How AI is Transforming AEC Proposals Forever—Michelle Ott, JE Dunn Construction

✉️ https://boldbrand.com/email

In this episode of the Bold Brand Show host Josh Miles sits down with Michelle Ott, CPSM, Vice President Marketing Operations at JE Dunn Construction, to explore how AI and marketing operations are transforming AEC proposals and firm growth.

Michelle shares an inside look at how one of the nation’s top contractors is rethinking proposal strategy, freeing marketing teams from the constant pursuit treadmill, and using AI to create more scalable, strategic impact.

We discuss:
- How AI is changing AEC proposals (and what won’t change)
- The role of marketing operations in scaling large construction firms
- How AI helps marketing teams focus on strategy instead of production
- What AEC leaders need to understand about the future of marketing

This conversation is a must-watch for AEC marketers, firm leaders, principals, and business development teams who want to modernize their approach to growth without losing what makes their firm competitive.

👤 About Michelle Ott

Michelle Ott, CPSM, is Vice President Marketing Operations at JE Dunn Construction,  where she focuses on systems, process, and innovation to help marketing teams work smarter at scale. Her work sits at the intersection of AEC marketing, proposals, operations, and AI. She’s served SMPS in a variety of roles, including SMPS Colorado past president, and last year won the Leonardo Award.

https://jedunn.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/michelle-ott-cpsm-16134121/

:::::

Today’s show is brought to you by OpenAsset and Shred.ai.

AEC pursuits are more competitive than ever, and the best firms know it’s not just about what you say, but how you say it.

That’s why leading AEC marketers are turning to OpenAsset, the industry’s go-to platform for managing project photos, staff resumes, and marketing files—all in one easy-to-search place. And now, OpenAsset is even more powerful with Shred.ai, the AI-powered proposal writing tool purpose-built for AEC workflows.

With OpenAsset and Shred.ai, your team can:
- Instantly surface past proposal content
- Draft, edit, and polish responses with AI
- Seamlessly pull in project visuals and resumes
- Eliminate the busywork and focus on the storytelling

Together, they’re transforming how AEC marketers win work: faster, smarter, and with fewer late nights.

✅ Visit https://openasset.com/shred to learn more.

:::::

Connect with us:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshuamiles/
https://www.youtube.com/@BoldBrandShow
https://boldbrand.show
https://boldbrand.com
https://instagram.com/boldbrand
https://instagram.com/joshmilescom

#AECmarketing #aecindustry 

Creators and Guests

Host

Josh Miles

Keynote speaker, TEDx presenter, author, AEC brand strategist, and founder of Bold Brand LLC.

Guest

Michelle Ott, CPSM

Vice President Marketing Operations, JE Dunn Construction

What is Bold Brand Show?

On the Bold Brand Show, host Josh Miles and his guests go deep on a topic to uncover the growth secrets of the most successful firms, how firms can create lasting legacies, and what the future has in store for the AEC industry.

Keynote speaker, past TEDx presenter, and AEC brand strategist, Josh Miles hosts The Bold Brand Show.

This series showcases conversations with firm executives, marketing leaders, and innovators in the AEC industries. For more information, visit https://boldbrand.show + https://boldbrand.com

So from a marketing ops perspective,

what we're really focusing on right now

is pursuit content management

and finding a pursuit

content management solution.

So obviously the advent of AI has changed

and will continue to

change the way that we work.

We recognize that there's

a tremendous opportunity

by leveraging

technology to make the process

of pulling proposals

together much more efficient

so we can really focus

on the strategic content.

(upbeat music)

Welcome to the Bold Brand Show.

If you're in the AEC

industry and want to grow your firm,

we're sharing exactly how bold and

innovative firms win more.

The sad truth is most

firms that are struggling

in the AEC industry

are still doing things

the way we've always done them.

But this show is about

finding a better way.

I'm your host and founder

of Bold Brand, Josh Miles.

I'm a published author,

veteran of the TEDx stage

and a brand strategist with

over 25 years of experience.

But my superpower is

my focus on AEC firms

to understand how branding and marketing

in the professional services industries

is wildly different

than for retail brands

like Apple, Amazon, or Starbucks.

So in this podcast, we're

going deep with AEC firm leaders,

marketers, and

innovators in the AEC industry.

We'll focus on the

hottest topics and trends in AEC

to uncover the growth secrets

of the most successful firms

and how firms can create lasting legacies

and perhaps what the future has in store.

Today's show is brought to

you by Open Asset and Shred AI.

AEC pursuits are more

competitive than ever.

And the best firms know it's

not just about what you say,

but how you say it.

That's why leading AEC marketers are

turning to Open Asset,

the industry's go-to platform for

managing project photos,

staff resumes, and marketing files,

all in one easy to search place.

And now Open Asset is even

more powerful with Shred AI,

the AI powered proposal writing tool

purpose built for AEC workflows.

