A few decades ago, manufacturing companies produced and sold products without necessarily having to do proactive and overly aggressive marketing to find a buying audience. Today, there are many companies, and the competition in the manufacturing sector is intense. Several manufacturers might build products of similar quality, but only the ones who market their products well enough can develop and expand rapidly. Manufacturing marketing firms drive this growth and development for manufacturing companies.

Role of manufacturing marketing agencies today
Manufacturing marketing involves a lot of things, from defining target audiences and creating brand awareness to generating leads. To truly add value to companies that seek their services, manufacturing marketing firms need to offer a range of services.

1. Content creation and management
Most companies are active content creators today, given that digitization is at an all-time high. They regularly put out content meant to show their technical expertise and thought leadership in the manufacturing sector. The quality of the content businesses create and publish often reflects the quality of their products. This is why efficient content creation and management can optimize a manufacturing company’s perception in the minds of its clients.

A manufacturing marketing company has to consistently develop engaging and informative content, including case studies, blogs, whitepapers, product literature, and multimedia assets. These firms are also expected to manage how their content is distributed across various channels.

2. Website design and development
In most cases, a website is the first point of contact between the company and potential customers. The biggest manufacturing companies have websites with the most immersive user interfaces, ease of use, zero lag, and a seamless user experience. They are meant to showcase a manufacturer’s products in a way that highlights their benefits to consumers. A top-quality website often conveys positive brand messages and value to customers. The manufacturing marketing team is responsible for creating, updating, quality controlling, and maintaining a manufacturing company’s website.

3. SEO management
While content creation and website development are critical to selling and making a product or service enticing, they are not enough to connect a manufacturing firm with its target customers. Discoverability is a prerequisite for the content to reach the widest possible audience. Most customers use search engines to look up content. For a manufacturing firm, the content it creates must rank highly in browser search results. A manufacturing marketing agency helps manufacturers achieve this objective: the search engine Optimization (SEO) of their content and website.

Manufacturing marketing firms build SEO strategies to increase organic traffic for a manufacturer’s website and boost the company’s online visibility through keyword optimization, consistent improvements to the website structure, and the creation of high-quality meta descriptions for the content created.

4. Social media marketing
Social media platforms are the perfect space for manufacturing companies to connect personally with their audiences. If social media marketing is managed effectively, it can help create a brand identity and ensure customers don’t view it as a faceless brand. Marketing firms achieve this objective through storytelling, interacting with social media audiences, and sharing strategic content. They have to create and publish posts for manufacturers and respond to comments under those posts.

Social media management is one of the key roles or responsibilities of any manufacturing marketing agency. By fulfilling this responsibility to the fullest, a marketing firm amplifies the reach of its clients’ products, enables direct engagement, and builds brand awareness about manufacturers in the minds of social media users.

Benefits of hiring a manufacturing marketing agency
Manufacturing marketing is a costly affair. Manufacturers spend huge amounts of money to hire marketing firms and continue using their services. The percentage of money spent on manufacturing marketing depends on several factors, such as the company’s growth stage, marketing objectives, and current market conditions. On average, manufacturing marketing takes up between 5% and 10% of a manufacturer’s annual sales revenue. Sometimes, it can be more. In return, marketing firms offer a range of benefits that are indispensable to their clients.

1. More lead conversions
B2B marketers measure marketing success through certain key performance indicators (KPIs). One such indicator is the number of leads generated and converted (on a per-day or per-week basis) for the manufacturer. For example, if a marketer can get their manufacturer a new customer based on their marketing efforts alone, that is considered to be a lead generated and converted.

2. Increased customer loyalty
A successful strategy and continual marketing efforts build a culture of trust between customers and a brand. Eventually, as customers become accustomed to a brand’s name and credibility, they purchase most goods and services from that company. Brand awareness is a key driver of customer loyalty in the manufacturing sector.

3. Better brand positioning
Companies need to build a positive image of themselves. This is achieved over a period of time by constantly creating and publishing content that shows a manufacturer as an expert in their own industry. The content manufacturers publish helps to provide complex information to content consumers in the simplest language or visuals possible. This enables companies to not only come across as thought leaders and experts on topics related to their core operations but also make their content accessible and informational to their target audience.