The latest news from GuildQuality.

This news is from late last year, but we just noticed the article: Avid, in partnership with Professional Builder, awarded John Wieland Homes and Neighborhoods top honors for customer satisfaction in the Atlanta market. This echoes the company’s similar 2007 JD Power Award for best in Atlanta.

The folks at John Wieland Homes and Neighborhoods are top-notch, and we’re pleased to have the opportunity to serve them in their ongoing pursuit of service excellence.

Investing in growth during challenging times is the philosophy of many successful building and remodeling companies out there. When the market slows down, they speed up. I’ve seen as a characteristic among GuildQuality members the tendency to be a bit ahead of the curve, the willingness to face challenges head on, and as a result, these companies stay afloat when all around them others are folding or slapping stickers onto their trucks promoting some new skill. In talking to building professionals all across the country, one thing we’ve heard consistently from all sizes, types, and locations of our members is a stress on the importance of a strong, smart marketing push during market downturns.

I wanted to pass along a few tips on ways to use your GuildQuality tools to help strengthen your brand and promote your excellence to past, present, and future customers. Combining these things with your other marketing efforts should yield positive effects. Most importantly, these things are FREE– they are just some of the many benefits of being a GuildQuality member.

Customize your Qlisting
Add content to your Qlisting and use as it a reference piece. Include satisfaction scores, testimonials, a company bio, type of work you do, etc. Building your Qlisting helps your web-marketing efforts: linking to relevant content boosts your search results in search engines such as Google and Yahoo (this is called Search Engine Optimization). A stronger web presence brings your name and brand to your customers’ eyes and minds. The GuildQuality Qlist gets tons of traffic—about 800 hits a month. You can see how many people have viewed your company’s Qlisting via your Dashboard.

Incorporate your company logo
Add your logo to your Qlisting and put it on your survey mailers. Reinforce the strength of your brand and your commitment to quality and satisfaction. Both Qlistings and survey mailers look really slick when the logo is added. Check out this previous blog post on the 10 most visited Qlistings, and here’s a picture of our gallery of survey mailers. Both of these are easily uploaded right into your account.

Share your stats
Share your strengths with your clients—let them know what to expect when working with your team. You can do this in a number of different ways, but one easy way is to print your Customer Report and include it in leave-behind material on sales calls. You can also link your Customer Report to your company’s website so that clients and potential clients can see your commitment to the customer experience.

Most importantly, share your results with your entire team. When it’s transparently clear what the company’s strengths and weaknesses are, you can work on improving the weak areas and promoting the strong areas. Holding your team accountable to their performance will result in a better customer experience.

For any additional info on these things, send an email to our Member Services team and we’ll help you out.

Congratulations to Perry Builders, who was recognized as the 2007 Builder Member of the Year by Raleigh-Wake County HBA.

From the press release:

“It was a great honor to be presented the Builder of the Year Award,” says Ryan Perry. “The HBA is a great organization, offering outstanding support to builders. As a member, I feel not only that it’s my duty to be involved, but that my involvement has a direct effect on the future of my company. I’m humbled and appreciative of this recognition.”

In the last 90 days, about 10,000 people have visited the GuildQuality Qlist to find out more about the members in our community of quality. The most frequently visited Qlistings from the last 90 days are:

1. Betenbough Homes, Lubbock, TX
2. Eberle Remodeling, Sacramento, CA
3. Quadrant Homes, Bellevue, WA
4. Johnson Homes, Cherryville, NC
5. Jimmy Nash Homes, Lexington, KY
6. Ivey Residential, Evans, GA
7. Goodall Homes, Gallatin, TN
8. Advanced Kitchens, Marietta, GA
9. Wetherington Builders, North Augusta, SC
10. Structures Building Company, Mount Pleasant, SC

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Common themes: Logos, links, customer comments, company descriptions. Customers want to see as much as they possibly can and the more info in your Qlisting, the more traffic it receives.

Additional content helps in a couple ways: First, the Qlistings with the most content are listed highest in the qlist, and thereby get more traffic. Second, search engines like good content, so the more relevant content on your page, the easier it is for search engines to direct people your way.

You can add more information to you Qlisting in your account preferences. If you need help, let us know!

We also report your Qlisting traffic to you. You may have noticed the messages in your feed: “3 people visited your Qlisting yesterday” (see the arrows below).

And for reference, here’s an example of a great looking Qlisting from Sabal Homes that didn’t quite make our Top 10 Most Visited, but was among the top 20.

The I’On Group announced that it’s latest project, Mixson, received the Congress for New Urbanism’s prestigious Charter Award. Congratulations to all the folks at the I’On Group. Sales and construction in Mixson began several months ago.

We are back from the International Builder Show. The highlight of our trip was unquestionably our Member Meeting on Friday evening. Thanks very much to those that came — we appreciate the opportunity to speak with you about your businesses and how you use our service. You’re also a fun group of folks, and it was a pleasure spending time with you.

To all of those that wanted to come that we couldn’t accommodate (10 was our limit!), please accept my apologies. Next year, we’ll plan earlier for a much larger group.

We had guests from three companies: Lubbock Land Company of Lubbock, TX; William Shaw & Associates of Houston, TX; and Emerald Ventures of Gainesville, FL.

