Category: Industrial Marketing Strategies

  • Top 10 Industrial Marketing Posts of 2011

    As we wind down 2011, this is a good time to review all the industrial marketing posts that I have published here and been viewed by you, my readers, during the year. Not all the posts were written in 2011, one was way back from 2008.

    If there is one important takeaway from this exercise, it is that blog posts live forever and continue to attract traffic long after they have been posted. That’s the power of inbound marketing with content.

    I looked at my Google Analytics for the entire year and have selected the top ten blog posts using a combination of Pageviews, Engagement and Social Sharing data to determine the ranking.

    Unlike David Letterman’s Top Ten list; my industrial marketing blog posts are listed in decreasing order of popularity.

    And now for the drum roll please…

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  • 2012 Content Marketing Trends for Manufacturers and Industrial Companies

    I just finished reading an excellent research report from the good folks at Content Marketing Institute (CMI). This report is chock full of statistics and graphs about B2B content marketing. In this post, I want to focus on some of their findings that I feel apply to content marketing for manufacturers and industrial companies.

    Even though the content marketing adoption rate for these companies is at an impressive 83%, I am surprised that it is even that high; the Manufacturing/ Processing industry (as defined in the report) is dead last among the six industries studied.

    What is encouraging though is the fact that 68% of companies with 10 – 99 employees maintain a blog as compared to only 55% for larger companies that employ this content marketing tactic. Many of the manufacturers and industrial companies fall in the smaller size category.

    That’s not the only good news for blogs. Even though other marketing tactics like in-person events and webinars are still seen as the most effective tactics, this year blogs registered a 45% increase in “perceived effectiveness” as compared to the study done in 2010. (See chart below).

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  • When the Going Gets Tough, B2B Marketers…

    …fall back on tried-and-true marketing tactics that they have relied on for years. In the current tough economy, cutting edge and innovative marketing is taking a back seat to proven strategies for lead generation.

    B2B companies are spending more of their marketing budgets on channels such as trade shows, Website design, management and optimization and e-mail marketing. Those three marketing channels received the largest allocation of the budget. The trend holds true across the board even though the mix may be different depending on the size of a B2B company.

    Smaller companies, those with less than 100 employees, tend to spend more on digital marketing tactics like Website design, e-mail marketing as well as traditional outbound marketing channels like direct mail. Not surprisingly, they tend to spend less on trade shows.

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  • Use Content Marketing to Manage Industrial Sales Funnels

    B2B and industrial marketers are usually tasked with two main responsibilities:

    1. Fill the top of the sales funnel (ToFU) with high quality leads
    2. Maximize the middle of the funnel (MoFU) for converting more leads into sales opportunities

    Achieving those two objectives are difficult enough, now add to that the constant pressure of having to lower the cost per lead at the same time. That’s why more B2B and industrial marketers are turning to content marketing to lift their lead generation ROI.

    Several studies have shown that these lead generation challenges hold true across the board in B2B marketing. According to the recent MarketingSherpa’s B2B Marketing Benchmark Survey (June 2011) of more than 1,700 B2B marketers:

    52% of the companies reported, “Converting qualified leads into paying customers” (MoFU) as their biggest challenge. This was followed by Lead Generation (ToFU) at 48% and Lead Nurturing (MoFU) at 40% (See chart).

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  • Are Community Forums Good for Manufacturers and Industrial Companies?

    Blogging and mainstream social media sites like LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube get all the attention these days. What about good ol’ community forums?

    Community forums have been around a lot longer than the newer social media channels. Some even consider it the original crowdsourcing platform for content. Traditionally used as customer support tools by manufacturers and industrial distributors, the discussion threads were primarily text-based. However, the more modern incarnation of community forums support rich media content, file attachments and social sharing options.

    According to a survey done by GlobalSpec (Social Media Use in the Industrial Sector – 2011), 33% of industrial companies provide an online discussion community for customers, and 32% provide one internally for employees. (See chart)

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  • Using E-mail Marketing for Lead Generation

    Most manufacturers and industrial companies use email marketing as a way to keep in touch with new leads and existing customers. This usually means sending out a bi-weekly or a monthly email newsletter.

    It has been my experience within the industrial sector that these companies rarely use email marketing proactively for lead generation. Here I am not referring to new subscribers to newsletters and free content. To me, those contacts are prospects and not leads. There is a difference. For more on that, refer to my post, “Subscribers to Free Content are NOT Leads.”

    How to generate quality leads using email marketing

    Email marketing is an effective tactic for generating high-quality leads from an audience of engineering, industrial and technical professionals. However, it does require you to think about emails somewhat differently.

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  • Content – The Biggest Hurdle in Digital Marketing for Manufacturers

    Most manufacturers of industrial products agree that digital marketing is essential for their success now and going forward. Yet, many of these industrial companies are struggling to implement digital marketing because of  lack of relevant content.

    At first glance, that may sound like an oversimplification of a bigger problem.

    I talk to small and mid-sized manufacturers on a regular basis. What I have learned is that these companies need help with content in digital marketing at many levels.

    This is not a new problem. You can read some of my earlier posts on inbound and content marketing for manufacturers and industrial companies.

    Manufacturers are dealing with some big issues when it comes to content for digital marketing. Here are the ones that I have discovered:

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  • Industrial Blog Sites Revisited

    The idea of combining a website with the benefits of a blog is very appealing to many industrial marketers. In my conversations over the past few months, I have noticed a growing acceptance of blog sites among manufacturers, industrial distributors and engineering services companies.

    Blog sites as inbound marketing hubs

    Industrial companies have realized the importance of inbound marketing and its impact on lead generation. They are beginning to look beyond a static informational website and are now seriously focusing on developing a more robust online presence for attracting qualified traffic, generating higher quality leads and positioning themselves as thought leaders in their respective niches.

    If you are still not convinced about the power of industrial blogs and inbound marketing, let me highlight some of the facts and findings that I have written about in the past.

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  • Making Industrial E-mail Marketing More Relevant

    E-mail marketing to a house list continues to be the top marketing channel for many industrial companies and manufacturers according to Trends in Industrial Marketing 2011 from GlobalSpec. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean that industrial marketers are very happy with the results.

    The biggest challenge in e-mail marketing faced by industrial marketers, besides not enough resources, is getting their subscribers to pay attention to their emails when everybody’s inboxes are already overflowing with messages. Keeping e-mails relevant has become the key factor in proving their worth in industrial marketing.

    In this post, I’ve listed the major areas to focus on if you want to make your industrial e-mail marketing more relevant and productive.

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  • Inbound Marketing Alone May Not Be Enough for Industrial Companies

    Inbound marketing with content has been getting all the attention lately. Consultants and practitioners of “pull” marketing want marketers to abandon “push” marketing because they say it is old school and no longer effective.

    I too have read all those studies about the how the Internet has permanently changed the industrial buyer’s behavior. They provide examples of how the target audience behaves in their personal lives where they TiVo through commercials, use caller ID to ignore telemarketing calls, direct mail pieces go straight to trash and of course, nobody ever reads a newspaper or a trade magazine anymore.

    Ergo, these people are too busy at work and couldn’t be bothered with anything that is deemed as interruption marketing.

    I agree that there is a lot of truth to all those findings. After all, every industrial marketer would like hordes of interested visitors swarming to his/her website, eager to sign up for free content and engage in a meaningful conversation at every stage of their buying cycle.

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