10 things you should know when marketing to Professional Electricians in 2016

1.  73% of Professional Electricians are aged between 41-60+ years. Only 11.5% are aged between 18-30 years. 

2.  68.9% are small businesses (1-3 employees).

3.  54.9% visit a wholesaler at least once a week. 18.1% visit every day.

4.  32.7% belong to the NICEIC, 13.3% to NAPIT, but surprisingly 32.8% do not belong to any trade association.

5.  Type of work undertaken: 80.3% Rewiring, 78.9% Test & Inspection, 73.8% Circuit Protection and 60.8% Cable Management.

6.  Only 22.6% say they undertake Smart Home Installation yet 48.4% say that they are interested in reading about Smart Home Technology.

7.  Where they find information about products: 100% Trade Magazines, 63.7% Manufacturers’ websites/internet, 46% say Wholesale Counter Staff.

8.  Where they look for technical advice: 76.9% Internet, 63.8% Trade Magazines, 53.6% Trade Bodies and 21.5% Wholesale Counter Staff.

9.  70.6% regularly listen to the radio on site.

10.54.6% regularly use Facebook, 30.7% YouTube, 26.7% LinkedIn and 21.6% Twitter. 27.7% don’t use social media.

Source: Readership survey 2016 conducted by Hamerville Publishing Ltd:

How to market to them: this is a very mature customer group, and like many other trades, it is suffering from a lack of new blood entering the sector.

The more mature the group, the more set in their ways they are, which probably justifies the heavy readership of trade magazines, regular trips to the wholesaler and the slow but growing use of the internet.

Print versus Digital versus @Wholesaler promotions/merchandising – these three channels alone define the need for a multi-channel marketing program, plus the use of regional trade shows that are still very well attended. 

Experience has taught us that no one size fits all, but it is possible to develop a program with overlap across channels to deliver maximum returns, i.e. sales opportunities

Many new products aimed at this customer group fall into the ‘smart’ category.

With only 22% currently installing products but approx. 46% reading about them, there’s plenty of scope to grow this sector.

The use of social media figures are impressive but we believe the response would have been a lot different  if they had been asked: ‘use of social media for business purposes’.

This is a customer group we know well, check-out our work for Hamilton Litestat, and Kosnic Lighting.

For a revised 2022 perspective, please click here!