The Secret to Winning More Construction Work in 2026

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ℹ ABOUT THIS EPISODE

Most contractors still rely on dropping off donuts and hoping for callbacks, but today's buyers research you online before they ever return your call. 

Wade Carpenter and Stephen Brown break down why digital business development isn't optional anymore—it's your competitive advantage. 

Learn how to build trust before the first meeting, speed up your proposal process, and stand out from competitors who are still stuck in the past. Your digital footprint is your first handshake.

⌚️ Key moments in this episode:

• 00:00 Introduction: The Changing Landscape of Business Development
• 00:20 The Digital Shift: Embracing Online Presence
• 00:37 Understanding the Modern Buyer
• 01:14 Building a Strong Digital Footprint
• 03:25 The Importance of Reputation and Authenticity
• 06:01 Leveraging AI and Technology
• 10:46 The Role of CRM Systems
• 12:33 Combining Digital and Personal Touch
• 13:32 The Future of Business Development
• 20:05 Conclusion: Evolving with the Times

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Wade Carpenter, CPA, CGMA | CarpenterCPAs.com
Stephen Brown, Bonding Expert | SuretyAnswers.com

Transcript

[00:00:00] 

Wade Carpenter: Most contractors still think winning business happens the same way their dad did it. Shake some hands, drop off some donuts, brag a little about the last job, and hope somebody calls you before the work runs out. But here's the truth nobody wants to admit. The modern buyer is checking you out online long before they ever return your call.

Today we're talking about business development. This is the Contractor Success Forum. I'm Wade Carpenter with Carpenter Company CPAs, alongside Stephen Brown with McDaniel Whitley Bonding and Insurance. Stephen, you had some interesting thoughts about what it takes to win business nowadays.

Can you kick us off today? 

Stephen Brown: Yeah. The whole topic today is really hitting on the fact that Millennials and Gen Xers, they're the gatekeepers. They're used to doing things. One of the young fellows that I'm on the board of the Memphis Builders Exchange with was simply saying, somebody talked about a check. He goes, what? I don't even have a checkbook. What are you talking about? If I can't digitally do business with you, I'm not doing [00:01:00] business with you. It's just that simple.

And it's the same battle that we were going through with the Memphis Builders Exchange. It's always trying to be one step ahead of what our customers need. Our members are our customers as a board, we represent them.

Okay, so, the whole idea is digital is the new business development. You might say Wade, Stephen you old guys, this was 20 years old. How could you even be talking about that? And we're talking about it because a lot of our listeners may be our age and may not get it. Okay? And they're great contractors.

And Wade, I have seen how you have developed your business, how you present yourself, how people can research you and who you are and what you can do for them long before they call you on the phone. So aren't they at least 80% sold on you before you even talk on the phone? Absolutely.

So I guess what I wanted to do in today's podcast is, what does that look like? What are the elements? And then how do I develop it and how do I get [00:02:00] some help making that a reality?

So, the first thing Wade is this true? Are people really looking at you digitally? Or are we just making that up?

Wade Carpenter: They absolutely are. And I think you and I have said this before, if you've still got a Gmail address, if you got a website that hasn't been updated since the Bush administration, buyers assume you work the same way.

Sometimes the old school ways are not so bad, but in this case, I do the exact same thing. People check me out online, but when somebody books an appointment with me, I'm looking at them and trying to determine what they're all about and the level of construction they are capable of doing.

You form an opinion based on what they've got out there. If your website is out there for trying to get construction business, just think about what it's saying to their buyers.

Today's buyers really wanna meet you online, just like you were saying, before they meet you in person. So it's dating except, maybe with fewer photos taken in trucks, I don't know. Anyway, it really does [00:03:00] help sell yourself if they can know something about you before they even talk to you. 

Stephen Brown: Absolutely. And they feel safer. I think the dating analogy is a good way of looking at it. You know, online dating has taken off and if you're doing that, you wanna present yourself in your best possible light, but you also want people to be able to really dig into you and try to understand who you are as a person.

And that's just it in a nutshell. You can throw some goofy, fake images out there and think that you're doing the job, but I can just tell you, one of the problems with websites, always been the bane of my existence, is contractors that advertise stuff that they don't do. They found a bunch of pictures online, and they post those when they're developing their website.

Please, listeners, know AI can develop a website for you in 15 minutes. The capability of having better websites, that's easy. The hard part is figuring out the vision. What do you want people to know about you? What exactly do you want to [00:04:00] accomplish? So what is your vision and how do I get it out there? And what is mandatory to have as a minimum in this digital marketing age?