With Open Asset and Shred AI,

your team can instantly

surface past proposal content,

draft, edit, and

polish responses with AI,

seamlessly pull in

project visuals and resumes,

and eliminate the busy work

so you can focus on the storytelling.

Together, they're

transforming how AEC marketers win work,

faster, smarter, and

with fewer late nights.

Visit openasset.com

slash Shred to learn more.

Thanks again to Open Asset.

Today's episode is brought

to you by Fox Photo Studios.

Do you ever wish your video podcast

could just look a

little more professional

or that the process

was just a little easier?

I get it.

I mean, when I started

the Bold Brands Show,

I was setting up

everything in my home office.

Before I could ever hit record,

I had to rearrange the furniture,

the camera gear, and the lights

before each and every episode,

and then tear it all

down again when I was done.

That's why I opened Fox Photo Studios.

It's all set up for me just to show up

and start recording.

So now after a year of

planning and build out,

it's all open and ready for

you and your team to use too.

Welcome to Fox Photo Studios.

Of course, your show

could look a little like this

or even something like this.

And if you're really fancy,

you can bring your own neon sign.

And it's not just for podcasts.

Fox Photo Studios is a

fully equipped studio,

great for corporate

videos, commercial productions,

or even photo shoots.

Best of all, we're

just north of Metro Denver

near I-25 and I-70.

So follow Fox Photo Studios on Instagram

or visit

foxphotosstudios.com to book your next project.

We'll see you soon.

Welcome back to the Bold Brand Show.

We're back today with Michelle Ott,

who's the Vice President

of Marketing Operations

for J.E. Dunn Construction.

Michelle Ott, CPSM, began

her career in AEC in 1997

at a Denver-based architecture firm.

And in 2002, joined

J.E. Dunn Construction

as their first

Colorado-based marketing coordinator.

That's a big deal.

Currently serving as the Vice President

of Marketing Operations,

her responsibilities

include strategic planning,

development of pursuit and

communication strategies,

and enhancing marketing

operations nationwide.

I've known Michelle for

a few years from SMPS,

where she's served in a variety of roles,

including SMPS Colorado past president,

and last year won the very prestigious

Leonardo Award.

Congrats again on that.

Thank you.

I'm excited to be here in your backyard.

I mean, Denver, not

literally in your backyard.

I don't live in your

backyard at a home house.

But you know what I mean.

Michelle, welcome to

the Bold Brands Show.

Thanks for having me, Josh.

Yeah, it's so nice to have you here.

On this show generally, as

I tell people all the time,

we're talking to leaders

and innovators and marketers

in the AEC space to

hear some of the successes

that you've had,

learnings that you've had,

and maybe some of the boldest moves

that you've made in your career.

Specifically today,

we'll be digging into topics

around leadership and

marketing operations,

and maybe even a little bit of the future

of the AEC industry.

Great, looking forward to it.

It's not incredibly

common in our industry

for somebody to stay at one

firm for a really long time,

as you have.

And so I'm curious to

hear about your career path

and your current role at J.E. Dunn.

And maybe before we jump

all the way into your story,

just for our viewers who are

kind of around the country,

give them a little overview of J.E. Dunn

for anyone who's maybe

not familiar with the size

of the company or offices and people

and those kind of things.

Sure, so J.E. Dunn Construction

is a large commercial general contractor.

We have 26 offices across the US.

We are typically ranked among

the top 10 general contractors

in the country.

26 offices nationwide.

We are just shy of 6,000 people,

and I'm expecting revenues of

around $8 billion this year.

From a career

standpoint, you mentioned that

it's unusual for someone

to stay at the same place

for as long as I have,

but J.E. Dunn has just

really done a fantastic job

of creating a growth path

for marketing professionals.

And it allowed me to grow

from being the first Denver-based

marketing coordinator

to now being able to oversee

national marketing

operations for the firm.

Having been on staff

with SMPS headquarters,

I've nerded out on a

lot of the history of SMPS

and the marketing various

associations in the AEC space,

and specifically how

marketing fit into that.

As an association, we're

just over 50 years old.

So prior to that, this

profession was looked down upon

in a very real way.

It was almost deemed

illegal in some ways,

or it was certainly frowned upon

that people would pitch their services

or would put out an ad to promote a

professional service.

So as other industries listen to

conversations about AEC,

may seem unremarkable that

there's a path for people

to get to stay in the

marketing role in a firm,

but there are a lot of big firms

that haven't gotten to that point yet.

Yeah, and that's

true, and it's interesting

because when you think

about the four pillars

of just the standard business,

so businesses outside of AEC,

the four primary groups are finance, HR,

operations, and marketing.

And I think that

we've definitely witnessed

that lag in the industry

because of some of the limitations

that existed within

the industry for so long

that being prohibitive

from marketing your firm,

and so it has taken us some time

to be able to get to that space

where we are kind of an equal part

of that quad in typical businesses.

Yeah, I think what's

particularly interesting

about your path is going

from the first marketing chair

ever in Denver to now leading

the national marketing operations.

