UK facilities management continues to be a big, evolving, competitive and often confusing marketplace. Broadly speaking , it is dominated by a comparatively small group of multi-service providers with national or even international reach, complemented by a strong and often ambitious mid-market sector, plus an army of more or less specialist service providers operating more or less regionally. The ‘noise’ in this market, generated by companies working to be seen and heard by both existing and prospective customers, can be exceptional. Breaking through this to make an impact that leads to commercial success can be a matter of good timing or good luck; but it can also be – and is probably more likely to be – testament to good branding and a consistent communication strategy. We have been tracking brand perception in UK FM for years. The results are always interesting - for what they say about the marketplace, what the companies in it are doing and what some of those companies might do to enhance the impact they are making. One thing has never changed: in every case when we ask survey participants to name the ‘top service providers’, the number of companies proposed is high - typically 20 or more under each category. This emphasises how many companies there are in UK FM offering similar services, which in turn helps to explain why no one organisation dominates the market. In general terms, buyers have a wide choice of providers, and providers are always in competition. In the tables below, the companies named were cited most frequently; many of the companies not named in the tables have multiple supporters.just not enough in this case to make their mark. There is also – still - some tendency for multi-service companies to be perceived in terms of their ‘original’ or ‘home’ service areas: for example, ISS and cleaning or Sodexo and catering. For companies that are and want to be seen as ISS Classification - Unrestricted
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