Wade Carpenter: I think that goes a long way. A lot of my contractors say, I just do bid work, so I win by bidding and that kind of stuff. But do know that your owners, your architects, your developers, they are gonna be out there vetting the contractors online before they even meet you.

 Relationship business development is not dead. It's just starting earlier. You gotta get out there and they wanna see who you are before they meet you. 

Stephen Brown: That's right, and somebody sees you out there and then wants to know more about you, what a great opportunity to develop that relationship in person. Some people can do that, some people can't. But if you're a contractor, I guarantee you can, because it's just what you do. You get out there, you gotta be out there to build your projects. You can't just sit behind a computer and build stuff.

So, you're right. The relationship end of it is not dead. But when you want everyone to get the warm, fuzzy feelings [00:05:00] before they even talk to you, they're gonna meet you, Wade, and they're gonna say, what a dynamic guy. But they look online and they find out what all Carpenter and Company CPAs can do for people. It will blow their minds. Okay? And so you put those two together and next thing you know you're doing business. 

Wade Carpenter: Yeah. Just me putting out there that hey, construction is all we do. And, not just we have construction and manufacturing and retail and restaurants and stuff like that. When you can get out there and say, this is all I do, your digital footprint is your first handshake, even before you talk to them.

But again, the relationship part is not dead. And it still goes into the reputation, and how are we putting our reputation out there before we even-- I know there's some things you want to get into on that part of it too. 

Stephen Brown: Yeah, no, you're exactly right Wade. What is your reputation and what do you do best? That's easy to sell. But what's hard to sell is stuff that you have never done before. Yet people are still trying to do that. Did that make sense? 

Wade Carpenter: Yeah. And they [00:06:00] do want to know something. The age of AI, they want to know instant, okay, some photos, what do you do? How do we pre-qualify you? If you have this delayed response, somebody else is gonna get that job.

So, number one, you wanna be out there first. And I don't know if we want to get in this today or not, but just that website also has to change because of AI. 

Stephen Brown: Right.

Wade Carpenter: Search engine optimization. A lot of people say that's dying or dead. But it's different. I think they call it like it's AEO instead of SEO. Search engine optimization versus I think it is some like Artificial Engine. But it's not that, it's AEO. I'm not sure, but it's just a different way of putting it out there so that AI can search on you and recommend you. 

Stephen Brown: No, that's huge. And that's exactly what we've been working on. And also Wade, I think to myself, say you have a perfect digital marketing platform in place, that really shows off everything, and you're constantly updating it. Case studies, testimonials, [00:07:00] vibrant on LinkedIn, QR code links everything that it takes to quickly help people find you. Letting the search engine optimization and the AI drive people to you.

If you don't have that system in place, it's driving nothing to you. That's not helping you. And then at the same time I'm thinking to myself, okay, I meet you. I wanna drum up business and I meet you and you're an owner and you're building a hotel, and I wanna be your general contractor.

I've met you, you've found me, you found my information by AI. That's great. But what about if I just meet someone and I want to let them know more about me? How could I do that? What I've always done in the past is just had a business card I handed them with a QR code where they can just immediately get in to find out about me and McDaniel Whitley.

That personal relationship to me is how I've always been trained to operate. So having somebody or something drive business to you, you can still decide whether it's the kind of business you want. You can [00:08:00] still plan that AI to drive business to you based on your best projects and profit margins.

So it's like a Catch 22. You wanna start selling something that you don't do in order to grow? That's just crazy. But if you do it, you want to show it absolutely the best of your ability. And so many people are afraid to ask their customers for referrals. That's how you get these testimonials.

That's the real power to me in digital business development is those testimonials. So I know I'm jumping around here, but then again, I wanted this topic to really hit home with people of how important it is to have that digital presence in place. 

Wade Carpenter: Another thought is just having that digital presence with AI. I know you wanted to maybe talk about CRMs too, but if you're taking a week to get back to somebody and get a capability sheet and your competitor already had one, and already had lunch with their project manager, they probably stole your parking spot.

Stephen Brown: Yeah. 

Wade Carpenter: So, speeding this stuff up. Your business development, you can't be slow [00:09:00] and showing up bid day, if you're still living in dial up internet land. I don't know. 

Stephen Brown: Yeah. No, you're right. Civil War General from Memphis was famous for saying be there the fastest with the mostest. That's the key. And that's what you need to do. You and my business, you don't get big new bond accounts until someone needs something. And your ability to move fast and do something for them quickly is how you get that business. It's absolutely a fact. 