What was that journey like?

Well, I will say, when I

started in this industry,

I can't say that I thought

there'd be a career path for me.

It definitely started as a job,

as many of us do in this industry.

And so it has been a

windy path, a zigzag path.

Definitely has not been a straight on.

When I started JADon,

marketing coordinator

was the only role that you could have.

There was no real clear path for growth.

And so really just kind of the

incremental expansion

of what that role could look like,

what it can look like

beyond a support role

as more of a strategic function.

And so not even just

creating just kind of linear tiers

of marketing

coordinator to senior coordinator

to marketing manager,

where now I've kind of gone

in this tangent and done

this like lateral shift

into marketing operations specialty

that I don't even think we

would have had on the radar

maybe five, seven years ago.

So what does marketing operations

practically look like

on a day-to-day basis?

And how much time are you

spending kind of on more local

regional issues versus

things that are happening

in other field offices?

Well, I'm gonna start

out by kind of describing

marketing operations on more of a

philosophical level.

And so it really has to

do with the optimization

and enhancement of basically

winning work in our industry.

And so it's all that

foundational activity

that needs to be done,

leveraging best in class technologies,

leaning into data and actionable insights

and then creating innovative processes.

And so from a philosophical level,

that's what it looks

like on a day-to-day basis.

It has to do with implementing, evolving,

maintaining large scale systems

such as our customer

relationship management systems,

client experience

systems, management systems

that we use to manage pursuit efforts.

Also how we manage things

from content to workflow

within the marketing space.

So tell us a little bit in addition

to like marketing operations,

what does the marketing team

as a whole look like at JE Don

and how are they kind of

distributed around the country?

Yeah, we actually have a

pretty robust marketing team

at JE Don and again,

this is another reason,

it's not meant to be a

JE Don advertisement,

but they've done a really great job

of really seeing the

vision of what marketing can be

and allowing us to

grow in that direction.

The way we're structured today

is we have a national marketing lead

and we have six geographical

and vertical market focused regions

and then we have four national groups.

And so marketing operations exists within

that national force.

So we've got marketing

operations, corporate creative,

corporate marketing and

corporate communications.

And then our six

regional groups are the west,

east, Midwest, south central

and then we've got our

advanced facilities groups.

That's kind of a more market focused

versus geographical focused

international healthcare group.

And so all of those groups

roll up to a national director.

And you had mentioned,

what are my

responsibilities on a regional level?

I did still serve as

the marketing director

for the west region.

So I'm actually quite

fortunate that I still,

I get to see really that

kind of cradle to grave activity

of marketing.

So laying the foundation,

creating the infrastructure

for pipeline tracking,

gathering insights on our clients

and applying those

insights in the physical pursuit

and capture process as well.

So I still have that benefit,

that lens of cradle to grave.

The pursuit piece is such

a huge part of marketing

in most AEC firms.

How much are you getting your hands dirty

and overseeing those specific functions?

And is that mostly just

in the west region then?

Yeah, so I will say it kind of varies.

So from a marketing ops perspective,

what we're really focusing on right now

is pursuit content management

and finding a pursuit

content management solution.

So obviously the advent of AI has changed

and will continue to

change the way that we work.

We recognize that there's

a tremendous opportunity

by leveraging

technology to make the process

of pulling proposals

together much more efficient

so we can really focus

on the strategic content

and the varying medias of delivery.

So that's one a little

kind of hands off way

I get to deal with pursuits.

In the west, I'm still involved

in early pre-positioning campaigns

and leveraging all the

channels that exist today

to build our brand, promote our brand.

And so when we are submitting a proposal,

we already have that

strong brand awareness

and brand association with the client

to better our odds of actually winning.

Well, as you and I were talking,

just before you hit

record, I'm a big branding nerd.

Like I do so much video work today,

but brand is kind of how I got started.

And so especially in AEC,

I'm always curious to hear about,

especially with large firms,

how they position themselves differently

from the competition, how

they set themselves apart.

And how does J.E. Dunn think

about the positioning side of brand?

And again, I would say

this is probably another area

that our industry has

been somewhat lagging,

really embracing

marketing as, like I said,

one of those core four

functions within the business.

And so for many years, I

feel large brands like ours

were very disparate.

Everybody wanted to be their own thing.

Everybody wanted to

be a local contractor,

you know, the guy with the pickup truck.

And what we're realizing

now is there is so much power

and actually tangible value

to a strong unified brand,

being able to consistently deliver,

make promises that you can stand on

and deliver on those promises,

whether you're

delivering a project in Denver

or delivering a project in Austin,

it really does augment your brand,

but it's taken us a little

bit of time to get there.

And I think that's

where our industry is today,

is really trying to focus

on that unified brand promise

and delivery.

I have to imagine being a large firm,

especially makes it challenging to have

something like brand

or positioning or even culture

be consistent across different offices.

How has J.E. Dunn worked to ensure that?

