Online marketing has continued to prove its efficiency in helping design companies reach potential clients, and digital marketing has become essential for architecture firms. In this article, we will explore the best digital marketing options available to architects in 2023.
Over the past seven years, we have seen tremendous growth in the AEC industry’s use of digital marketing strategies, such as social media marketing, responsive websites, paid advertising, inbound blogs, and search engine optimization, to drive traffic and generate qualified sales leads.
It’s no surprise that digital marketing has become a favorite for architects, as the stunning creations and projects they work on make for the perfect content for a world that demands luxury.
We are witnessing architects amassing millions of followers on social networks and breaking through the traditional mold of web design, redefining what it means to have a portfolio.
This is a revolution in architectural marketing, and it’s happening right before our eyes.
As an architect, you don’t want to miss out on this digital revolution. We recommend maximizing the following channels for digital marketing in 2023:
The AEC Guide to Digital Marketing
Building industry-specific guide to grow a digital presence.
READ MOREWhat is digital marketing?
Digital marketing consists of the promotion of brands. The purpose is to connect with potential customers through the internet and other forms of digital communication, like:
It encompasses all web-based channels at your architecture firm’s disposal to spread brand awareness, promote your services, and get your ideal future clients to convert, or become actual new business opportunities.
Essentially, if a marketing campaign involves digital communication, it’s digital marketing.
Responsive Websites
The importance of a website:
- Positions your company as an expert
- Improves customer service & support
- Increases brand exposure & leads generated
With a website, you can efficiently position your company as a defined expert in your field. You can leverage your brand exposure and generate more leads with an official page that customers can reference to.
Top Architecture Websites
Explore these well-put together websites of architecture firms from all over the world.
VIEWProper optimization and integration of smooth UX/UI can truly boost the credibility of your company, helping visitors gain trust in your capabilities. A well-designed website can be utilized as an abundant resource. It can also improve customer service and support.
Quick tips to running a good website:
- Choose the right website platform for the job
- Focus on message clarity & ease of use
- Keep the content & design fresh (or timeless)
Depending on what kind of company you own, there are a variety of website platforms that you can choose from to build your site. Choose from platforms such as Squarespace, Wix, WordPress, and more. You can also opt to build your own website from scratch. It also depends on your level of technical design knowledge.
It’s important to stay focused on your overall message and ensure that visitors can navigate your page intuitively and seamlessly. However, a confusing layout doesn’t fare well with conversions and customer service.
Lastly, always make sure that you are updating your content. You also need to integrate timeless design, keeping your page fresh and relevant.
Downsides to running a website (hint: it’s still worth it):
- Takes a considerable investment to get started
- Needs consistent content updates to stay fresh
- Requires technical design & development knowledge
Running a website has multiple proven benefits for businesses, but a few downsides come along with it. For one, you must have considerable capital and willingness to invest to get started. High-quality websites come with a high price tag, but it’s usually worth investing in once your company is established.
You must also ensure that your content is consistently updated, which may take some advanced planning on behalf of your content generation team. Learn to keep your audience in the loop by generating content geared towards their interests.
Depending on your personal knowledge of technical design and development skills, you may need to hire someone to help build your website. It’s important to consider these factors before committing to setting up a website for your company.
See some great examples of architecture website design.
Interested in hiring an agency to help your with your architecture website?
Our team has got you covered.
DISCOVERSearch Engine Optimization (SEO)
What is SEO?
Search Engine Optimization is the practice of optimizing a web page to increase the quality and quantity of traffic generated from organic search. It’s arguably the best digital marketing channel to bring in leads for architects.
Are you considering some digital marketing strategies for your architecture firm? Then, SEO is a must-have.
The importance of SEO:
- Increases brand awareness & traffic organically
- Positions your company as an expert in organic search
- Increases ongoing organic traffic & leads
- Higher conversion rate than all other channels
(93%+ of all traffic comes from search)
With proper SEO, you can organically increase your overall brand awareness and direct more traffic to your website. After you climb up the rankings on search engines, your website can constructively set an example on how to be an expert in organic search.
Your ongoing traffic and leads will increase through implementing an SEO strategy. The more your website appears on a Google search, the more credible it is to onlookers. Historically, there is a higher conversion rate through SEO than all other channels.