A couple things were notable coincidences:

1) All three companies joined GuildQuality in January. Welcome new members!

2) All three were referred to us by existing members: Lubbock Land Company from Betenbough Homes (also in Lubbock); William Shaw & Associates from Citadel Enterprises (of Charleston, SC); and Emerald Ventures from Brice Business Group (also in Gainesville).

I’d like to spend a lot more face to face time with our members, and am working to make that happen. These meetings are extremely helpful for us: Member feedback guides our service’s development and contributes to our continuous pursuit of improvement in our reporting and customer satisfaction surveying processes.

It’s also great fuel for us to hear so many stories about our members’ commitment to service excellence. They truly appreciate the importance of quality in the building and real estate profession, and it’s a nice affirmation of GuildQuality’s purpose: “To elevate the profession to a stature commensurate with its important in our lives.”

Thanks again to those that were able to join us!

The Charlotte Observer reported today about the progress at Morningside Village, a mixed use redevelopment project near the heart of the Queen City.

Post Properties has contracted to purchase two of the project’s 10 blocks.

The Charlotte Business Journal talked about the plans for this project in September of 2007. This is a significant project for the Charlotte community, and it’s nice to see those plans becoming a reality.

The Morningside Village development team is led by my father Tom Graham (pictured to the right, researching playground equipment for another development).

My brother Vince, our father Tom, and I are partners in the development of I’On in Mount Pleasant, SC. I’ve referenced I’On a few times in this blog. Both Vince and Tom are also GuildQuality shareholders.

Over the last month or so, we’ve been beta testing a new feature among a small group of our “power users.”

The GuildQuality Marketplace is a directory of member-rated vendors, manufacturers, and service providers. Members can rate companies and comment on their experience with them, and they can review the feedback provided by other members. You’ll soon notice the new chapter in your account, and you’ll be able to see the latest ratings at the bottom of your dashboard.

So why are we launching a vendor directory and what does this have to do with customer satisfaction surveying? Our mission is to elevate the building profession to a stature commensurate with its importance in our communities. There’s the customer service side of that mission, which we’ve been addressing with our customer satisfaction surveying and performance reporting. There’s also a products, subcontractors, and manufacturers component, which we’ll begin to address with the Marketplace.

We intend for the Marketplace to reward companies that do a great job servicing our membership. If members tend to have a great experience with Window Manufacturer A and a poor experience with Window Manufacturer B, all of our members will know about it. That means WMA will be rewarded for their service with more business from our community, and WMB will have more incentive to enhance the quality of their service for every Guildmember.

Beginning tomorrow, we’ll expand our beta test to a wider subset of our membership. After another month or so, we’ll turn it on for all of our members. If you’d like to be a part of the beta test, simply let us know, and we’ll turn it on in your account.

Congratulations to Bob Peterson and Associates in Building and Design (ABD) on their NAHBR’s 2007 Remodeler of the Year Award. This accolade was bestowed upon Bob and his staff at a gala in Las Vegas in October of 2007 adding to their already impressive trophy case. In celebration, NAHBR cited Bob’s “17 years of professional remodeling achievements”, more than 30 years of business in the industry, being “one of the fastest-growing in his area” and being “the first Colorado contractor to achieve the Certified Aging in Place specialist certification”.

“As an industry leader, Peterson has been active at the local, state, and national levels of NAHB. He serves on the Board of Directors for the Northern Colorado Association of Home Builders, is a National Director and Board of Trustees member of the NAHB Remodelers as well as being one of 12 national members to serve on the National Association of Home Builders CGR Board of Governors. Peterson is also known for his charitable remodeling works, building homes, ramps, playhouses, and completing renovations in his community.”

Having recently become a Guildmember, we are delighted to welcome ABD to our community of quality. As always, we are proud to have such wonderful companies as part of our endeavor to elevate the building profession to a stature commensurate to it’s importance in our community.

The Seattle Times recently described the discipline of “the No. 2 homebuilder nationally in gross margin, sixth by pretax earnings and 15th in closing volume and revenue.” (Here’s the link to a web-based version at HousingZone.com and here’s the original pdf.)

Some notable excerpts: “Quadrant’s goal was to begin the permitting and building process only when the house had been sold, and to move quickly to complete it…Quadrant began with a 63-day timetable. Now it takes 54 working days to complete a house. Ten years ago, Quadrant started one house per day; now it starts seven, a number unchanged by the national downturn.”

Quadrant’s acumen radiates beyond the construction process. Quadrant was recently recognized by the Puget Sound Business Journal as one of 2007’s best Washington workplaces.

Click here to read more about Quadrant’s values (as described in the image above).

We are hosting a Member Meeting in Orlando during the IBS. I hope that you can join us at Bonefish Grill on Friday, Feb 15th, at 6:00pm for heavy appetizers and cocktails.

I’ll be sharing information about GuildQuality’s latest happenings, along with our plans for the near future. I am especially interested in hearing your feedback about GuildQuality, our services, and how we can better serve you.

Space is limited. We only have room for ten guests, so please RSVP as soon as possible. Also, please limit your attendees to three per company. I hope to see you soon.