The skills shortage is turning trades marketing into recruitment marketing
For years the marketing problem for a small trade firm was finding customers. Increasingly it is finding people to do the work the customers want. The same channels that fill an order book are now being used to fill vans, and the firms doing it well have noticed that the two jobs are closer than they look.
The scale of the gap
The Construction Industry Training Board's Construction Workforce Outlook 2025 to 2029, published in June 2025, put the industry's recruitment requirement at 47,860 extra workers a year, around 239,300 over the five years, to meet expected demand. It forecast the workforce growing to about 2.75 million by 2029 from roughly 2.65 million in 2024.
Those are national figures. At the level of a six-person building firm they translate into a familiar story: a good apprentice who finished and went contracting, a plasterer poached by a bigger outfit, a van that could be earning if there were anyone to drive it. Turning work away for lack of hands has become as common a complaint in trade forums as the cost of leads.
Some progress, from a low base
CITB reported in May 2026 that its New Entrant Support Team had helped 5,913 apprentices into the industry in the 2025 to 2026 financial year, a 43 per cent rise on the previous year, and had engaged with 20,579 employers about apprenticeship recruitment. Encouraging, and still a fraction of the annual requirement.
The gap is being closed, where it is being closed, one small firm at a time. And small firms do not have HR departments. They have whoever handles the Facebook page.
Same channels, different audience
The shift reported by trades who have gone down this road is that recruitment marketing uses exactly the tools built for customers. A Meta ad targeted by radius and age, pointing at a careers page instead of a quote form. A Reel of the team on site, captioned "we are looking for a second-year sparky" instead of "call us for a quote". A Google Business Profile post. A WhatsApp number for enquiries.
The overlap goes further than tools. The things that make a homeowner trust a firm (real photos, a visible team, honest reviews) are the things that make a candidate want to work there. Short-form video has been particularly effective, for reasons set out in our report on short-form video and how homeowners find tradespeople: a sixteen-year-old deciding what to do next is far more likely to see a firm on TikTok than on a jobs board.
What a recruitment-ready trade presence looks like
| Element | For customers | For candidates |
|---|---|---|
| Photos | Finished jobs, before and after | The team at work, the vans, the yard, a Friday |
| Website page | Service pages with areas covered | A careers page: what you pay, what you train, who to contact |
| Reviews | Google reviews from homeowners | A line from a current apprentice or employee about what it is like |
| Social posts | Job reveals, tips, offers | Day-in-the-life clips, "we are hiring" with specifics |
| Paid ads | Radius targeting to homeowners | Radius targeting to 16 to 24 year olds and to tradespeople by interest |
| Contact | Phone and WhatsApp for quotes | Same number, with a named person to ask for |
The honesty test
The firms reporting success at this are specific. Hourly rate or salary stated. Whether the firm pays for the college day. Whether there is a van after the first year. Which towns the work is in. Vague recruitment posts ("great opportunity for the right person") get the same response as vague customer ads, which is none.
This mirrors a theme in our analysis of marketing a one-van business against marketing five vans: once a firm has staff, its marketing is partly about being a place people want to work, and that cannot be faked for long.
Parents and schools are an audience too
Several trade bodies have pointed out for years that the decision to take an apprenticeship is often made at a kitchen table with a parent who still thinks of the trades as a fallback. The firms getting good applicants are talking to that parent as much as to the teenager: what the qualification is, what a qualified electrician or plumber earns, what the career path looks like beyond the tools.
A careers page that answers a parent's questions, and a willingness to turn up at a school careers evening with a van and a real apprentice, do more than any job advert. It is slow marketing, but the shortage is not going away quickly either.
Where this leaves the marketing budget
For a growing trade business the honest calculation is now two-sided. Spend on customer acquisition brings in work. Spend on recruitment brings in the capacity to do it. A firm that is turning away jobs has, by definition, a recruitment problem rather than a marketing problem, and the money is better spent on the careers page than on more leads.
The firms that have grasped this are not running two separate marketing efforts. They are running one, with a visible team at the centre of it, and letting homeowners and candidates both see the same thing. The wider context sits in our state of trades marketing in the UK, 2026.
Frequently asked questions
How many workers does UK construction need to recruit each year?
CITB's Construction Workforce Outlook 2025 to 2029 estimates 47,860 extra workers a year, around 239,300 over the five years.
Can a small trade firm use Facebook ads to recruit apprentices?
Yes. The same radius targeting used for customers can be aimed at 16 to 24 year olds in your area, pointing at a careers page with specifics on pay and training.
What should a trade careers page include?
Pay or rate, what training is funded, the areas worked in, what the progression looks like, and a named person to contact.