Why do Building Material Companies need Data Analytics?

So why do Building Material Companies need Data Analytics? To answer this question lets go over the basics first.

Difference between the Database and Data Analytics

The building material companies and entities need to understand the difference between the Database and Data Analytics. Some data providers promise to deliver data & analytics but sell database.

Database might not give you a summary of the whole data. For e.g. in RERA (Real Estate Regulatory Authority) platform, all the projects are registered, every minute information is put in, such as project name, type, location, owners, construction area, building height, floors, cost, construction start date – end date, etc. Just click on a project and all the information will appear regarding the project. But it will not show you how many projects of a particular type or owner are registered on the platform.

Hence, Database will give you information about the projects but not deep insights which are required for decision making. Therefore, Data Analytics comes into the picture.

Why Data Analytics?

Data Analytics is a process of evaluating and analysing data and entering them into the data platform to draw conclusions from the information they contain.

They are used by the Building material companies, consultants, contractors and other entities to make more informed business decisions based on project data, company data and industry relations to increase sales. In a Data Analytics platform, the information is stored in such a way that it is easy to understand, filter the larger data and use it for decision making. You can get data based on various parameters and factors and can get comparable results.

Because of the quality of data stored in Data Analytics, the construction companies stay informed about the prospecting projects and companies in this highly fragmented industry. Through insights and analytics, you will get a shocking view of the unexplored market opportunities.

What can Building Material Companies benefit from Data Analytics?

Strategic Business Planning

To achieve the short term and the long term goals, it is very important for the manufacturers in the construction industry to do strategic business planning through forecasting demand and mapping the market.

a.     Data Analytics helps to:

• Forecast demand (predicting the future demand for the product) which plays a vital role in decision making.
• When you know the number of upcoming projects in your target geography, the project area, and the required capacity of your product in that project, you can decide how much volume of the product you need to produce, how much to sell, etc.

b.     Data Analytics also helps in:

• Comparing your territory performance against current market dynamics based on actual construction statistics.
• Market mapping is one of the benefits of using data and analytics through which the manufacturers can target potential customers and get access to contact the key decision-makers to increase sales and relationship building.

Hence, Data Analytics provides building material companies with project tracking and due-diligence information, showing the potential market opportunities; giving them a bigger scope to increase their sales. It gives access to valuable construction market data and competitive intelligence to improve planning and make more informed decision.

Increased Sales Leads

The manufacturers in the construction Industry believe that there are only a handful of projects in their target Geography and they know about all the projects; but through deep and insightful Data, many other opportunities are revealed which they did not know exists such as:

• Data Analytics provides a bigger picture of the market opportunities which the Sales professional can feed into its CRM platform.
• For example, if you are a premium product manufacturer looking for the upcoming luxury and Grade A projects, Data Analytics will provide you the number of projects coming up along with the detailed current status of the project. This enables you to make each sales meeting more productive.

Provides Marketing Focus

In certain Geographies, the demand for the product in the construction of the project could be more. Data Analytics gives you this information, hence, the Sales and Marketing activities could be focused more on those Geographies at that particular period of time to make a sale. It also provides the list of top architects, contractors, consultants in your target Geography who have maximum projects, on whom you can focus.

This knowledge is needed to be positioned as a trustworthy company who understands the challenges that occur in building projects. Hence, marketing focus enables to target and prioritize prospects giving a boost to sales.

Efficient Salesforce

To find out and shortlist a prospect, a sales professional might take hours to find accurate information, devoting more time to do research than to pitch on a sales call. Hence, Data & Analytics acts as a supporting arm to the sales professional providing them all the required information such as project name, location, type, project owners, architects, consultants or contractors involved, approvals, floor plan, cost, contact details etc in quick seconds so that they can put in their maximum time in pitching for sales.

Some construction data and analytics providers also show industry relationship intelligence such as:

• Which architect works with which developers most of the time, some of the time or not at all
• Which company is mainly into construction of what type of projects etc.

Due to this, the sales professional understands who to approach and how to approach. Moreover, with the same number of resources, you can get more sales.

Conclusion

For building material companies, access to the right data would mean the ability to better evaluate architects, contractors, consultants working on a project. With proper data and analytics, one can determine how reliable a potential prospect could be. With accurate data, the company can enter into new markets and capture a wider market.