Or do you just sort of

like let the local offices

do what they're gonna do

or somewhere in between?

You know, and honestly,

it's always a work in progress.

We've grown tremendously, you know,

from where I started in

2002 to where we are today,

you know, we were a one and

a half billion dollar firm

to an eight billion dollar firm.

And so we've obviously grown tremendously

and it is hard to maintain that culture.

I have to say, I give a lot of credit

to our executive

leadership team, our C-suite.

They are incredibly accessible.

They have regular rotations

where they come to every single office

and have that FaceTime with the people

that are actually

putting the work in place,

that are doing all the

behind the scenes work.

And I think that that helps

to kind of lay the foundation

for a consistent culture.

And we also are very fortunate

that we have a lot of tenured employees

that can carry on that

culture from project to project

even in remote locations.

And so I would say the combination

of really strong

leadership that is very accessible

to tenured employees who

really believe in the culture

and continue to carry that on

has really made the difference for us.

I have to think like with

mergers and acquisitions,

especially that the culture challenges,

the brand challenges are even bigger

because you had something else before

and now you're part

of someone else larger.

Has JE done grown more by, you know,

shipping somebody off to a new city

and opening a new shingle

or are you focused more on acquisitions?

I would say we're

focused a little bit more

on organic growth.

So, you know, understanding

where the market demand is,

where we might have a good

position in growing there.

And we have historically, you know,

acquired firms in the past,

but as you've noted

that it can be a struggle

really trying to align the two cultures.

And we have such a

strong existing culture.

And in general, we've

kind of fared better

really growing offices

organically in more recent years.

On my last episode,

somebody had seated a

question with me as she stated,

she's our biggest fan and is

not someone I'm married to.

(both laughing) So it's a different she.

But she was talking about

how from her perspective

as being a leader in her firm,

but also so she's feeling pressure

to do the right thing fiscally

to make the right financial challenge.

But then also as a marketer,

wanting to do the new

thing and do the cool thing

and invest in a service

or invest in a product

or a piece of software or something.

And she was just saying,

hey, it would be

really interesting to hear

how other people think

about balancing those things

when you have this sort

of fiscal responsibility

and also that marketers

need to chase the shiny things.

So how do you balance that?

Yeah, and it can be a tough one

because I feel like we are

just built to be curious.

Marketers are just curious beings.

And I think the growth

that I've experienced

being in this marketing operations role

is I've really learned to analyze

and apply the maximum

amount of critical thinking

to each move that we make.

And so before we make

any major investments,

we do our due diligence.

So we make sure that we're

interviewing key stakeholders,

that we're properly

gathering requirements,

that we are creating a problem statement

and we're really assessing

what is the ROI of this change

before we really make

any big moves forward.

And especially in a big firm like ours,

it's beyond the

investment of the technology

where what is the people investment?

We just rolled out Microsoft Dynamics.

So we moved from a CRM

that we had for 25 years

into this new system.

That meant that in addition to all of the

build implementation testing hours,

we add all the

training and adoption hours

and that's still carrying on into 2026.

And so those are all the considerations

that you have to factor in.

But I'm still a fan of just kind of

the incremental exploring,

but before you make

any major investments,

it definitely has to be

dealt with a lot of planning

and thought and methodically.

So for something like a

major CRM implementation,

are you bringing in

consultants to help roll that out

or is that an internal

thing where you're tasked

with also doing all these other things?

So we did have a

consultant that helped us build

and implement the system.

But as far as training and adoption,

we did that all internally.

I think we found again,

Jaden as a 100 year old company,

like I said, a lot of tenured employees,

I think training from the

people that are actually using it

and understand our business

really goes a long way for our folks.

And then also just having

that continuity of accessibility

where someone knows that

they can reach out to me

or they can reach out

to a member of my team

and we can help them

because we built the system,

we built the training program.

So it is a large lift.

I'm hoping to see our

marketing operations team

continue to grow because again,

there's all those components

that we have to contend with

in addition to building and

maintaining the technology.

How's that rollout going so far?

It's going really well.

You know, it's interesting where I think

I probably romanticized what the outcome

was going to look like

because honestly on paper,

I would say we did

almost everything right

as far as tons of communication,

providing live virtual trainings,

having open office hours

and kind of all the things

that you would do to check off the list,

being, making sure

they knew who to contact.

But as we kind of close

out the end of the year,

I'm finding these

pockets where people are still

kind of surprised at

what it's capable of,

where it still feels very new to them,

where I'm surprised

that they're surprised.

And so this is why I say it's still

carrying on into 2026.

It is, these truly are living systems

that we're putting in place.

And so you're really

never done evolving it

and training and fostering adoption

and supporting the stakeholders.

Yeah, I mean, CRM or asset management

or content management, it

really only is ever as good

as the content you put in there.

Absolutely.

What are some of the

things that you guys are doing

to encourage people to

use it and to actually put

their data in the system?

