Ep. 12: Winning Work Through Lockdown with Digital Marketing with Amos Goldreich
I’m your host Ayo Abbas, a built environment marketing consultant. And, I’m excited to share my interview with architect Amos Goldreich who runs his own practice of 04. In just a few years' he has amassed an Instagram following of 30,000.
Key takeaways
How digital marketing has helped his firm
How he’s won 8 projects during lockdown including 4 via social media
His tips on getting started with digital marketing
Where he finds his inspiration and support
And why we should all push ourselves and try something new – even coming on podcasts like this.
Resources
Amos Goldreich Instagram
Subscribe, Rate and Review
Don’t forgot to subscribe so you don’t miss an episode and rate us and review us while you’re there – it’s always great to hear what you think.
Transcript
Ayo Abbas 00:04
Hello, and welcome to the latest episode of Marketing In Times of Crisis. Today is Friday, the 6th of November 2020. And I'm your host Ayo Abbas, a freelance marketing consultant who specialises in all things built environment. I've just finished recording my latest podcast interview, this time with architect Amos Goldreich, who runs his own practice of four, and has been making waves in terms of his digital marketing efforts. In just a few short years, he's amassed 30,000 followers on Instagram, something you'd ordinarily expect from a much larger firm. In this interesting interview, we look at how he uses digital marketing to help his practice, the tips he has on getting started, where he finds his inspiration and support from when it comes to marketing, and why we should all push ourselves and try something new. Even things like coming on this podcast. If you like the show, please leave us a rating and a review as it really does help spread the word. Anyway, I won't hold you up anymore. Enjoy the interview. Happy listening. Hi, I'm Amos. Thanks so much for coming on the show. Can you give me a brief intro to you and your role? And your practice? Please?
Amos Goldreich 01:18
Hi Ayo Thank you very much for inviting me. So I'm an architect from a Amos Goldreich Architecture. We design beautiful buildings and spaces. And we do that with an acute sense of empathy and pragmatism. And our aim is to change the lives of the people that use them, whether it's our direct clients or the end users in a positive way. So we are based in North London. And there are four of us.
Ayo Abbas 01:57
For you, wow, that's you, you've got a lot of output for for, I guess, as we've just gone into lockdown mark II. How did you fare in the first one? What was the impact on your practice, then?
Amos Goldreich 02:13
Uh, well, I think like many other practices, the first couple of weeks were a sense of shock, perhaps. And just kind of not knowing how we're gonna go about things working remotely, whether we could see clients or not, so we had to really act quickly. And I can, looking back, I think the priority was to reestablish the human connection. All that we do is about people, and it's about this connection, and before locked down, you know, when we meet a new client, we meet face to face, and suddenly we have this, this sort of barrier. And this new method of communication, which is was completely alienated. So we had to quickly adapt to it. And we did that through through all the software, which are now come to the basics, like Zoom and Teams, and sharing. And I think what what became an emphasis is perhaps, communicating more than often. And, and just just emphasising on that communication,
Ayo Abbas 03:41
So you wanted to keep people just just just updated, I guess,
Amos Goldreich 03:44
Updated as much as possible. And sharing information as perhaps more than before. And just keeping them reassured. But also so we have one example we we got a project about three weeks before lockdown. So we've already kind of established some sort of relationship. I like to see the beginning of project as a slight kind of blind date. Because we have a we have a short period of time to get to know the client and especially for the client to know us. And and in those early stages the human interaction or the physical human interaction where you see someone face-to-face is extremelyextremely important. And it's also extremely important to be able to visit the site because there are things that will never transform through through digital media. And then suddenly we have this this lockdown. So we have this drastic shift into digital the digital world. So it was quite interesting to see that that transition, but it worked well. And with the right software and the right kind of frame of mind.
Ayo Abbas 05:12
So I guess you've got the communication software. I mean, did you offer different services? How did you kind of did you try something new during lockdown,then?
Amos Goldreich 05:20
Definitely. We've really pushed the boundaries and pushed ourselves focusing on communication. Okay. One of the first things that we did is we started offering online consultation for free, which is still running. Although it was free for us, or for the client, we insisted on the clients to donate to charity. In the beginning, it was for masks for Heroes for the NHS, at some point that they reached a target. So we switched to a homeless charity called New Horizon in Camden, for young homeless people that we work with. And that proved extremely popular during lockdown. We had about 30 consultations, met really interesting people and really helped the community. And already one of those consultations generated into a client and the project.
