Why construction marketing needs its Moneyball moment

I'm currently reading Ian Graham's book 'How To Win The Premier League' about how Liverpool FC used data to win the Premier League, and as a Tottenham fan, I'll admit that hurt to type.

But there's a passage that stopped me in my tracks.

Graham describes how Liverpool tracked every player in the Premier League, and thousands more across Europe. They weren't just looking at goals and assists. They measured everything; pressing intensity, pass completion under pressure, defensive positioning, even how players performed when their team was losing.

But here's the clever bit. They didn't just look for the best players. They looked for players who were undervalued, who fit their specific system, and who were performing brilliantly in leagues that everyone else dismissed.

That's how they signed Mohamed Salah from Roma and both Virgil van Dijk and Sadio Mané from Southampton. Players that other clubs had seen, even owned, but hadn't properly valued.

Reading this (through gritted teeth, given my allegiances), I couldn't help thinking: construction marketing is exactly where football was fifteen years ago.

We're still playing the old game

Most construction and property business owners approach marketing the same way football clubs used to scout players: gut feel, big-name tactics (the equivalent of signing the top scorer), and surface-level stats.

You look at total website visits. Social media followers. Trade show attendance. Maybe conversions if you're being sophisticated.

But these are like judging a footballer purely on goals scored. They miss the whole picture.

The "League Weighting" problem

Graham talks about how a striker scoring 20 goals in the French league isn't the same as 20 goals in the Premier League. You have to weigh the data based on the strength of the competition.

Construction marketing has exactly the same issue.

A roofing contractor might get 1,000 monthly clicks in London versus 200 in rural Scotland. On paper, London looks like the winner. But what if those 200 Scottish clicks convert at three times the rate and generate projects worth twice as much?

Consider brand awareness campaigns. They don't generate immediate leads, so they "underperform" compared to PPC. But just like a midfielder who makes 50 passes that lead to goals without getting the assist, brand work feeds the whole system.

Most businesses only look at the raw numbers. The smart ones weight the data for context.

Finding your 'Salah'

When Liverpool signed Mohamed Salah from Roma for £36.9 million in 2017, plenty of people questioned it. He'd already had a stint at Chelsea where he barely played. ‘Wasn't he just a pace merchant who'd done well in Italy?’

The data told a different story. Salah's numbers, when properly analysed, showed a player who was exceptional at exactly the things Liverpool's system required.

(And yes, as a Spurs fan who watched us sign players based on "potential" and "resale value" during the same period, this stings even more.)

In construction marketing, your ‘Salah’ might be a channel everyone else overlooks.

Most firms chase the same keywords like ‘commercial fit-out London’ or ‘M&E contractors.’ They're expensive, competitive, and everyone's bidding on them. That's like every club trying to sign the Premier League's top scorer.

But if you specialise in heritage restoration, the data signature of your ideal client looks completely different. Maybe they're searching for ‘listed building regulations’ or ‘conservation area requirements.’ Maybe they're active in heritage LinkedIn groups. Maybe they download technical guides about lime mortar six months before they need a contractor.

The insight isn't that you should ignore the obvious channels. It's that you need to understand your specific model well enough to spot value where others don't.

The attribution nightmare

Graham makes an important point about football data. When a goal is scored, was it down to the striker's finish, the midfielder's through ball, or the defender who won possession 30 seconds earlier?

All of them. And none of them, individually.

Construction marketing has the exact same challenge.

Did that £2 million project come from the Google Ad they clicked last week, the specification guide they downloaded eight months ago, the directors' golf day, or the fact your CEO wrote an article in Construction News?

The honest answer? All of them contributed. Trying to find ‘the answer’ is like trying to identify the single pass that won Liverpool the league.

The better approach is what Liverpool does; track everything, understand how different elements work together, and build a model that accounts for multiple touches.

Most construction firms either give all the credit to the last click (usually PPC) or give up entirely and make decisions based on what ‘feels’ right.

Neither approach works.

But data isn't the answer on its own

Here's where I think Graham's book gets really interesting, and it's something I think about a lot at Fabrick.

Liverpool didn't replace their scouts with algorithms. They combined them.

The data tells you where to look. It shows you which players are performing in ways that fit your system. It highlights value that others are missing. But you still need people who understand the game to watch those players, assess whether they'll fit the culture, and make the final call.

I spend a lot of time looking at data. Google Analytics, Search Console, campaign performance metrics. Sometimes it's clear as day. Often, it's not. You can look at the same numbers and come to completely different conclusions depending on what you know about the context.

The same is true in construction marketing.

You can have all the Google Analytics data in the world, but if you don't understand how construction procurement actually works, what specifiers need, or how different sectors operate, you'll misinterpret everything.

Data tells you that specification downloads are up 40%. Experience tells you that's because a major infrastructure project just hit the planning stage and contractors are gearing up to bid.

You need both.

What this means for your business

If you're a construction, property or built environment business, there are three areas where you could apply Liverpool's approach right now. (And trust me, if it's good enough for me to grudgingly admit it works for them, it'll work for you too.)

First, channel scouting. Stop chasing the same keywords and tactics as everyone else. Look at your data differently. Where are you getting leads that others don't value? What channels seem small but convert brilliantly? That's your undervalued market.

Second, performance weighting. Stop judging channels in isolation. A regional LinkedIn campaign that generates five good leads might outperform a national PPC campaign that generates fifty poor ones. Weight for quality, not just volume.

Third, model fit. Liverpool didn't look for the best players. They looked for the best players for their system. What does your system need? If you're a specialist high-value contractor, you need different data and different marketing than a volume housebuilder. Stop comparing yourself to industry averages.

The reality check

I'll be honest: data doesn't always work.

Sometimes, it makes decision making harder, because you see all the complexity. You can't just point at one number and say ‘that's the answer.’

Graham makes a fascinating point about this in the book. He talks about how Liverpool's data could identify undervalued players brilliantly, but it was almost useless for choosing the right manager.

Why? Because so much of what a manager does is immeasurable. The psychological effect they have on players. The way they handle pressure. How they adapt tactics in real-time during a match. And crucially, the result of any game is influenced far more by the players on the pitch than the manager on the touchline.

There are too many variables, too many intangibles. The data just couldn't solve it.

The lesson? You need to be selective about where you use data, and honest about where it won't help you.

This resonates with me deeply. I've been in digital marketing for almost a decade now, and I'm tired of vanity metrics. Website visits that don't convert. Social followers who never engage. Campaign impressions that lead nowhere.

I want to focus on what really matters. I want to look at data that actually has value and helps us make informed decisions, not data that just looks good in a report.

At Fabrick, we're using data internally to help guide our decisions about where we invest time and resource. But we're not naive about it. We understand context is involved heavily too. We know that sometimes the numbers don't tell the full story, and that's where almost 40 years of construction marketing experience comes in.

We do the same with our clients. We use data to inform our strategies, but we spend a lot of time choosing the right data to look at, and only focusing on areas where it will actually be accurate and meaningful.

We're not interested in telling you your website traffic is up if it's not generating the right kind of enquiries. We're not interested in celebrating LinkedIn impressions if your target specifiers aren't seeing the content.

We're interested in finding the data that matters to your specific business model, weighting it properly for context, and using it to spot opportunities your competitors are missing.

That's the real opportunity here.

Most of your competitors are still operating on gut feel and surface stats. If you can combine proper data analysis with genuine sector expertise, and be selective about where you apply it, you'll spot opportunities they're completely missing.

That's your ‘Salah moment.’ (As a Spurs fan, I can't believe I just wrote that.)