Quick tips for SEO:
- Target the right keywords (Find a niche & specialize)
- Create the right type of content (Fulfill the niche’s desire)
- Be consistent with new content & improvements
- Create a solid internal link structure through your posts
The first thing you need to know about SEO is that it is heavily based on keywords. It’s all about targeting the right keywords for your niche and specializing in your field. Create content that’s geared towards your target audience, fulfilling their needs and pinpointing popular queries.
As always, be consistent with your content and ensure that you are always finding ways to constantly improve and enhance your current rankings, which can take research on your behalf or investment in SEO software.
Downsides to SEO: (Hint: It’s still worth it again)
- Takes longer to provide results than other channels
- Needs to be maintained continuously over time
- Requires technical search engine & web knowledge
Unfortunately, SEO isn’t something that produces results overnight. It’s a gradual strategy that takes time––up to a couple of months––to start seeing the payoff. It requires constant maintenance to ensure that your SEO strategy is positioned toward success. You may also need an intermediate level of technical search engine and web knowledge to get started, but fortunately, there are SEO services available and we offer quite a few.
Check out SEO for Architects for a deep dive into improving your SEO strategy.
Social Media Marketing (SMM)
What is SSM?
Basically, Social Media Marketing is the use of social media platforms, like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc, in order to connect with your audience to build your brand awareness, increase your sales, and more.
When you think about social media marketing for architects, it includes marketing techniques you use to market your firm on social media networks.
The importance of social media:
- Grows brand awareness organically (or paid)
- Positions your company in the conversation
- Gets free (& paid) ongoing traffic & leads
Through a variety of social media platforms, you can dramatically grow your brand awareness organically, and even through paid advertising. Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn are great ways to connect with your prospects, clients, and relevant users in the industry. Social media is the perfect way to engage with your audience, positioning your company within the conversation.
There are multiple benefits to using social media, including free and paid traffic as well as lead generation. By curating an enticing feed, you can successfully drive steady traffic to your profile and increase your brand and company awareness.
Quick tips for social media:
- Target the right audience for your goals
- Create engaging content for each platform
- Be active within your digital community
Learn how to utilize social media to your greatest advantage. You can start by creating content specifically targeted to suit the interest of your preferred audience. As a designer, you can post photos of recent projects or things that inspire your work.
Notably, Pinterest is an ideal platform for sharing “inspo”, and is also a proven platform for an effective marketing strategy.
Lastly, always be active within your digital community. It pays to put forth the effort to engage with people who are interested in your brand, as it fosters a sense of trust and reliability between you and your audience.
Downsides to social media (Still worth it, again):
- Lower conversion rates than other channels
- Less traffic generated to the website than other channels
- Requires significant time investment to maintain
Although social media can help you gain traction within the digital realm, there are some downsides to depending solely on social media efforts. Keep in mind that your social media page is entirely separate from your company’s website. The end goal should be to direct traffic through backlinks to your website and not exclusively to your social media page.
However, the traffic tends to stop at social media, resulting in lower conversion rates and less traffic generated to your website. Always be sure that you are incorporating a powerful call-to-action or offering an incentive for users to redirect to your page in order to avoid this dilemma.
An effective social media campaign also requires a significant time investment to maintain, so be prepared to build your social media presence over time.
See why social media can be a powerful tool for architects.
Pay Per Click Advertising (PPC)
What is Pay Per Click Advertising?
PPC stands for pay-per-click, it’s a tactic used in SEM which advertisers pay a fee each time one of their ads is clicked.
But, what is SEM?
SEM or Search Engine Marketing, is one of the most popular forms of PPC. It’s the term of digital marketing strategy working with a broad search.
Search Engine Marketing allows advertisers to bid for ad placement in a search engine’s sponsored links when someone searches on a keyword that is related to their business offering.
Now that you know what SEM is, PPC is a model of internet marketing in which advertisers pay a fee each time one of their ads is clicked.
Unlike SEO, which brings users organically to your website, PPC is a way of buying visits to your site.
The importance of PPC:
- Increases brand awareness & traffic via paid ads
- Gets consistent ongoing traffic & leads without waiting
- Offsets slow periods while waiting for organic traffic
They’re a ubiquitous part of browsing the internet––and now you can learn how to utilize PPC advertising to your company’s greatest advantage.
The best part about PPC advertising is that it’s passive, allowing you to increase brand awareness and traffic through exposure. It’s up to the viewer whether or not to click your advertisement, and with creative funnels, you’ll be able to land more traffic.
Organic traffic will follow while also offsetting the slow periods. It also allows you to utilize your time and funds efficiently.