Ayo Abbas 06:38
So what sort of things were people asking you for advice in those first consultation were there any trends you saw?
Amos Goldreich 06:45
We want to move a wall? What do you think? What colour do you think we should use into kind of bigger projects? I think what we're what we're definitely seeing at the moment, a huge increase in leads coming in and enquiries, because people are spending more time at home. Yeah, and realising
Ayo Abbas 07:10
that this doesn't work for me.
Amos Goldreich 07:12
It doesn't work, we hate the colour on the wall, for instance, can we improve things Oh, we actually our businessli fe is changing, and we're going to be working more from home and we don't have the right space for that. So suddenly, garden studios are becoming more popular again. And then it's really people wanting to improve, improve their life and their wellbeing.
Ayo Abbas 07:50
Okay. And in terms of your kind of what's the kind of overall approach that you tend to take to marketing? What sort of things do you do as a practice?
Amos Goldreich 08:00
Well, marketing is, first of all, very important. I think it's very important for us and I should, I think it should be very important for all architects. There's, there's more there's the traditional marketing of and PR through magazines and national press. But then there's also the digital marketing, which I think especially now is is very relevant and needs to be addressed and sort of, prioritised, prioritised, really, because we spend more time online. We use the online social platforms to interact with people to get ideas get information. So you really you really need to, to be present. I would say that and then and then through I guess, through digital media or digital marketing, it just opens up the possibilities. You can do podcasts this one. You can do events, you can do lectures, you can really connect directly with your clients or with your targeted clients. So you have to know there's a lot of homework that one needs to do. And if I if I may, elaborate on that. You have to start with with your why. Simon Sinek talks about companies Instead of thinking about what you do and how you do it, and why in the end, the why needs to be first. So I have started this podcast and I've kind of shared my, our why that we we all about creating spaces around human beings really and we want to, improve their life in a positive way? And then you need to think well, who are our clients? Who do you want to target? Where do they hang out? I guess now there's some limitations on physical location. So do they Hangout on Facebook or Instagram or LinkedIn?
Ayo Abbas 10:42
So now, I guess it's just where do they hang out online? I mean, that's what it is at the moment, cos you're not physically seeing them?
Amos Goldreich 10:47
Yeah. And then this naturally leads you into your visual identity, which is your, your identity online. So it's, it's how you as a practice come across. For instance, Instagram is a good example.
Ayo Abbas 11:08
Yours has changed recently, hasn't it? or slightly the kind of look and feel of it?
Amos Goldreich 11:14
It has, I think that I think definitely more and more practices are understanding the potential of Instagram that it's it's a platform to showcase your work and and to really direct your your marketing and efforts directly to your key or followers and, and those followers would become your, your, your future clients. And there's different approaches, you can have a very kind of styled appearance. For instance, our look or identity on Instagram is more like a journal or a snapshot of our practice and the way we work we we see our marketing and our kind of approach as a way
Ayo Abbas 12:16
to lift a lid in a way isn't it?
Amos Goldreich 12:18
Yeah, and to, to educate our clients, most of most of our work is in the private residential. And for most people, they've never worked with an architect before. For a lot of them, this would be the most expensive project or Yeah, project they would ever do. So we want to kind of ease the process and explain as much as we can about it, and then show why we are what makes us different to other practices. So we show for instance, we show before and after photos of projects. We show the process, we show the life of an architect, how we go about, we show things that interest us, so sometimes we even Wow, yeah, yeah. And sometimes we show other architects work that we admire. So to summarise, I would say starting with your why, then it's the who, where and then and then and then your your visual identity.
Ayo Abbas 13:43
And which is there a social platform that you find is a practice that works for you the best business wise?
Amos Goldreich 13:51
Yes. Instagram has been really good. We've so since lockdown since the first lockdown, we've we've gained eight new clients and eight new projects. Four them of them are through social media, and through digital marketing, so two were through Google, which is now proving as a good source of leads. Yeah. And then and then I think, and then Instagram and Facebook has been have been really powerful in that respect.
Ayo Abbas 14:40
And do you? Are you looking at only organic or do you actually do paid for stuff as well is in support of the great content you put out?
