Manufacturers still need to rely on outdated techniques for marketing their brand, such as trade shows, networking events and word-of-mouth referrals to promote it. But these strategies still work! Industrial customers today are better educated than ever and more determined than ever to avoid salespeople.
On average, 70% of industrial buyer journeys are complete before engaging with salespeople directly. However, most prospective customers may visit your website as part of the research process. Manufacturers looking to attract ideal buyers (and job applicants) through social media must present themselves well; having an impactful digital footprint increases the chances of shortlisting them for consideration.
Digital marketing may be familiar, yet many manufacturers continue to rely on traditional forms for the promotion of their products and brands - trade shows, networking events, and word-of-mouth referrals are still effective ways of reaching potential industrial buyers. Still, as customer buying patterns evolve, manufacturers need to implement digital strategies as part of their overall promotional strategies.
This post will show manufacturing companies how they can establish an effective digital presence to increase conversion rates with existing customers and attract new ones. Digital marketing tactics now account for 46% of marketing budgets.
Therefore, manufacturers must employ digital strategies effectively to stay competitive in today's global economy. This Ultimate Guide to Digital Marketing For Manufacturers will teach the fundamentals of digital marketing and help you determine whether investing in it would be worthwhile.
Digital Marketing For Manufacturing
Recent years have witnessed an exponential expansion in the global manufacturing industry due to numerous contributing factors. Marketing campaigns have also contributed significantly to manufacturing's rise. Industries use various promotional models for their products. Digital marketing has proven essential in driving growth and success among many manufacturing industries. Let's consider some advantages of digital marketing for manufacturers:
Enhance Brand Recognition And Perception
Digital marketing has an immediate and tangible effect on brand perception. If more people come in contact with a brand and its products, more may associate that brand with superior quality - regardless of whether actual manufacturing quality levels are being met or not; but their image allows for this space in potential clients' minds.
Customers appreciate brands with wide visibility; they tend to associate well with them and are, therefore, more inclined to purchase from companies whose brands can be seen everywhere. Manufacturers can take steps toward this end by investing in digital marketing - including social media, content marketing, SEO and email. Heavy manufacturing industries should consider employing similar strategies when investing in this form of promotion.
A Ready Industry For Change
Over the last several decades, manufacturing plants have undergone rapid modernization. Now equipped with technology such as robots and energy-efficient machinery, modern plants require equally modernized marketing strategies, digital marketing being one such investment decision.
Digital marketing has quickly become the industry standard approach to manufacturing businesses' marketing. By adopting it themselves, these manufacturers demonstrate they're open to revamping their approach to promotion.
At first, due to its sheer scale and complexity, manufacturing wasn't considered suitable as an industry for digital marketing; however, through systematic digital marketing efforts over the years of the time, the manufacturing sector has since integrated digital strategies.
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Digital Marketing Is Measurable And Results-Driven
A Digital marketer aims to calculate marketing ROI as easily and precisely as possible. ROI (Return On Investment) measures the costs associated with digital marketing against its results, such as search results on Google for any business or organization being an indicator that their digital marketing campaigns were successful; manufacturing sector businesses being no exception! When learning SEO, you will often hear that "SEO means the Battle For The First Pages." If a company can reach that threshold, it signifies success for digital marketing initiatives.
Qualitative Leads Are Generated
Digital marketing offers manufacturing firms numerous advantages. Leads refer to people or companies who could become clients; lead generation is also defined as collecting customer details to pursue future business relationships. Digital marketing goes beyond selling products directly; rather, it involves turning prospects into prospects through lead gen programs.
Digital marketing provides manufacturers with an easier means of generating potential leads in the manufacturing sector. Customers are provided with all of the information necessary for informed decisions. They can decide for themselves whether to provide their contact info or alternative, less natural methods of collecting it. It doesn't allow salespeople to manipulate customers; potential buyers receive proper education from manufacturers as well as honest responses about their products.
A Boost To Existing Marketing Activities
Digital marketing can amplify your traditional marketing efforts. A manufacturing firm might already engage in traditional advertising methods; digital strategies should supplement these efforts rather than supplement them.
Industry can find more success by integrating traditional and digital efforts to achieve maximum results. Working together, both approaches capture customers across platforms while expanding options for marketing efforts.
