The Thomas Blog

Inbound Marketing and ROI: For Industrial Companies & Manufacturers

As the digital world reshapes the industrial world, marketing budgets are on the rise. According to ENGINEERING.com's annual survey of engineering marketers, twice as many respondents reported that their budgets were growing rather than shrinking in 2017.

Like with any investment, marketers and manufacturing companies want to ensure that they are receiving a positive return. We’ve outlined two major areas of return on investment (ROI) that illustrate the effectiveness of inbound marketing — but first, what exactly is the difference between inbound marketing and traditional marketing?

9 Tips For Video Marketing Campaign Success

Video marketing is on the rise, and for good reason; videos have been shown to capture attention  more effectively than plain text or static pictures, and videos are shared more than any other type of content on social media. Today, 61% of content marketers are putting videos into play in order to keep up with the competition and establish their brands as cutting-edge thought leaders. If you haven’t yet made use of video in your content marketing campaigns, it’s time to get going. Or, if you’re already utilizing video, it may be time to kick it up a notch and use videos to increase sales.

With solid production value and engaging content, your video will position you as a knowledgeable, current, and trustworthy brand. Below, we’ve outlined tips industrials should keep in mind when using videos in your marketing campaigns.

The 5 Types Of Marketing Emails You Need To Be Sending (And Why)

Whether you are just starting with email marketing or you're already sending marketing emails every week, you know that emails are one of the best channels to sell. But smart marketers are always looking for new ways they can build relationships and grow revenue.

Should you nurture your subscribers with weekly newsletters? Are dedicated sends (stand-alone emails with one offer) better at optimizing your sales and marketing funnel? What about email digests?

These are all valid questions marketers find themselves asking when selecting the right format to meets their email marketing goals. In this post, we're review the different types of marketing emails you can send, and their respective advantages and disadvantages. This information should help you make an educated decision about picking the most appropriate email type and how to go about using it.

7 Quick Ways To Check If Your Website Is Out Of Date

It used to be that simply having a website would set you apart from the competition. You could create a handful of pages, add a little background about the company, sprinkle in some images, set it, and forget it. Unfortunately, a website that works for you requires a lot more upkeep than that.

As a key driver of new business, your website is the centerpiece of your digital marketing efforts.

For manufacturing and industrial companies, establishing a digital presence is no longer merely an option; it’s critical to staying relevant in today’s increasingly connected, online-focused B2B world. Today, users expect more. They want to know that a company is actively invested in keeping their processes, technologies — and their website — current and up to date, reflecting shifting trends and market changes.

SEO Basics for Manufacturers and Industrial Companies

You know you want more new customers, and you know your website is key to getting them to your company, so how can you connect the dots? When you do a Google search, you’re likely to click on a link from one of the first five results. Have you ever given any thought to exactly how one of those sites gets to a top slot?  It's a lead generation tactic fueled by organic search and search engine optimization (SEO) to drive your target audience to your website. 

The Basics Of Instagram For Manufacturers

When it comes to content marketing, social media plays an undeniably huge role in how businesses manage their online interactions with consumers and partners. You’re likely already familiar with the “Big Three” social media channels — Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter. 

These networks are just the tip of the digital iceberg; the social media landscape is vast and teeming with a wide variety of platforms. In order to master your social media game, it’s important to understand these networks and how they can be utilized.

One of the most popular social media networks is Instagram. Synonymous with ethereal, nostalgic filters, and heavily edited photographs, this image-based platform might not seem like an obvious choice for an industrial social media marketing strategy. However, with its high popularity and excellent engagement rate, integrating Instagram into your social media marketing strategy is definitely worth considering.

5 Risks Of Exporting Manufactured Goods — And How To Avoid Them

With tariffs and trade impacting the supply chain, a lot of the discussion has focused on the importing of goods and services. However, it has also sparked a renewed interest — and intensity — in exporting.

As standards of living continue to improve throughout the globe, foreign companies have more buying power than ever before. Couple that phenomena with the rise in global supply chains, and exporting represents one of the best opportunities for industrial companies to grow.

12 Sourcing Tips To Identify Quality Suppliers

When most buyers plan on identifying a new supplier, they are usually tempted to focus on the best price. However, concentrating only on low costs can hurt you in the long term. That's because shaving a few cents off the price of a product is no help if the quality is below standard and the component or material does not arrive when you need it.

So instead of solely focusing on cost, focus on quality by incorporating these 12 tips into your sourcing strategy:

Top 3 Pitfalls for Industrial Sellers

Over time, sellers learn that not all customers are created equal, and some customers are more difficult to sell to than others.

That's because the industry is evolving and the buyer’s journey of an industrial customer is changing along with it. As an industrial business, how are you managing these changes — are you keeping up internally, or are you facing roadblocks when it comes to connecting with the right buyers and closing your sales?

In this post, we discuss three common pitfalls industrial sellers experience, important things to remember about the industrial buying and selling process, and how to make sure you're on the right track to closing those deals.