I think where the rubber hits the road

is when people can pull information

that they find useful in there.

And I think that that's

what people are starting

to see now, some of the

enhancements that we made

moving over to this CRM is

really be able to understand

and better track why decisions are made.

So if a certain competitor, so doing

competitor tracking,

and if certain

competitors are winning over us

more frequently than we

feel like they should be,

we can go in and see,

okay, why are they winning?

We've noted price as the primary factor.

We've noted that they

have stronger relationships

with the clients and really

able to track that information

because armed with that information,

we can combat and neutralize

and overcome the competition.

Kind of on the heels of

wrapping the CRM implementation

from a marketing operations standpoint,

what's the next major thing

that you are gonna be tackling?

It is really pursuit content management.

And so, there's a lot of

products on the market right now

for proposal production.

I think we're really in

a unique space in AEC,

especially for firms like ours.

And actually, I think a lot of our firms

who are not low price bid type firms

that we really pride

ourselves on being value-based,

value selection type

firms, that we really,

we need access to

information, but we need the ability

to also customize and that

support and customization.

So, and we found that it's actually a

more complex problem

than just plugging in a technology

that searches all your past proposals.

There's the whole process of creating,

validated, federated, gold star content.

There's a process of

searching all past proposals,

weeding out maybe things

that don't apply universally

or not best in class.

And then there's also

the process aspect of it

where like you said,

proposals are such a big part

of what marketers do.

I think there's so much opportunity

for improvement and enhancement,

but I also don't think

we can get complacent.

I know some people will say that

proposals are table stakes

and I've never believed that.

And I actually never wanna

get too far from proposals.

They are the life brought blood.

There's what keeps us sustainable.

It gives me a job, it

gives my whole team a job.

So, it's really important.

Yeah, the marketing and business

development function

contrary to a lot of

technical professionals

really is the thing that

feeds the firm and keeps it alive.

You can do really good work and nobody

could know about it.

Which means you won't get

any work from really good work.

So, like being able to share that story,

I think is just so important

for firms to be able to win

and continue to see your

next 100 year birthday.

Absolutely.

Any other project specific things

that would be interesting

to unpack for the audience?

You know, I would say another thing

that we're seeing a

trend in, and honestly,

it's kind of an extension

of customer relationship management

is the whole client experience.

And I would say

experience management altogether.

And so, there is that

whole aspect of starting fresh

with the target client, pre-positioning,

making sure that there's that awareness

and ultimate conversion and repetition.

But part of that repetition process

is knowing how we're performing

and where we're falling

short, where we're doing well,

where should we lean in,

where do we need to pick up?

And that's what we're digging

into a lot further right now.

And so, we do have a

client experience program,

but we're starting to

extend that to really understand,

what are our

relationships with our trade partners

and our design partners look like?

So that, I really think that's the

differentiation right now

is when you're really

addressing the needs

of all those

stakeholders that are critical to us

winning and delivering work.

Yeah, you said something

that reminds me a lot of,

from a brand strategy standpoint,

I'll talk to a firm's

leaders and their marketing team

and say, who do you think we are?

Who are we trying to be to the market?

How do you think the market sees us?

And then I'll go

interview some of their clients

and see, well, what do the clients

actually think about them

and what do they actually say?

And it's interesting to

see, it's never a one-to-one,

it never lines up perfectly,

but to see those

things that are resonating

and then the things that aren't,

and then so does that

mean we wanna push harder

into those or do we

wanna lean into the things

that the market's

already saying about us?

Right, no, and I think

it's a great question

and it is quite fascinating

that we're often surprised

when someone might say to us,

oh, I don't see Jay

done as a sports builder.

And then we go on the defense

where we built the KC Current,

we've done all these

stadiums around the country.

Sure, we don't really have a resume here,

but we have experts that

we can bring to the table,

but you have to be conscious of,

you have to deliver that message out,

that's marketing at the end of the day.

You can't just know it,

you have to evangelize it

and that's our job here.

Yeah, we were talking to

a few guys a few weeks ago

about wanting to move into a particular

market here in town.

They were like, but we

don't really have any work

in that space.

Well, I don't know

what step one looks like

if you don't have anything to show for

it, but it's tricky.

It is really tricky

and sometimes you do have

to find those adjacencies

and smaller projects

and kind of start building

a small portfolio there.

But it is really tricky, that kind of gap

between what you want to

be and what you actually are

and the steps that you

need to take to get there.

You're going back to the proposal thing

for just a second.

Are you seeing any clients or owners

who are looking for next level things

from a technical

perspective on the proposals

in terms of accessibility

or websites have been

doing this for years.

So if somebody is

visually or hearing impaired

that there are different ways

that you can interact with the media.

And I'm hearing that

proposals are gonna start

going that direction and

maybe some of the public

and municipal work has

maybe already gone that route.

Does that change the

technology that you're looking at

or change how you guys are

thinking about building those out?

I don't think it changes our approach

to what we need to

build out because again,

having the right solution

allows us to see those trends

before they happen.

