The Thomas Blog

The Manufacturing Leader’s Step By Step Guide To Building A Strong Digital Presence

One of the most significant changes in the digital space is that people are becoming so conditioned by the digital experience in their personal lives, they are beginning to expect the same level of ease and satisfaction when dealing in a professional capacity. 

3 Reasons Manufacturers Should Work With A HubSpot Diamond Partner Agency

If you’ve decided it’s time to get on board with partnering with a marketing agency to grow your business better and more efficiently, congratulations! You’re on the right track to use digital marketing to be ahead of competitors and get more qualified leads your sales team will appreciate.

During your evaluation process vetting through marketing agencies, you may have come across some that are HubSpot partners. While all marketing agencies can produce results, some are equipped differently than others. Let’s go through the reasons why manufacturers and industrial companies should partner with a HubSpot Diamond Partner Agency.

Inbound Marketing ROI: For Industrial Companies & Manufacturers

As the digital world continues to shape the industrial world, marketing budgets shift from trade shows to online efforts. 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. The latest Thomas Industrial Survey assessing the ongoing impacts of COVID-19 on North American manufacturing revealed that 21% of companies are less likely to invest in trade shows while the use of webinars & virtual events (20%), search & social media (14%), and website (12%) all increased in light of COVID-19. 

Like with any investment, marketers and manufacturing companies want to ensure that they receive a positive return. We’ve outlined the effectiveness of inbound marketing in tracking ROI and why it's important for manufacturers and industrial companies today.

Pitching Digital Marketing To Your Manager (For Manufacturers)

Digital marketing has become the most scalable, measurable, and effective channel to drive sales. As technology continues to advance and marketing best practices evolve, industrial companies are continuing to adopt digital marketing tactics at a much higher velocity — further sped up in 2020 by COVID-19 and the cancellation of trade shows. Thus, more manufacturers are using digital marketing to match their competitor’s ability to connect with buyers in the digital space.

Why Brand Marketing Is Important For Manufacturers

When it comes to branding, the major players probably come to mind first — Amazon, Coca-Cola®, Disney, and so on. The strength of their name recognition is immense. When these names come up, you immediately see their logo, and even if the logo doesn’t bully its way into your brain, you at least know what they’re selling. It doesn’t matter whether you consume their products or not; you know them. They’ve seared your mind with a branding iron. (See what we did there?)

Many manufacturing and industrial companies, however, don't think that they need to worry about branding. Some still prefer to rely on word of mouth marketing and referrals to attract new business, and they feel that branding isn't important in their space. 

But there's a better way to grow your business.

How To Use Digital Marketing To Get Customers In The Defense Industry

To help the manufacturing industry be appropriately equipped for change, we launched Thomas Industrial Data earlier this year.

Our sourcing activity data coupled with our Thomas Industrial Survey results, reveals interesting insights with North American suppliers shifting their businesses to meet the new normal.

• 55% of survey participants being likely to very likely to invest in Production Performance Automation in the next 12 months
• 69% of companies across the manufacturing and industrial sectors are likely to bring manufacturing production and sourcing back to North America
• 12% increase in website usage by manufacturers and industrial companies to connect with more buyers and customers

How To Measure B2B Marketing Success

Measuring the return on investment for marketing is challenging in even the best cases. Many industrial marketers mistake commonly used online B2C metrics for effective measures of their efforts. But marketing effectiveness can affect business outcomes like revenue growth and customer retention — so with so many variables and items to test, how can industrial marketers measure the success of their marketing campaigns?

The Role Of Color Theory In Marketing

The concept of "color theory" is not new. In fact, the term first appeared in the writings of Leone Battista Alberti and the notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci way back in the 1400s. 

Today, color theory is still prominently taught in disciplines like art and science. However, marketers can certainly benefit from learning about it as well. After all, no matter what industry you are in, colors can define your brand, influence your audience, and prompt people to take action. 

Why It's Important To Know Your Audience: The Key Role Of Buyer Personas

Imagine a trade school instructor working with a brand-new class of students and jumping right into the finer points of programming a 5-axis CNC machine. Or a presenter at an executive seminar who just goes over the basic concept of a balance sheet. Neither one would make much of an impact on the audience, and it is likely the presentation would only be memorable for the worst of reasons.

Both the instructor and presenter failed because they didn’t know their audience, and therefore couldn’t address the audience’s needs.