marketing: The Latest Architecture and News

The Second Studio (formerly The Midnight Charette) is an explicit podcast about design, architecture, and the everyday. Hosted by Architects David Lee and Marina Bourderonnet, it features different creative professionals in unscripted conversations that allow for thoughtful takes and personal discussions.

A variety of subjects are covered with honesty and humor: some episodes are interviews, while others are tips for fellow designers, reviews of buildings and other projects, or casual explorations of everyday life and design. The Second Studio is also available on iTunes, Spotify, and YouTube.

This week David and Marina of FAME Architecture & Design discuss whether or not architects should sell their floor plans online. The two cover the financial benefits of selling plans, making good floor plans accessible to more people, the downsides of selling partial services, quality concerns, the future of the profession, prioritizing speed and efficiency in design, why architects are often not used on projects, and more.

This article was originally published by Archipreneur as "How to Grow Your Architecture Firm Through Marketing."

Marketing is not simply an expense reserved for already established architecture firms. Small businesses in particular can benefit from a smart marketing strategy by aligning their operations with some of marketing’s most basic premises and concepts.

Architects in general have a tendency to underestimate the importance of marketing in creating and running a successful business. Even those who claim to understand the role of marketing in acquiring clients and building relationships often fail to fully utilize its potential. Principals of small architecture firms often get caught up in trying to keep their practices afloat and end up treating marketing as a luxury that they will be able to afford once they achieve stability--thus missing the true role of marketing as being a catalyst for growth. Architects need to apply marketing to their practices from the onset and treat it with the same amount of dedication as they do with their floor plans, sections and 3D models of their building designs.

This article, by Principal of Breuer Consulting Group, Mary Breuer, originally appeared in Dogpatch Dispatch as "Why Marketing People Fail."

In many firms, the marketing function is like a revolving door: a new director comes in; the coordinator resigns; the director stays for six months only to leave the AE industry. Two coordinators later, a new director is hired, doesn’t work well with the market sector leaders, and is asked to leave the firm. Pick up any “People on the Move” section in your local Business Times and there will inevitably be the smiling face of a new Marketing Manager or Director for some design firm in your town.

This article, which originally appeared as "Clients for Life: 6 Tips to Generate Leads and Build New Business" on Autodesk’s Line//Shape//Space publication, is by Ken Micallef; it features the advise of John Beveridge, a 30-year veteran in the management-consulting industry.

“Like most small businessmen,” Beveridge says, “I too am a small-business guy trying to compete with bigger companies, trying to generate leads.”

To that end, Beveridge stresses the importance of Internet marketing. But creating a business website is only the first step.

See Beveridge's 6 tips to building business, after the break...