Amos Goldreich 14:47
We do both. We are advertising through Instagram and Facebook.Facebook. So we we've we actually advertising the online consultation. And we've got a running ad that appears on Instagram, Facebook, it appears even on messenger. Yep. Which is great. It's also a bit kind of scary. Because Facebook owns Instagram so thatthat helps. But then the whole algorithm and the whole scary, right, it is very scary, especially after you. I don't know if if our listeners have watched The Social Dilemma.
Ayo Abbas 15:33
Oh my gosh, I did I watched it a couple of weeks ago. Scary. Yeah. And it's like was the one that was the one last year as well. But The Social Network wasn't the follow on from that. Yeah. But yeah, basically, they have all your data, they money from data
Amos Goldreich 15:45
they know everything. And you can, you can basically you can target the ads to the demographics, social, economic, age, location, hobbies, everything, everything everything. Which it is it is frightening. But it does help. So we don't know. So for instance, we are now working on a project in Gravesend converting a very large house into multi units. And that was through targeted marketing. Our ad appeared on the clients messenger. We communicated all through lockdown. We haven't a) we haven't kind of met in a in a virtual world. It was all through text messages. And we only met face-to-face post lockdown when we a) saw the site for the first place. And for the first time. Yeah. And and also signed the contract.
Ayo Abbas 17:03
It's a crazy world right
Amos Goldreich 17:04
It's completely nuts. But but it's exciting. And you. Yeah, it just opens up new possibilities.
Ayo Abbas 17:17
Yeah. I mean, in terms of, I guess, and the adverts and things. I mean, how did you tackle that? Was it something you did yourself? Did you? Did you get support? Or how I guess how did you get started on some of these kind of new things that you did over lockdown.
Amos Goldreich 17:32
We we get support on that. We work with a an amazing guy called Dave Sharpe, who I know as well. He's our go to guru when it comes to digital marketing. Yeah, we've never met him. It's all in a virtual world of Zoom. Yes, he's also very far away. He's in Melbourne, Australia. So we can only speak either late at night or early in the morning. But he's been a bit of a coach for myself, for the past four years, helping me kind of understand this, this new world. And we meet once a month, where he throws or we discuss ideas, and then I have a month to implement them or work on them. And then I get a critique. So he's some some part of his service. He also takes over all this targeted ads, but but it is something that you can do on your own. You just need to kind of learn learn the tricks.
Ayo Abbas 18:55
Yeah. And that's it, isn't it? I know, I think with the whole kind of digital marketing, it's kind of I mean, last year, I, I worked for an edtech company, which was actually really interesting in comparison to the built environment. Because actually, you know, a lot of it is try test, try learn, you know, because you I mean, sometimes I mean, I feel even for my own business, I kind of, you know, I'll try it out to Twitter just spending the 10 just to see how it works. Yeah. You know, what's the rage? What's the numbers and look at the ROI and understand what's happening and where what's bringing people to my site or whatever. And I kind of think, you know, you don't have to spend loads of money on an but I just think it's something we've not necessarily done. And I think as an industry, we've always kind its organic has got to be this but actually if you actually look at Facebook, and all the kind of internet companies, they're basically out to make money and they offer you a free platform to use. And that means that actually to do that they are looking at they're given more priority for paid for things nowadays. And so it's about You kind of sitting there going, there's the organic, we can get this level of engagement on our own. But also we can get a bit of a boost if we need it.
Amos Goldreich 20:07
Correct. I totally agree. And I can I can share an example we so up until I would say, first lockdown we spent on advertising our consultation, probably 2000 pounds. Yeah. And, and from that period, we converted one, one consultation into a pay paying client, and our fees or, or on that are above £20k. So immediately, that's a huge return on our investment. I think it's very important when you engage in such paid ads to to measure, measure your your spending measure, measure your your your your return. And like you said, if it doesn't work, we just we just try a different a different route.
Ayo Abbas 21:12
or tweak it or design a different message. And that's the thing you can actually Yeah,
Amos Goldreich 21:19
sometimes. Yeah, sometimes is as little as changing the wording of your ad. Yeah. or changing the image or having the same text but then alternating the image. So one week, there's one features one photo and then another week to another photo and then through the Facebook platform online for the ads, you can measure the the engagement of people with with the ads, so you can see which which photo works better, which texts work works better? Yeah.
Ayo Abbas 21:57
A/B testing on there, isn't it?
