The Thomas Blog

5 Things Industrial Buyers Are Evaluating You On Right Now

Today’s industrial buyers prefer to research suppliers online in order to create a shortlist of potential partners. If you want to have a chance of winning the business, you need to be sure you are on that shortlist. That's why it is so important to make the right first impression online. But how?

Start by focusing on these five things that buyers are evaluating you on right now.

The Oversight That’s Damaging Your Company Website

You think your website is great. You haven’t updated it in a year or two, but you’re getting decent traffic and a handful of RFQs each month. You’ve got products, a flashy video and a lot of text on the homepage.

Overall, it works, so no need to make any improvements, right? Wrong.

For years, manufacturers and industrial companies have insisted on bloating their homepages with product and certification information, part numbers and company insight — and then it just collects dust.

You’re Probably Making This Fatal Sales Mistake

Think about your current sales process: You probably get leads from marketing, the RFQ form on your website or referrals. You might give a prospect a call, ask a standard set of questions, set a price, send an email and hope your bid is selected. 

5 Procurement Strategies For Small And Mid-Sized Businesses

Small business owners wear many hats, and a multitude of demands (staffing, financing, inventory management, marketing, and customer service) quickly consume their time, focus, and daily operations. As a result, procurement tends to be an afterthought — when it should be approached strategically.

Small businesses spend between 45 and 65 percent of sales revenue on procurement of inputs.  Therefore, procurement should be considered a viable opportunity to reduce costs and improve efficiency. 

Video: 3D Printer Goes Big

As 3D printing continues to advance, it's become possible to produce anything from life-sized clones to printed drones. These are big innovations, but they don't stack up in size to the new SLCOM 1, which is capable of building objects up to 24 feet tall and 30 feet wide.

Product Manufacturers: Are You Targeting Your Audience With The Right Content?

In the industrial space, marketing and sales leaders target three common personas: Engineers, Procurement Managers, and Plant MRO Managers.

Each of these personas has different primary concerns based around their job focus and function within their company. Let’s take a look at these three personas in detail, so you can better understand your audiences and how to reach them.

How to Grow Your Business Through Non-Traditional Hiring

When you’re building your team, you want to find the candidates that will contribute most to the company. Thinking “outside the box” will bring you to the most qualified and hardworking individuals. (The phrase may be cliché, but the resulting actions aren’t.)

What Are The Industrial Applications Of Inline Heaters?

Inline heaters, sometimes referred to as circulation heaters, have a number of different industrial uses. 

Inline heaters make use of heating elements that are covered with a special type of vessel chamber that has anti-corrosion properties. This type of heating is indirect. The fluid is circulated through a closed loop around the heating element until it reaches the correct temperature. Then it’s passed out of the tank through a nozzle. Different uses may require different flanged connections, sheath materials, or temperature ranges. These heaters are often insulated to help increase their efficiency. 

5 Important Marketing Tactics To Fine Tune This Summer

Traditionally, activity slows way down in the industrial manufacturing sphere during the summer months; owners take time off to see their families and enjoy the nice weather, employees make use of vacation days, and plants shut down for weeks or even months at a time to complete scheduled maintenance and repairs.