Even now, just in our discovery phase,

we've already gone through the process

of cataloging RFP

questions over the last three years

and cataloging all of our proposals

and actually really leaning into AI

and saying, what are clients asking for?

What are the questions

that are rising to the top?

And interestingly enough,

like sustainability

has kind of taken a dip.

It's not as prevalent as it's been.

Where this is the power of AI is we can,

instead of continuing to tell something

that we think is a big differentiator,

it's like, that's not really

what our clients are asking

and maybe they will,

but it kind of allows us

to react to what we've seen

and also maybe do some

predictive analysis as well

as to what we think we

might see moving forward.

But again, I think the

solutions that we're looking at

that leverage AI will be nimble enough

to be able to address the

changing needs of the clients.

Yeah, it really helps to be listening

to what the market is saying.

Absolutely.

Going back to the

thing we were talking about

from a pre-positioning standpoint

or where does what we say

line up with what they say.

I have the story I

tell all the time about,

I was at a networking

event very early in my career

and a guy who I knew who was an intern

for another marketing agency

was standing practically

shoulder to shoulder with me

and we're having two

different conversations.

And I hear the guy he's talking to say,

"Well, how are you

different from Josh's company?"

Because they do kind of similar stuff.

And he was like, "Oh, they

do like really high end work

for professional services companies."

And we tend to work with startups.

And I was like, "Wait, say that again."

If my competitor is saying that about me,

maybe I should say that about me.

Yeah, wow, that's amazing.

What an endorsement.

Such a golden nugget.

So here I am years later

leaning into high end work

for professional services firms.

But I think it's so

helpful to be paying attention

to not only what the

market's saying about you,

what your prospects and

clients are saying about you,

what your competitors say about you,

how they would say

they're different from you.

That would be really interesting.

And so as we continue to

expand our listening program,

our experience management program,

that's not one that

we've actually talked about

is really digging into

what competitors are saying.

But that would be a fascinating study.

You gotta go hang out at

more networking events.

Just listen in.

Shoulder up next to your competitors

and see how they tell the story.

I think the industry,

maybe every industry

is changing right now.

Are there other ways that

you're seeing AI or technology

or anything else sort of accelerate

how you're doing business or changing

how you're looking at things from a

marketing ops standpoint?

I will say I think

technology is really transforming

the way we're doing business overall.

And so not even just

from a marketing standpoint,

from an operations standpoint as well.

I think ultimately it

will make us more efficient.

It'll make us more communicative

and aware and responsive to client needs.

I would say the thing that I'm really

conscious of right now,

we've gone through a lot of change

in the last couple of years.

On the marketing operation side,

launching a digital

asset management system,

launching a client experience system,

launching a new CRM.

I think there's a lot

of technology fatigue.

And frankly, I think people are,

in my mind, I think

they're less nervous about AI.

I think they're more overwhelmed by it.

And so really figuring out

how do we harness the

power in the right way?

So going back to your

comment about your last guest,

or how do you stay

focused on what you're doing?

And I think it does

take that slowing down,

really analyzing what is a

problem you're trying to solve

and applying the right solution

and not grabbing at

everything that's available.

My favorite parlor trick at the moment

is when I have a question about AI,

is asking AI the

question that I have about AI.

I know, it's really amazing.

And again, I will say,

I'm really just scratching the surface.

I definitely have folks on

my marketing operations team

that are a little bit more,

a little farther down the road with it,

but it's amazing the power of it,

where you can use it to kind of create

first drafts of pieces

after you interview somebody,

or you can use it to kind of

frame out an experience survey

or you can cut that time down

in that kind of original

generation and a lot, a lot.

You can cut it down a lot.

Yeah. Yeah.

I'm currently enrolled

in a YouTube class for,

I do video professionally,

but YouTube is a

whole other Rubik's Cube,

like getting your

video to actually be seen

and be found in search.

And how do you use that

to drive leads specifically

in their algorithm?

And this particular

instructor has built their own AI

to help guide through things like

thumbnails and titles

and all these things that,

you think you're doing it right

and then to throw that over to the system

and to get nuanced

feedback on those kind of details.

I don't have results yet,

but I hope to tell you in the future

that it was a game changer.

Yeah, you know,

and that's one thing that

I'm really curious about

where, say we're all

using kind of similar prompts

for AI to develop our proposals.

Do they start all looking the same,

or if we're all putting in the client RFP

and saying, what does this

client really care about?

And then we're responding to it.

Does everything start to

be kind of carbon copy?

And I think it'll be interesting to see

what that looks like going forward.

But all that to say,

I still think that

there is still that need

for critical thinking that

only a human can provide.

And so maybe there's

not really a risk of that,

but that's just

something I've been wondering

where if you're

getting this kind of guidance

and someone else is getting it,

then isn't everybody at the top again?

So it'll be interesting

to see how it pans out.