Wade Carpenter: Yeah. Again, when you're especially you're at the proposal stage or whatever, people notice that kind of thing. If you've never developed some of those things, like the capability sheet, or just some pictures, past projects, with AI too. It can write it up pretty quickly, make it look pretty and then you got it from then on.

Stephen Brown: No, that's a great point. And also email and micro content that keeps you top of mind. To me, that's feeding something regularly. Feeding that digital marketing system regularly. And then fast digital ready proposals and [00:10:00] capability sheets. 

Wade Carpenter: Having templates of things like emails or putting some blog posts on your website talks about the type of work you do or how you can do something better, how you did something. If you're homeowner or whoever your target customer is, this is what you should look for in finding a right contractor.

Things like that. I believe that's what you're talking about, some of these micro blogs. If you do a blog one time and it hasn't been updated since August of 23, I think you're a little behind the eight ball. If they can't find you online they might assume you went out of business.

So you do need to be something more than just having a Craigslist ad out there and expect them to take it seriously.. 

Stephen Brown: Yeah, our younger listeners are laughing at that. But what about CRM systems to track and follow up? 

Wade Carpenter: I was actually having a conversation trying to help another accountant in Texas that is a friend of mine yesterday, and we were talking about this very thing. Because I built my [00:11:00] own CRM the way I wanted it. And he basically had seen that and he was like, this is what I want.

I need to have a follow up system because I'm not gonna remember that kind of stuff. Has it been three days and we haven't heard from somebody? Letting them know we, we did this. If it's a good customer, do you remember when their anniversary is?

He does a lot of tax stuff. He was like, okay, the widow's husband died last year. He sent a little card on anniversary of their husband death. People remember stuff like that. They remember when you follow up. Having this relationship and knowing something about the customer-- this is something also I do when people book an appointment.

I have automated thing where when somebody books on my website, I can punch an automation up, and within five minutes, I've got an dossier on everybody that looks at their website, their social media, their Secretary of State, when you know a lot of things. And AI is doing this kind of stuff.

I know I've heard people if you find out something about their kids or you have something in common, [00:12:00] I don't know how often I use that, but a lot of people probably do use that.

I actually do have a great story that happened last week. Somebody had reached out from the book actually. I put them in touch with one of my clients and they were military. They were looking for a referral. I have to ask, and I asked this great client of mine and I did not know he went West Point. And apparently it came up on the call, there was two guys that went to West Point and so they instantly bonded and that kind of stuff, that's golden.

Stephen Brown: No, it is golden. And you're right. So here we were talking about at the beginning of this podcast about relationships, hands-on versus digital marketing. And the best systems need to have both of those in place. And that's what's going on.

People do business with people they like, and people want to do business with people they trust, too. If they like you and trust you, they can develop that trust before they get to meet you.

It's just like the dating platform. Before [00:13:00] I agree to meet you for coffee. I wanna know you're safe and I wanna know it's not gonna be scary and intimidating. Wow, what an art form it takes to get from point A to point B. You gotta get out there.

But in today's business world, whatever you want to accomplish, you need help. And I can't tell you how many times you make the right introduction and all of a sudden it just takes off because it's a perfect fit.

You and I do that all the time. We do. But let your system get that started for you and then see where it takes you. 

Wade Carpenter: Right. Can we pivot a little bit here? 'cause I know you had a lot of great points on this. It used to be like, okay, we drop in and as I said, I'll bring some donuts or something like that. But office drop-ins are dead, and Zoom is this new handshake.

Before COVID it was few and far between I could get a contractor on a Zoom call. And now, I think about how many miles contractors put on their trucks every single year going to job site meetings that [00:14:00] possibly could be done on a Zoom call.

But the point here is, this is the new waiting in the lobby, this little rectangle on the screen where you're meeting somebody even before you met them in person. And I've got contractors all over the country i've never met in person, but I've met on a little rectangle on my screen that I feel like we've been friends for years.

Stephen Brown: Yeah.

Wade Carpenter: You understand where I'm going with this?

Stephen Brown: It's absolutely fantastic. This doesn't have to be terrifying. You just got to do it.

Wade, how a contractor that doesn't have this in place and says, oh okay, they're right. I get their points, and we really need to have that in place. How would they even start?

Wade Carpenter: If you're talking about the Zoom call, well, just go sign up for Zoom, but--

Stephen Brown: Yeah, I'm just saying everything you did, you taught yourself. Okay. And you've been a great coach for me, because you've been there first and done it. But there's so many specialists out there that I feel like you need someone to be the coach or to be the [00:15:00] quarterback, to call the plays, and also bring the different people into place that you need to actually get this digital marketing presence in place.