Skilled Workers
Digital marketing goes far beyond simply selling products online; advertising for manufacturing jobs may also be necessary due to openings appearing. In traditional practice, job openings were advertised through newspapers, radio and TV broadcasts.
As globalization, modernization, and connectivity advance further, it's no longer surprising that younger workers with the necessary qualifications only sometimes use traditional media for job advertising purposes. More companies use digital recruitment methods like digital recruitment to find more qualified employees; as digital job postings increase, it has become common for job advertisements to appear solely online.
The Strategy Should Always Come Before The Tactics
Starting with tactics without first developing and documenting an effective strategy is rarely recommended because such an action plan provides direction towards reaching one's desired destination; tactics are actions taken directly by individuals or teams within industrial businesses to carry out these social media strategies outlined by leadership.
Manufacturing businesses frequently operate without an effective marketing plan and implement random acts of promotion in an attempt to drive results; unfortunately, this approach seldom reaps positive returns and often wastes both time and resources:
- Audit Of Marketing - An evaluation involves conducting an in-depth assessment of both you and your competitors to help identify investments for maximum short- and long-term returns. Hiring an experienced marketing team with knowledge across various industries increases your odds that they'll provide a complete strategy with tactics.
- Roadmap For Marketing - Begin by developing and creating a Marketing Roadmap that will assist in reaching and meeting your marketing objectives and driving sales growth. A Roadmap should not just be theoretical; an experienced team should assess your company, competitors and key markets to craft one which helps expand market share while closing any gaps that exist in its development.
After considering budget and experience factors, you can identify the optimal method to carry out your strategy. Many companies find it more cost-effective (in terms of speed, concentration and expertise) to contract an external digital marketing agency for implementation; often, this solution works better.
Create Accurate Buyer Personas
Before initiating channel strategies, it is necessary to have an in-depth knowledge of who your customer is and their wants and desires. One approach would be creating buyer personas based on data and internal research - these will allow you to target only qualified prospects when creating marketing campaigns or product designs tailored towards meeting those specific requirements. Buyer personas also help guide product design.
Your buyer personas can be created through research, surveys and interviews conducted with people in your database who closely match your target audience. By identifying commonalities across accounts, you will create at least one buyer persona person. The next steps for developing customer personas include the following:
- You can write down the basic information about your persona, such as their job title, where they live, what interests them, or how they behave.
- You can share the details you collected during your research, such as the motivations of the person, their business goals and obstacles.
- Prepare them with sales training materials and analytics tools to help prepare them for future interactions.
- Create key messages for all your communications to prospects.
You can create targeted marketing campaigns to meet the needs of your ideal customers better and position your business as a solution.
What Are The Types Of Digital Marketing?
Two basic marketing types can be identified:
- Outbound
- Outbound
Outbound Marketing Tactics
Outbound marketing involves one-way, self-centered communication. Your company goal is to reach as many people as you can with your message:
- Sending email without consent.
- Broadcast (radio, tv).
- Advertisement Print.
- Direct Mail.
- Telemarketing.
- Outdoor Boards.
- The following are some examples of the events that you can attend.
Inbound Marketing Tactics
Inbound marketing involves two-way, customer-focused communication. Permission-based marketing is based on the company goal of providing personalized, useful, and relevant original content while meeting your customers wherever they are:
- Sending emails with consent (to those who have agreed).
- Marketing content.
- Websites.
- Video.
- Online Webinars.
- Social Media.
- PPC Ads.
Attract new contacts by asking existing ones to visit your booth via an email invite campaign; use business cards collected at trade show booths as fodder for this email nurture program; advertise future events with links leading to registration on your homepage website and more! You will increase your return on your investment this way.
Read More: These are the Five Things You Need to Do To Make Your Digital Marketing Strategy a Winner
Inbound Vs. Outbound Digital Marketing For Manufacturers
Marketing can be divided into two distinct types, inbound and outbound. Outbound marketing entails reaching large audiences using one-way communications like broadcasting, print ads, direct mailing campaigns, events or billboards - it reaches as many people as possible regardless of demographics and buying patterns - with regular contact. To maximize effectiveness with outbound campaigns, personalize outreach initiatives while setting regular follow-up strategies.
Inbound marketing is an approach focused on customer acquisition that utilizes relevant content to form bonds between brands and their wider audience. Primarily focused on digital channels, Inbound marketing entails:
- Marketing content
- Websites
- Video
- Search Engine Optimization SEO
- Email marketing
- PPC (Pay-per-click) advertising
- Social Media Marketing
Why Should Manufacturers Use Digital Marketing?