Yeah, I mean, I've

enjoyed using it more so

as sort of a

brainstorming partner of like,

hey, I want to do this end result.

Here are three ideas that I have.

Which one is gonna be the stickiest

for this particular

audience or this particular need

and to help kind of shape

where I'm going with those things.

I agree.

I will say that's probably

how I use it now as well.

But again, I know I'm

just scratching the surface,

but it is a great, great starting point.

Do you feel like there

are any other big things

coming from a marketing perspective that,

good or bad?

What are you looking as the next six, 12,

18 months, 10 years?

You know, I think,

I guess this could be

perceived as good or bad.

I think that the more we get efficient,

the marketing will look very different

where we likely will need

less people to pump out pursuits.

But I do think that

opens up greater opportunity

for market research,

client intelligence, data analysis,

visual storytelling,

really understanding the client

and delivering in a way

that really speaks to them.

And so I feel like

we're going to move from

less of a production model

and more of a

customized deliverable model.

I loved how you were saying earlier even

how some of these tools have allowed you

to spend more time on the

strategy side of things.

I mean, imagine if you could

crank out just as many RFPs

or maybe twice as many RFPs,

but put different thinking into it.

And how could you incrementally

win a greater percentage of those?

Right, absolutely.

And so I think it will change

what is required of a marketer.

And so I think it's for the good.

I think most

marketers don't wanna be stuck

on the pursuit treadmill

and just pumping the same

thing out over and over again.

I think they wanna

really spend time digging

into the details and

delivering those high quality pieces

that really speak to our clients.

So I think it's a good shift,

but I can see there could be some

apprehension around it.

I know you've got sort of fingers

in a lot of the parts of marketing.

Is video something that

J.E. Dunn is leaning into

and is that anything that you're paying

greater attention to?

We do lean into video.

We find, especially on

our social media channels,

we get great interaction

when it comes to videos,

especially videos of our people.

I would say it's probably not something

that we've really mastered.

I think that we're kind of dabbling in it

like a lot of other firms are,

but we're continuing to

explore it a little bit further

and how we can really

lean into it for things

beyond trying to win new work,

but recruiting where, I always say this,

even though I've been in

the industry for a long time,

I recognize that the

mindset of the decision makers

and really just kind

of like the preferences

of decision makers is changing.

A lot of them do rely

on those digital inputs

to get first impressions and kind of

guide their decisions.

Sure, they're not gonna

award you $100 million project

because I saw a video or

they think your Instagram feed

is really entertaining,

but it does leave an impression

that affects how they

perceive your brand.

Yeah, it's that the

know, like, and trust piece,

I think is huge with video.

It's certainly real

in-person relationships

or you can't duplicate that,

but you can give somebody an idea

of if they think they like you

just by seeing you on screen.

Absolutely.

And I don't think there's anything else

that gives you that same

sort of potential shortcut,

especially as our younger generations

are moving into buyer

or influencer roles,

they're gonna do that research

in the way that they

research everything else,

which is probably with one thumb.

Right, right, absolutely.

And some of the things

we've actually talked about

on a pursuit innovation standpoint,

so going back to trying to

automate the things that we can

and not spend time on things

that are kind of repetitive,

kind of the general proposal things,

but really developing those.

But we have talked about

really kind of using mixed media

within our pursuits and maybe

using sound bites from people

or short form videos or, you know,

I know everybody's kind

of been exploring like VR

and that sort of thing,

but really thinking about

how can we get people to interact

with our content a different way?

Well, certainly when I have

the time to respond to an RFP

and it's not always

something that I want to do,

I'd rather somebody say,

hey, let's talk and see if it makes sense

for us to hire you.

Absolutely.

But when there is that

competitive bid sort of situation,

I always love putting

a video in the start

of the response of the proposal,

which usually sounds

something like RFPs suck.

And the reason they suck isn't because

I don't want to fill out the document.

Maybe I don't want to do

that as my most favorite thing,

but it's hard to buy from

somebody that you don't know yet.

And to think that you're

going to look at the PDF and go,

okay, I'll hire these

guys because of this PDF.

There's got to be more to it than that.

It's hard from both sides.

It's hard for us to pull it together

and really try to get in

the psyche of our client

and deliver what they're looking for.

And it's hard from a review standpoint.

So on the marketing operations side,

I've read through a number of RFPs

just because that's how we select vendors

and it is really challenging.

And honestly, I don't feel

like anybody wants to do it

from either side.

They just want to get to the project.

They want to get to the deliverable,

the building that

they're trying to build,

the technology that

they're trying to implement.

That's all they want to

do at the end of the day.

I mean, as people on the whole weekend

are trying to make decisions

whether we want to admit

it or not pre-emotionally,

and then we want to

justify it with the data.

So the document, the RFP

kind of gives us the thing

to be able to justify the decision.

But yeah, I'm curious to

see how that's going to evolve

over the next few years.

I agree, I agree.

And I think we're all

always going to be human.

