought you were just a paper.

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39:34
Speaker 1
I didn't know you did that.

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39:35
Speaker 3
I didn't know you did that. Goodness. Because that means their perception is wrong. And I guess I'd say I'm in the business of perception management and I want to help make sure that people get the right perception of your company, other companies.

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39:51
Speaker 1
I know that you and Stacy work hand in hand together on some projects where, you know, Stacy is the guide and consultant for her client on their overall marketing strategy and just speaks incredibly highly of your ability when it comes to understanding how to do the storytelling aspect. So I just wanted a moment for you to tell that story because I think it's something that our audience ought to be aware of. Next week, guys, we are going to be on again live on the 27th, 9am Eastern, where we're going to have Mike Wisnevsky, who is the CEO of Materials Exchange, which is a raw materials digital marketplace. And we're going to be talking about the Amazonification of the, you know, building materials and perhaps beyond in the building industry. I can't wait to get into it with Mike.

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40:45
Speaker 1
He's got some big ideas and I look forward to some spirited argument and discussion between, you know, he and myself and also our audience. So please join us. And then finally, as always, if anybody that you know or you are trying to create positive change in the building industry and you have a story to share, the morning huddle is a platform. So please be in touch with us. We're full for this season, but we are building, you know, our game plan for the winter, which will be season four. And look forward to having people, you know, wonderful new introductions. So please pass those along. Seth, thanks again. Have a great one. Any final words?

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41:25
Speaker 3
No, this was good. Thanks for the opportunity. Thanks, everyone for tuning in. I think, I think the format's great. It's quick, it's short, it's in the morning and tons of value for people in a myriad of roles and industries.

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41:37
Speaker 1
We hope. We hope. All right. Thanks, Seth. Have a great one. Thanks, audience. Appreciate it. See you next time.

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