Manufacturing · OEMs · Engineering businesses
Digital marketing for manufacturers that need qualified demand.
Not a manufacturing marketing agency in the brochure and trade show sense. Commercial digital marketing for businesses that make things: search built around what you make and what it is for, Google Ads that produce RFQs rather than form fills, and measurement that follows an enquiry to an opportunity.
For UK manufacturers and OEMs selling direct, through distributors, or both. Machinery, equipment, engineered components, technical and specialist products.
- Capability and application search
- RFQs tracked to pipeline
- Direct and distributor journeys
Why manufacturing demand is different
The engineer has decided before sales hears the name.
A design engineer specifying a component has usually shortlisted suppliers before anyone at those suppliers knows a project exists. They searched by standard, rating, dimension, material and application. They read the datasheets. They compared lead times. Then procurement sent an RFQ to the two or three companies whose websites answered the questions. The companies that did not appear in that search never had a sales conversation to lose.
That is the shape of manufacturing demand: technical, early, invisible to a sales team until late, and decided by whether the product and its capabilities can be found and understood online. It is also slow. An enquiry this month may become an order next year, which is why form counts and last month’s cost per lead say almost nothing about whether marketing is working.
Digital marketing for manufacturers, done properly, is built around that shape. Pages for what you make and what it is used for. Search and paid search that capture the engineer’s questions. An RFQ or quote path procurement can actually use. Tracking that records the enquiry, follows it into the CRM, and reports on opportunities rather than activity.
What the work covers
Five jobs, from specification to sale.
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Lead generation
B2B lead generation for manufacturers
Inbound demand from engineers and buyers with a live requirement. Not lists, cold email or appointment setting. The model is search, paid media, conversion and measurement.
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Search
SEO for manufacturers
Product, application and capability pages structured so Google understands what you make and engineers find it by specification, standard, application and problem.
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Paid
Google Ads for manufacturers
High intent search captured with tight search term control and landing pages built for comparison. Lead outcomes from the CRM fed back so bidding learns from quotes and orders, not form fills.
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Routes to market
Direct and distributor journeys
Which enquiries the manufacturer's site should handle and which it should hand to a distributor, with the handoff recorded so the demand you create is visible even when someone else invoices it.
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Measurement
From RFQ to opportunity
Quote requests, technical enquiries, calls and downloads tracked to source and followed into the CRM. Reported on opportunities and value, over the timescale a manufacturing sale actually takes.
Two kinds of manufacturing marketing
Brand and trade show marketing versus demand for the sales team.
How it runs
Learn it, track it, find the demand, earn the RFQ.
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Learn what you make.
Products, capabilities, applications, who specifies, who buys, how it is sold. Without this nothing else is credible.
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Fix the measurement.
RFQs, technical enquiries, calls, downloads and distributor handoffs tracked to source before any campaign is judged.
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Map technical demand.
Specification, standard, application and problem searches, plus capability terms, prioritised by the value of the opportunity they lead to.
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Build capability and application pages.
Pages an engineer can specify from and procurement can compare with. Datasheets on the page, not behind a form.
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Run search and feed back outcomes.
SEO and Google Ads managed to the demand, with CRM outcomes returned so budget follows pipeline. Reported on opportunities, over the real timescale.
Selling standard products online
Where a manufacturer also has a shop.
Many manufacturers sell two ways at once: engineered or capital products through enquiry and quote, and standard products, spares and consumables that could be ordered online. The two need different journeys and different measurement, and putting them on one generic contact form loses both.
Where standard products can be sold online, the eCommerce discipline applies: Shopping, product feeds, category structure and revenue tracking. Where they cannot, the enquiry discipline applies. The site should make it obvious which is which, and the reporting should keep the two apart. See eCommerce growth for the online half.
Questions from manufacturers.
Do you have manufacturing case studies?
Not many yet, and that is stated rather than hidden. Published case studies so far are website builds; eCommerce and lead generation case studies will follow as engagements mature. Arlieo has direct experience of technical product marketing inside machinery, agriculture and heavy industry, and a method built for products that are specified before they are bought. The audit is a low risk way to test whether the method fits.
We sell through distributors. Is our website even relevant?
It is where the engineer’s search lands, whether or not you invoice the order. A manufacturer’s site that owns the specification and application searches, then hands a recorded enquiry to the right distributor, creates demand it can see. One that does not creates nothing measurable and assumes there is no demand.
Our sales cycle is a year. How can this be measured?
By tracking the enquiry to its source, following it into the CRM, and reporting on what it became over the time it actually takes. Leading indicators are watched monthly. The judgement is made on opportunities and orders, not on last month’s form count.
Is this SEO or PPC?
Both, in the order the demand requires. Paid search captures high intent quickly while the capability and application pages build organic demand over months. The audit sets the order for your market.
What does a manufacturing marketing agency cost?
Arlieo does not sell a manufacturing package. Engagements start with the £975 audit, which tells you what to fix first and what it would take. Some of that work you can do yourself. Some Arlieo can do. There is no retainer required to find out.
Marketing built around what you make.
Start with a conversation about your products, who specifies them and how they are bought. Then, if it fits, the audit.