Customers' demands and behaviors have evolved. Reaching new clients requires more than traditional means; there may also be alternative or better strategies available. Inbound marketing has fundamentally altered the dynamics between seller and buyer.
Buyers no longer depend on sales teams for information; instead, they can find all they need online without wading through irrelevant material or sales pitches - something your competition is likely doing more readily than you are! Manufacturers, engineers and construction firms can benefit from digital marketing by targeting various pain points with targeted marketing messages:
- Education of buyers about complex products.
- Brand perceptions and the industry as a whole can be improved.
- How to generate qualified leads.
- Increasing sales velocity.
- Recruitment of skilled workers.
If they were to know how to start, we believe more manufacturers would adopt a digital transformation. The manufacturers have said that they do not know:
- How much should we spend on marketing for a small company?
- What to do (internal team or agency?)
- What to do first (start with tactics or generation strategy?
- Are they the right marketing trends/best practices for us?
Some of these companies focus their efforts on short-term fixes rather than long-term, sustainable results. Digital marketing that humanizes and makes your brand come alive is best achieved by:
- Video
- Podcasts
- Social Media
- Blogging
- Twitter and Facebook
By offering a wide range of digital content, you allow your customers to choose the information they want to read based on personal preference. This builds trust.
The Best Digital Marketing Strategies For Manufacturers
Industrial buyers are evolving, as most manufacturers recognize. Millennials have increasingly replaced customers in most companies; Millennials often become Influencers or even the ultimate Decision Makers; additionally, they purchase differently. Your tactics must meet the goals of your company and support its goals in reaching these objectives. Manufacturers may implement digital marketing strategies like those outlined here:
Content Marketing
As previously discussed, 70% of industrial buyers conduct online research before approaching sales staff for products or services which require advanced knowledge to sell effectively. This must happen for complex products or services that offer complex features or functionality. Content marketing can assist industrial buyers during the initial research stage by offering them relevant, helpful content - ultimately moving them into shortlisting and evaluation stages of decision-making.
Content marketing includes developing downloadable resources (for lead capture) like checklists, eBooks (which convert leads into leads), white papers (shortlisting criteria), on-demand webinars and CAD/BIM files to produce leads and increase conversion. Content marketing may also involve on-demand webinars for conversion.
Email Marketing Campaigns
Email marketing remains one of the most cost-effective forms of promotion available today, providing affordable yet personalized sales messages directly to buyers. Don't write off email marketing simply as "annoying" however: customers who opt-in permit you to access their inboxes; customers can select the delivery frequency that works for them and opt out anytime; our client has had great success using personalized emails such as weekly tips to effectively leverage email as an effective form of advertising and promotion.
Blogging/Vlogging
As with emailing, blogging (and its video equivalent, vlogging) is an effortless strategy that yields high returns. By regularly creating SEO-optimized articles optimized for search, writing articles regularly optimized to bring organic traffic can increase organic search visibility for your site while positioning you as an industry expert and giving sales staff something useful to share with leads. We advise posting at least twice monthly with 600-1000 word posts about helping rather than selling platforms; you could start this way to address questions frequently asked of salespersons by offering answers through your blog.
Social Media
Manufacturing companies utilize social media for one of two reasons; to amplify blog posts or company valuable content. Or they use it as a powerful employer branding tool; we recommend LinkedIn if you don't have time to monitor all platforms regularly and post regularly across them all; share blog posts through LinkedIn groups related to your industry; participate in discussions; comment on social media posts by others - these are all ways social media helps manufacturers position themselves effectively online.
Read More: How Digital Marketing Helps Companies
Video
Video content has an 80 times higher chance of driving organic search than text-only media; video at each step in your buyer's experience can boost organic search even further and is an effective way to nurture leads.
By mixing formal and informal videos, engineers may answer technical queries directly through talking head videos while professionals create marketing-centric videos which showcase the capabilities of your company - videos can be utilized both internally and externally. You don't even have to limit its usage to social media channels or emails: They could be part of sales presentations, website pages or home pages, among many more uses.
Website
Your website is the cornerstone of your business. It should be easily found through search engines, showcase products that your clientele needs, and inform visitors, building trust while turning visitors into paying customers and recruiting top talent.