And I think those emotional

decisions will still happen.

One of the things we

have been seeing, again,

I know we've been talking a lot about AI,

but honestly, it's a

hot topic for a reason

because we're all

trying to figure it out,

is clients are

actually starting to use it

to evaluate proposals.

And so I think going back to your comment

about what people make

decisions based on their emotions,

I think it is what

it's going to come down to

where it's a, okay,

this is how AI scored it.

This candidate talked about your firm,

said your firm's name a lot.

This one didn't, so maybe

they score a little bit less.

And so that's how you

go into the interview.

But then someone knocks your socks off.

That's probably who

you're going to go with,

as long as they're all equally qualified.

What other expectations

are you seeing changing

on the client side or

any trends in that area?

You know, honestly, I

feel like brevity seems

to be the thing lately where when I said,

I don't think anybody

actually likes the process.

I don't think the client likes it.

I don't think our side likes it.

Like it's a tough process.

I think the only good

thing that comes from it

from our perspective is we

really get to know the client,

know the project, and

so you start developing

that kind of emotional connection.

But it's a very labor intensive process.

So I'm really excited that

we're working on streamlining it.

And so, but I found the clients,

like they really do want the brevity.

I think they're

realizing that, like you said,

especially if there's

an interview process,

as long as they know that

you're qualified to do it,

they're going to decide

whether they like you or not

in that interview process.

If you could get ahold of

a young aspiring marketer

who wants to work their

way up in the AEC space

and give them one golden piece of advice,

what would that be?

That is a great question.

Normally, my piece of

advice to all marketers,

whether they're new or they've been in

this for a long time,

it's incremental

progress, it's still progress.

So celebrate every progressive moment.

I think sometimes we

can get mired down in the,

I'm not moving up fast enough.

I don't see a path

for myself where, again,

this role that I have is not a role

that I could have ever even

dreamed for myself 20 years ago

when I started in this industry.

And so I would say that lesson,

just kind of combined with the patience

and patience and being observant,

you'll find your path forward.

There's so much out there

to still discover and do.

I think that's really great advice.

One of my biggest challenges

is even as I achieve a thing,

I'm sort of already

looking onto the next thing

and I don't take the

time always to celebrate

and sit back and enjoy the moment.

So that incremental

progress is still progress.

It's pretty great.

Okay, it's time to get

out your crystal ball.

What's your bold

prediction for the future

of the AEC industry?

Can it be anything you

want, marketing, operations,

sales, BD, proposals?

I feel like I kind of

touched on this already

where I do think the face of marketing

is going to look very different.

I believe that marketing is gonna

continue to be elevated

as a strategic partner in that process,

recognizing the

impact of pre-positioning,

brand advocacy, brand

promotion, brand unity,

and then also ensuring that we're

speaking to our clients

in a way that's

really meaningful to them.

There's so many inputs out there.

It's very easy to ignore things that

don't resonate with you

and so it is going to

look very different.

It is not going to be

a production function

as it's been in the past.

Do you have any

particular asks or challenges

for our audience that you'd

like to leave them with today?

I guess my ask is to

just continue to be curious

as we naturally are.

I mean, this is where we uncover

these unexpected opportunities,

whether you're on the

BD or marketing side.

It's that curiosity is

what kind of wins the day

all the time.

So whether you've been in

the industry for five years

or 35 years, I don't think

we should ever lose that.

Well, before we let you go,

tell our audience where we

can find more about you online

and more about J.E. Dunn.

Yeah, so you can find me on LinkedIn,

Michelle Ott with J.E. Dunn,

and then to find more

information about J.E. Dunn,

you can follow us on all

the social media channels,

except for TikTok, we

don't have that one,

and then at J.E. Dunn.com.

I don't know, J.E.

Dunn dudes in hard hats.

Maybe there's a thing to take that one.

I know, I know, I know.

We keep talking about it.

We'll see, we'll see what happens.

Well, thanks for joining us today

on another episode of

The Bold Brand Show.

We'll see you next time.

Thanks for having me.

Thank you for joining us

today on The Bold Brand Show.

For all of today's show

notes and links to our sponsors,

head over to boldbrand.show.

Be sure to subscribe

to our email newsletter,

where I'll update you

on the latest episodes

and other exciting things

happening at Bold Brand.

If you liked today's

episode, do me a favor,

and share this episode with a colleague.

Over at boldbrand.show, you

can subscribe on Apple Podcasts,

Spotify, and everywhere

you get your podcasts,

including YouTube, where

you can watch full versions

of each episode and join the conversation

by commenting below.

The Bold Brand Show is

produced by yours truly, Josh Miles,

and is a product of Bold Brand LLC,

a branding and video agency for AEC firms

based in Denver, Colorado.

Visit boldbrand.com to learn more

or hit that orange button

up top to schedule a time

to chat about your

branding or video project.

Catch us next time, where we chat with

another bold innovator

in the AEC industry.

Thanks for listening.

We'll see you next time.