Amos Goldreich 21:59
Yes. And sometimes the results are quite surprising. For instance, we have this one ad that keeps going on that, for some reason gets most of the hits.
Ayo Abbas 22:13
And any ideas? Why
Amos Goldreich 22:15
not? No? No, it does work. So then you kind of think oh, maybe if I increase the budget slightly on that one, maybe? Because that's working and then I can switch off the others. So it's really it's it I find the whole the whole system very exciting. Yeah,
Ayo Abbas 22:38
no absolutely is so in terms of practice is starting out and looking to kind of get into this whole kind of social media and getting more of a digital presence because I think a lot of people have obviously been reliant on face-to-face which now again, we can't do I guess what would you what what hints tips would you give people when he wants to want to go, I guess stop more get started or make more of an impact?
Amos Goldreich 23:06
That's a very good question. I touched briefly previously on starting starting with your why, who and where I think that that's still extremely important. And then this allows you to identify your, your, your presence, your your, your target audience, etc. I would also advise of a) don't fear it. Just Just do it really. It is it is a bit of a learning curve. And it's also I think that one one of the issues that I struggled with in the beginning was expecting that because it's it's online and it's immediate, that the results are going to be immediate. So if you post if you post something today then the phone is going to start ringing tomorrow. This is not the case. It takes time and the key is to hang in there. And and be consistent. You know, and if it's about being on Instagram, it is about posting posting every day. So that leads to so you need you need to generate content. Which is another thing to to kind of think about what are what is your content How How comfortable are you with producing it Can you do it all in house do you need support?
Ayo Abbas 24:51
So, how do you produce your content?
Amos Goldreich 24:56
I kind of what I really enjoy doing it. It does take time. I a lot of the content I do on my phone, because it's just there, and it's immediate, and I can do it anywhere. I've actually, I'm encouraging my team to produce a lot of the content. So we have a, we have a folder on our server called something like content for social media. And, and they know, and every week, I kind of remind them to produce or copy stuff in. So usually
Ayo Abbas 25:36
They can take snapshots and things like that, if they,
Amos Goldreich 25:39
I mean, with Yeah, with all the phones that we have, it's so easy so and you can do screengrabs, or you can. And what's really great about it is that you can experiment with all sorts of things. And it can be as simple as taking a snapshot. You can record the screen of your computer while you're drawing something and then you speed it up. So it looks it looks really interesting. But what you have to remember that especially Instagram, it's all about visual content. So it needs to have, it needs to look to look great. So invest in good photography. Yeah, that's really key. Videos are really popular, and sometimes they get more traction than than stills.
Ayo Abbas 26:33
You know, one of the reasons that is is because the actual social media platforms, they prioritise video, so that one of their algorithms if you use things like video and audiograms, and they actually prioritise those, so that's one of the reasons is that you know, video is, and yet you get some quite good metrics on stuff like LinkedIn as well.
Amos Goldreich 26:54
Yeah. And I would just say that just just go for it. Don't think twice, find a platform that you are happy with. But also that your target audience is is on it. If If your audience is not on Facebook, then then you will be wasting your time. If your client is more kind of sector based commercial than maybe LinkedIn is a platform for you. We were we are concentrating more on Instagram and LinkedIn at the moment in terms of the content and the posts that we do less on Facebook. So Facebook is primarily through the ads. And yeah, I'm both well, LinkedIn, I guess, we're not we don't have direct leads from LinkedIn. It's more about raising our profile within within the sector and with within the construction community. But all these things, build, build, and it's going back to this thing of time, and that it's not immediate, and and it all helps with your online presence and your SEO and everything else.
Ayo Abbas 28:30
So how long I guess I like on your social media journey. How long did it take for you to get that momentum of? Yeah, I can see this and making an impact. Did that take six months a year? Or, you know, like, yeah, before you started building that momentum, because it does take time. At first you are kind of posting into an ether isn't it? And you're like, Is anybody there?
Amos Goldreich 28:50
to come? I would say about two years. Yeah. And and it's funny now that I meet people or speak to someone and then you realise that they follow you on Instagram. And it's great. Yeah, you feel a bit of a celebrity for a second before your ego drops. And but it's Yeah, it's it's definitely took some time. We'd been on Instagram for quite a long time at the beginning. just posting ourselves without kind of knowing exactly what we're doing. And then we we met Dave Sharpe, who helped a bit and by being on it for about, I would say over six years we now have over 30,000 followers. Amazing and we are in the top 20 most followers in the UK, which is great.