Take for example, you get involved with LinkedIn. Next thing it's pushing and driving you to be better. It's telling you how to be a better presence on LinkedIn. That's the great thing about LinkedIn. It is constantly pushing and reminding you, and nudging you to develop that LinkedIn presence.

It's the same thing with your website, your optimization functions, your tracking systems. Your dashboard, so to speak. If you had a dashboard for this business development, digital marketing, what would that look like? 

Wade Carpenter: A dashboard could be a lot of things. How many people are you getting in front of? And that's the typical, how many people do you need to get in front of to close the sale? But also the business development, transparency beats the promises.

So if you've got case studies out there or testimonials or these [00:16:00] capability statements out there on LinkedIn that people can see it. . Nobody really wants to hear about how great you are. They just wanna see that you've actually done it.

Stephen Brown: Exactly.

Wade Carpenter: It's trust. It is the building material for business development. You've got a nice, beautiful picture. The assumption is you do quality work on time.

Stephen Brown: Hey, first of all, you gotta do it, right? But if you've done it, and you're good at what you do, you can always be developing content that supports that, right?

But a lot of the problem is, we don't do it. We get busy with other things or we think we're promoting ourselves over who we really are.

But if you have a healthy reputation and you know how to do your work, just present that out there regularly, and know that's gonna drive your sales in the future. It's what's gonna make your company more valuable down the road as well.

So whether you're just hard bidding work, and you don't need that digital presence, believe me, there are times between hard bid work that [00:17:00] you wanna negotiate some work. And then you can make better profit margins.

You might say, I am so tired of bidding against the same 10 guys over and over and over and over again in my operating area. Okay. So how would you be better than them? How would you stand out? That's what the Contractor Success Forum's been all about from day one. How do you stand out, what makes you different, and how do you show it?

Wade Carpenter: I know you had talked about who the gatekeepers are and the generations and--

Stephen Brown: We alluded to that at the beginning of the podcast, and that was who is out there deciding where the business is gonna be done now? And it's those people that need to get things done. They're not a baby boomer like me. Sometimes they are.

But nevertheless, you see the new generation of folks making these decisions of how they're gonna do business with someone. And that generation simply does business digitally first. There's just no way around it.

You remember when we did that podcast on what would it [00:18:00] look like if AI completely ran a construction company? That was fun and scary at the same time, right? We're like, okay, listeners, calm down. It's not gonna happen tomorrow, but this is what it would look like. Okay.

So how do you take humans out of the equation? You don't, not in sales. Have you ever tried to use AI to make someone look better? It's ridiculous. It can't do it. It's embarrassing. So you can't say, AI, develop a dating profile for me and make me look really interesting sexy and handsome. That's gonna be the biggest joke in the world to anyone who's trying to read between the lines.

And that's just our whole point here, Wade, digitally speaking. Speak the truth about yourself, and don't be afraid to get it out there and know that if you're not doing business that way, you're gonna have to be right now. Adapt. Be ready for it. Don't fight it and enjoy it. It's not as scary as you think. 

Wade Carpenter: Yep. I think some great points there. I know you were working on a lot of this stuff with [00:19:00] the Memphis Builders Exchange that you're leading this year.

Stephen Brown: That's kinda where this came from. It was simply this. What's our vision? What do we want to do for our members? We're owned by our members. Our job is to serve them and how do we best do that? And we realize that we could be this conduit to help them digitally.

We have our online private plan rooms. We have our MBX Connect where you can find people. We have social networking functions, but our next step is we wanna make sure we are helping drive business to our members. And this digital footprint for business development, we can do that, and we can help them with that.

Not to mention all the other things that we have that make us special: actually having a building to host functions that's centrally located, but also educational get togethers, safety training, so forth. So anyway, we had to get our vision straight before we could move forward. And that's where we're going.

Wade Carpenter: Great. [00:20:00] And I know the people there in Memphis appreciate you stepping up and taking on that role for them too. I guess the takeaway for me with this one, business development is not dying, is just evolving. And you need to be evolving with it. These relationships absolutely do still matter, but maybe they're beginning online. Although don't discount the in person. There's a lot to be said for that, and there's a history that goes along with that.

But just remember your digital first, business development, website, having all this stuff proves that you can scale this thing. It tends to help you scale it a lot faster.

So again, I appreciate you bringing the topic to us, Stephen. If our listeners have any thoughts or comments, we'd love to hear them below or any different spins you have on what we talked about today.

We do this every single week. We appreciate it if you'd like, share, subscribe, it always helps us out. And we will see you on the next show. 

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