However, your site could only succeed if SEO optimized, designed with current customer experience in mind and professionally written by experienced writers, mobile friendly with conversion points as well as boasts a professional design. In essence, it should not simply serve as an electronic brochure but as a powerful marketing tool representing and representing your brand!
Demos, Webinars And Other Online Educational Activities
Promote the expertise of your team by offering educational opportunities. Indulge participants with continuing education credit as an added perk; reuse webinars after events have ended to collect leads for your website; they make the great middle-of-funnel offers when current customers have knowledge about you but are comparing providers; they can even delight clients (by helping keep up-to-date on trends while offering continuing education credits).
The Best Tools For Digital Marketing Automation For Manufacturers
Marketing tech stack, commonly referred to as "tech stack", refers to technologies, platforms, and tools which enable digital marketer to manage and automate digital marketing across channels. If you have yet to hear, Industry 4.0 is upon us, with marketing playing an instrumental role - launching your tech stack is one way of connecting, optimizing and getting ready for Industry 4.0. These components can frequently be found in marketing tech stacks:
- CMS.
- Email management.
- Social media management.
- Marketing automation software.
- The following are some of the most effective ways to reduce your risk.
- Advertisement & Conversion Technology.
You should set up an inbound tech stack if you are suffering from the following pains:
- Want more high-quality leads?
- Lead nurturing needs to be improved
- Want to convert more visitors to your website?
- Need help determining what content marketing strategies are successful/failures?
- You have a small group, and you need to be more efficient.
- Better sales and marketing alignment is needed.
The right technology will allow your team to move quickly, increase sales, and improve customer retention.
The Top Mistakes Of Manufacturers In Marketing
Numerous manufacturers have taken advantage of this enormous market, testing their expertise in this expanding area before jumping in with both feet. While not every attempt was a success, some were hugely so. Before our engagement, many clients make common errors that we see again and again:
- Too Soon Expecting Results: Digital marketing can be an ongoing effort with long-term effects - even if initial results appear quickly. A consistent and strategic year is often enough to bring long-term sustainable benefits, with money invested directly correlated to results seen.
- Focusing On Perfection: Manufacturing demands zero defects; before anything is sent out, all components must go through an exhaustive quality check process. Marketing, however, involves more trial and error. Content creation (think A+ over B+), A/B tests, measurement digital marketing tools, and improvement are key in marketing; in fact, it's impossible to know exactly what will work without doing some experiments; being overwhelmed with perfection could prevent you from even taking the first steps forward!
- Prioritizing Tactics Over Strategy: An old watch can often be fixed over two consecutive days with careful thought and planning. Sometimes taking an approach that prioritizes strategy over tactics works better - setting specific, SMART goals for your business with regular measurements and adjustments of tactics are far superior to "hoping something will stick".
- Getting Distracted Constantly: Visionaries include business owners, CEOs and entrepreneurs with big ideas capable of revolutionizing entire industries or businesses. But over-ambitious thinking may cause you to chase shiny objects off track; when this occurs, your marketing agency or team should feel empowered enough to say no and stay the course set forth at the beginning of each quarter by you in terms of SMART targets versus being distracted from these targets by squirrels that waste resources (money/time/resources).
- Bottlenecking: CEOs and business owners can sometimes fall into the trap of micromanaging everything before sending it out - taking far too much time over each aspect. Consider giving someone on your team the ability and motivation to speed up marketing projects more rapidly.
- They Need To Measure Their Marketing: One mistake can derail an otherwise excellent digital marketing program despite adhering to all five. You should easily spot what works when it comes to digital marketing - set benchmarks at the outset and report regularly to make informed decisions.
The Secret To The Growth Of Your Business Is Digital Marketing
Digital marketing can help businesses expand customer bases and boost conversions, with buyer personas being an essential step for doing this. Once created, these will allow your organization to better understand potential customer needs, challenges and preferred channels before creating custom pillar messages based on them to attract high-quality leads more quickly.
Want More Information About Our Services? Talk to Our consultants!
Conclusion
Digital marketing, which emphasizes results over other forms of advertising, is the way forward. While only likely to replace some traditional methods entirely, digital advertising offers manufacturers an efficient means of reaching target customers at scale.
Digital marketing specialists provide you with a powerful way to raise brand visibility, reputation and generate high-quality leads for your company. Furthermore, this strategy makes recruiting skilled workers easier.