Ayo Abbas 30:03
I did see you on that list. I was like, well, done
Amos Goldreich 30:08
so it does pay off. Pay off. Yeah. And and the
Ayo Abbas 30:17
in a typical week? I mean, how much time do you actually devote to marketing? Ofr, do you have a, like,
Amos Goldreich 30:24
usually Friday is? Is are my marketing day? Yeah, I use a thing called Default diary. So I've I set time in advance for these things. And it's important to stick to it. So I don't plan any meetings around around that time. But and then there are there's a lot of really useful apps out there that allow you to pre or pre schedule all your posts. The things like Later and Get Social and many, many more, which a) makes, you can upload a months supply of content with with the text. And then and everything else. The app tells you the best time to post, you just you just put put the images and plan the future layout of your of your page, press a button and you can you can forget about it for a month. Or you can plan six months in advance.
Ayo Abbas 31:46
Who knows what's going on six weeks? Let alone six months at the moment, right? Yeah.
Amos Goldreich 31:51
And then and then it's really and then it's we use them, we use the Stories feature, for instance, in Instagram, or now on LinkedIn, to just show kind of the day-to-day life of of architects. And then, and then it's really easy. You just take take a snapshot on your phone, or you do small recording you posted on your story.
Ayo Abbas 32:19
And actually, they and again, the platform's prioritise their newer channels. Yeah, so if you're using Stories, or you're using Instagram Reels, then it's kind of they will show it to more people because they want these things to work. So that's the other thing to always kind of bear in mind is those new, those newer aspects of their of their platform, that's what they want to prioritise. Just moving on, um, in terms of, I guess, marketing during lockdown, and this year, have been any kind of standout companies for you or anything where you thought that's been they've done that really well can be in the architecture world, or it could be further afield?
Amos Goldreich 32:52
That's a really interesting question Ayo, I thought about it quite a lot. And funny enough, I would say the NHS. Okay. And I don't know if it wasn't I guess it wasn't an intended kind of marketing or, or rebranding, but it's just the way the way we as a nation connected with the NHS, and with the staff on the frontline, and then the sudden kind of branding of, of the, the rainbow. I think it's been really, really powerful. And the heroes kind of thing, the heroes and the pride. And I think, I think as as marketeers or even us as business owners who are I mean, we're not professional marketeers, but but we do need to, to, to engage with with our audience. You can learn a lot from it. So the way what I've sort of taken from it is really emphasising more on that human connection, which is something that we, I think it's it's the kind of thread that connects all our marketing efforts, whether they're online or in print, and how we come across as a practice.
Ayo Abbas 34:41
Being open and approachable.
Amos Goldreich 34:44
Yeah. approachable, being very much people focused and and clients focused. We see our clients as almost an integral part of the of our team so they So they become part of part of the design team. We, we design their homes, it's their homes, it's not ours. So they have to fit with their lifestyle and habits. And we are just facilitators that kind of help them achieve their their goals.
Ayo Abbas 35:27
Brilliant. And onto my final question. I'm so what one tip would you give to a practice leader now in terms of marketing,
Amos Goldreich 35:36
market market market,
Ayo Abbas 35:39
fantastic.
Amos Goldreich 35:40
Really, really seize the moment. It's exciting times. Scary. There's a lot of unknowns. Not only here, around the world, but there, but it's I think it's exciting time. And there's a lot of opportunities. And you just need to be there a bit. You can take chances. They're not hugely expensive, and you can quickly modify and find find, find your niche. And if you don't try, you will never know. And it's it's certainly paid off for us. So I highly recommend it.
Ayo Abbas 36:23
For anyone advice. Thank you so much for your time. I must it's been really enjoyable. I've really enjoyed the conversation.
Amos Goldreich 36:30
Thank you very, very much for inviting me.
Ayo Abbas 36:38
Thanks for listening to the latest episode of Marketing In Times of Crisis. If you liked what you heard, please do leave us a review, as it helps us to spread the word and for more people to get to hear about us. If you want to know more about things mentioned in the episode, do look at the show notes which will give you more information about where to find us and also about our show website. In the meantime, I hope you enjoyed it and have a great day.
