They are two different buyers doing two different jobs. Specifiers choose a product long before it is bought, and they choose on technical confidence: performance, compliance, certification and how easily your product fits their drawings and specification. Marketing to them is evidence-led. The trade, meaning distributors, merchants and hire businesses, sell your product on from a depot, branch or counter, and they choose on availability, margin, ease of ordering and whether their customers ask for you by name. Marketing to them is demand-led: catalogues, point of sale, promotions and campaigns. Most building product brands need both, and the common mistake is running the same creative at each.