Quick tips for PPC:
- Target the right audience for your ad/page goals
- A/B test ad creatives & optimize for cost per conversion
- Optimize your landing pages for conversion rate
When developing a PPC advertisement, your funnel should target the right audience for your ad/page goals. After all, you cater to a specific audience with targeted interests and needs.
There is an opportunity to do A/B testing for ad creatives, allowing you to see which PPC advertisement performs better. Each conversion also should be appropriately optimized for cost.
You should also ensure that your landing page is optimized correctly, which can dramatically improve your conversion rate. You want to leave a good impression on users who click on your advertisement.
Downsides to PPC:
- Takes a considerable ongoing monetary investment
- All traffic stops when the campaign is ended
- Requires considerable ongoing management & optimization
PPC advertising is incredibly useful for any digital marketing strategy. However, it does come with a couple of downsides. Anyone who chooses to invest in PPC must consider a considerable, ongoing monetary investment. PPC isn’t a one-time investment. it also requires constant financing. All traffic ceases to exist when the campaign ends. So, if you want the ads to keep going, you’ll have to keep on paying. As with all digital marketing efforts, PPC needs continuous management and optimization.
Inbound Marketing (Blogs/Vlogs)
What is content marketing?
Undoubtedly, content marketing is one of the most powerful strategies of Digital Marketing.
Content marketing is a strategy that helps you engage your audience and raise your number of clients based on relevant and valuable content creation.
A solid content marketing strategy combined with SEO can boost your architecture firm results by raising your brand awareness and authority, communicating your values better, and improving your results organically.
The importance of inbound:
- Increases brand awareness & traffic organically
- Positions your company as an expert in your niche
- Increases ongoing organic traffic & followers
Inbound marketing techniques are the perfect way to position your company as an expert within your niche. By composing blog articles and generating vlogs, you can share a plethora of information and valuable tips and tricks. Ultimately, you can elevate your brand awareness and create organic traffic through inbound marketing efforts.
Quick tips for inbound:
- Target the right audience for your page goals
- Create unique, engaging, & relevant content
- Encourage engagement within your comment section
Always keep your target audience in mind when creating content. You can opt to identify hot topics, pain points, trending issues, and more. Think about what your audience cares about, what they want to know, and what they already know––don’t be redundant. Moreover, your content should be unique, engaging, and relevant.
Through your blogs and vlogs, you can encourage engagement in your comment section by adding a call-to-action at the end of your content, such as “What is your favorite architecture blog? So, share in the comments down below!”
Downsides to inbound (Very, very much worth it):
- Takes longer to provide results than other channels
- Needs consistent ongoing content to gain a following
- Requires considerable time investments to maintain
Inbound marketing is a strategy that takes time to produce results over other channels, as content generation isn’t instantaneous. So, it takes a lot of planning and consistent, ongoing content to gain a following.
Learn more about inbound & content marketing for architects.
Digital PR & Media Outreach
The importance of digital PR:
- Gains brand awareness from top industry publications
- Positions your company as an industry expert
- Builds longer-term brand authority vs other channels
Digital PR is known to increase your online presence. Moreover, through a properly implemented strategy, you can increase your visibility within top industry publications.
Through digital PR, you’ll be able to build your company’s reputation, drawing appeal and recognition to your business. Digital PR also allows you to position your company as an industry expert while building long-term brand authority versus other channels.
Quick tips for digital PR:
- Target the right audience & publications
- Create unique, engaging, & relevant content
- Be active and available within your industry post-PR-launch
Utilizing digital PR is ultimately used to frame the value of your company. It also helps you stand out within the sea of endless competitors. The goal of digital PR is to clearly identify what your company is all about and what you stand for––essentially defining what makes you unique.
Be sure to target the right audience and publications during your launch, as well as active and available post-launch.
Downsides to digital PR:
- Difficult to quantify ROI & the effects on brand awareness
- Needs consistent ongoing content to stay in the discussion
- Requires considerable monetary investments to maintain
A digital PR campaign may be difficult to quantify ROI as well as the overall effects on brand awareness. It also requires consistent, ongoing content to stay in the discussion and considerable monetary investments to maintain.
Digital Marketing for Architecture Firms
With digital marketing being the new standard of reaching new clientele, it’s healthy to expect high competition.
That’s why it’s more important than ever to utilize a digital marketing agency that does this every single day. To learn more about our services, request our media kit below!