By specification and process
A process, a material, a tolerance, a standard. Searched by an engineer who knows exactly what they need and is checking who can make it.
Industrial
Manufacturer marketing for low volume, long cycles and large orders
A manufacturer's buyer is an engineer or a procurement manager searching for a specification, a capability or a certification, and a single order can be worth a year of a consumer business's revenue. Search volume is tiny, the decision takes months, and a marketing account measured like an online shop will report failure while the pipeline fills.
Or call +1 (510) 312-5086 Mon to Sat, 9:00 to 18:00 ET
Free, written by a person, yours to keep either way.
Certified across the platforms we buy on. 150+ businesses, 7 years.
Marketing does not behave the same way here.
Manufacturing marketing is a low-volume, high-value problem. The searches are specific and few: a material, a process, a tolerance, a certification, a capability. The buyer is technical, compares suppliers on specification and capacity before price, and takes months to decide, often through a request for quotation and a sample.
A single enquiry can be worth a contract that runs for years. That means a cost per click or a cost per lead tells the business nothing, and a campaign judged in month one will be switched off before the first order lands.
The work is to build pages around the specifications and capabilities buyers search for, put the certifications and capacity where an engineer will find them, track a quote through to an order, and report the account in opportunities and their value.
How your customers actually search.
By capability and capacity
Contract manufacturing, a capability plus a region, minimum order quantities, lead times. Searched by a buyer sizing up suppliers.
By certification
A named standard or accreditation plus the product. The search that eliminates most suppliers before anyone speaks.
How an enquiry becomes a customer.
Different intents take different routes. Serving all of them with one page is the most common structural mistake in this industry.
- A capability page, a specification check, a request for quotation, a sample, an order months later.
- A certification search, a supplier shortlist, a site audit or a visit, a framework agreement.
- An enquiry from a trade show or a directory, checked against the website before it is followed up.
- Product pages written for marketing rather than for specification, so an engineer cannot find what they need.
- Certifications and capacity buried or missing, when they are the first filter a buyer applies.
- No pages for the processes and materials the plant is actually searched for.
- Enquiries counted without value, so a tyre-kicker and a framework agreement look the same in the report.
- Campaigns on the specific specification and capability searches, where volume is tiny and intent is exact.
- Targeting by job title and company type, so the budget reaches engineers and buyers rather than students and hobbyists.
- Negatives against jobs, courses, consumer products and DIY, which absorb industrial budgets.
- Offline conversion import, so an order months later credits the search that started it.
- Quotation follow-up across the months a technical decision takes.
- Capability updates and capacity announcements to past enquirers and existing customers, which is where the next order usually comes from.
What the report should lead with.
- Requests for quotation and their estimated value, by source
- Opportunities opened and orders won, tracked back to the first touch
- Cost per qualified opportunity, not cost per lead
- Time from enquiry to order, so the campaign is judged on the right horizon
- Enquiries outside capability or minimum order, tracked so they can be reduced
On camera
Four clients on camera, in their own words.
Four clients, four industries, one thing in common: the number moved and they said so on camera.
-
It is the best long-term investment we have made in the company, full stop.
Ahmed · Business owner · SEO
-
The cost per lead from organic is a fraction of what we pay on ads, and that math gets better every month.
Sandra · Founder · SEO
-
People can book a table without calling during the dinner rush. My host actually thanked me.
Aaliyah · Restaurant owner · Website
-
These tech geeks know the Facebook analytics and the data and the pixels and all that stuff that makes a musician’s head explode.
David · The Wankers · Social ads
Read next, if you run a business like this.
How many businesses are actually in a market
Small business counts by state and employer establishment counts by metro, from the SBA and the Census Bureau, with what they do and do not tell you.
Read the postA marketing strategy that starts with the arithmetic
A one-page marketing strategy that starts with what a customer is worth and the most you can pay to win one. Free template, no email needed.
Read the postSEO audit template, with a pass condition for every row
A free 32-row SEO audit spreadsheet covering indexation, canonicals, architecture, on-page, speed, tracking and local, with a pass condition for each row.
Read the postQuestions
Questions from this industry.
01 Search volume for what we make is tiny. Is marketing worth it?
Yes, because every one of those searches is an engineer or buyer with a real need. Ten searches a month for a specification you can meet is worth more than ten thousand for a consumer product. The account is built around exactness rather than volume.
02 Our previous agency reported cost per lead. Why did nothing close?
Because a lead in manufacturing is not a result. Downloads and form fills from people who cannot buy look cheap and produce nothing. Count qualified opportunities with a value attached, track them to the order, and judge the campaign over the months a decision actually takes.
03 What should a manufacturer put on its website?
The specifications, processes, materials, tolerances, certifications, capacity and lead times an engineer checks before shortlisting a supplier. A site that says quality and innovation says nothing an engineer can use.