Originally published June 21, 2022 , updated on January 19, 2023

Content marketing can increase your manufacturing company’s visibility and revenue. However, digital marketing requires a steep learning curve and a steady stream of articles and posts. Some companies hire manufacturing writers to assist with these assets. This outsourcing helps business owners focus on other parts of their company while capitalising on a tremendous marketing channel.

Goodman Lantern has helped hundreds of companies with their content marketing. Along the way, we’ve learnt what best works for our clients and how to turn content into customers. So we’ll share some of our secrets in this ultimate guide to content marketing for manufacturing businesses.

Create Content for Your Customer

Blog posts, videos, podcast episodes, and other assets put you in front of your audience more often. Your audience will come to know, like, and trust your work. While high production is an excellent starting point for any strategy, it doesn’t guarantee new customers. Many brands pump out posts for the sake of it. These companies tick off content marketing tasks without understanding how articles inspire readers to take action. 

Understanding the customer journey helps you write more compelling articles for prospects. Each person is in a different phase of the journey, and each phase comes with different questions. Manufacturing writers can analyse your offers and create content specifically for your customers. 

Case studies and testimonials demonstrate your brand’s strength while enabling you to promote your services. Comparisons can highlight why your manufacturing company is better than the competition. Manufacturing content writing services know how to develop topic ideas that let your company shine. Posts will align with your business and offers instead of only serving to increase brand awareness. 

Discover Keywords for Your Content Topics

Prospects won’t stumble onto your website by chance. Qualified prospects find your website because they have questions that you can answer. Knowing how these prospects think can help you position articles to show up in front of them. Keyword research gives us a glimpse into what people think before they visit your website. 

A business owner searching the term “best quality control services” wants to find and pay the best provider. Business owners searching the term “how to improve quality control” may not want to pay for manufacturing services right away. However, if you impress them with the initial article and make them a part of your digital ecosystem, these prospects can turn into clients.

A manufacturing copywriter will determine search intent before producing content. The writer will discover keyword opportunities with high demand and low supply. These keywords can strengthen your SEO presence and help you rank for more competitive keywords. Keyword research fuels SEO growth and can lead to a passive traffic source. Optimised content strategically written by manufacturing writers can continue delivering traffic to your website years after you’ve published it. 

Establish a Social Media Presence

People use social media to interact with friends and brands. Many of these platforms have well over 100 million users and top-notch targeting capabilities. That is to say, you can search for decision-makers and create content that draws them to your company. 

Manufacturing companies have several choices for social media growth. You can use an outreach strategy and connect with executives on LinkedIn. You can present your solution and build rapport with these decision-makers. Also, you can participate in social media groups and use each platform to build your network.

Taking an active outreach approach can help you get more clients, but an inbound marketing dynamic attracts clients to your services. Manufacturing writers can produce social media posts that drive engagement and build trust. Prospects will find your optimised posts and send you messages. Content marketing for manufacturers can be as easy as creating content and getting prospects to reach out.

A content strategy also strengthens your outreach efforts. Prospects will browse through your social media posts to determine if you can provide quality services. A manufacturing content writing service can fill your social media profiles with case studies, testimonials, and industry insights. This content builds trust and helps you establish a social media presence. 

Being active on several social networks creates more touchpoints for your brand. Prospects may have to read several of your articles and jump on multiple calls before becoming clients. Each social media post reminds them about your brand’s reputation and their current stage in the customer journey. Prospects will get impressed upon seeing your brand on several platforms. Consequently, they’ll come to know, like, and trust your brand, the perfect recipe for turning social media followers into customers.

Lead Visitors to Your Email Newsletter

Social media and search engines put your business in front of more prospects. Businesses thrive on visibility and gaining traction, but the traction may not last forever. 

Social media and search engines operate under algorithms. These algorithms impact who sees your content and how well your brand performs against competitors. Social media and search engine companies can tweak their algorithms at any time. Some modifications can significantly limit your reach and turn off traffic streams overnight. 

Every business owner has to account for this risk when using other people’s platforms to gain market share. Growing an email list mitigates this risk. 

You can email your audience at any time, and an algorithm change won’t restrict your ability to communicate. Email list growth is a critical component of any content marketing strategy. You can create a newsletter to notify your audience about industry insights. These emails will build your brand’s credibility and also make prospects consider your services.

Adding People to Email Lists

Business owners can funnel visitors to their email lists through social media and search engines. These platforms drive the initial traffic while your newsletter keeps people engaged. Some businesses get strong traffic numbers, but revenue doesn’t rise in proportion to traffic growth. This mismatch indicates your online presence isn’t sticky enough to keep people engaged. If you never give your audience a choice to subscribe to a newsletter, you make it more difficult for them to stick with your company.

An email newsletter will engage prospects while reconnecting you with previous customers. It’s easier to convert a past customer than get a new customer. Some businesses neglect this truth and only focus on acquiring new leads. You can create email segments to provide different messaging based on someone’s stage in the customer journey. Email segmentation allows you to avoid treating past customers like new leads. You can also create email segments based on your offers and prospects’ interests. Manufacturing writers will write content strategically for readers at different stages of the buyers’ journey.

Use Various Content Formats

Social media and search engine platforms can attract new prospects, but they rely on content. Publishing articles, videos, podcast episodes, and other resources expand your potential market share. Some prospects only have enough time to listen to podcasts during their commutes. These people don’t fit reading blog posts and watching videos into their schedules. 

Using various formats will expand your reach, but it also puts more work on your shoulders. Manufacturing content writing services can lay the groundwork for your efforts. Their team of manufacturing writers can produce articles for your brand. These articles serve as outlines for videos and podcast episodes. You can have a representative create the videos and podcasts instead, but the articles form the backbone. Some businesses also create videos and turn the audio into podcast episodes. 

Repurposing existing copy makes it easier to use various content formats. Repurposing reduces the amount of time you spend producing digital resources while expanding your reach. 

Content marketing for manufacturing businesses needs to consider how decision-makers consume content. Presenting them with several content formats gives them more flexibility with how they receive your insights. 

Run Online Ads to Scale Growth

The best digital marketing strategy incorporates paid and organic marketing strategies. Blog posts, social media copy, videos, and podcast episodes attract people to your brand. They build trust and can gain momentum on social media and search engine algorithms. Therefore, organic marketing strategies are a long-term investment that can become passive traffic streams. Some businesses run online ads to speed up results and get a quick surge in clients.

Running ads on Facebook, Google, and other digital platforms introduces more people to your services. These ads provide superior targeting capabilities, but they also come with steep learning curves. You’ll have to learn about your options, how to navigate each dashboard, and what to look for in a profitable ad campaign. 

Many business owners delegate these responsibilities to save time and get better results. Ad managers optimise ads to decrease costs and increase conversions over time. These results don’t happen overnight, but the top managers can eventually find the winning formula after experimenting with several ads. Some businesses have ads that generate $2 for every dollar spent. Companies with these ads continue to run them and increase their ad spend, aiming to further capitalise on the opportunity.

Ads don’t guarantee sales. They simply bring more people to your sales page. You will have to enhance the sales page, audience, and messaging to turn more leads into customers. A manufacturing copywriter can assist with this goal and review each stage of your funnel. No business should exclusively rely on ads or producing content, but they work well together. Manufacturing companies leave market share on the table by choosing one over the other.

Constantly Look at the Data

Every dollar, click, engagement, and other action is trackable. Looking at your data gives you some of the best insights into your marketing strategy. Analysing data inspires you to work smarter instead of harder. 

You don’t have to put in more hours or produce more content to achieve better results. Sometimes, less is more, and the data can prove it. Brands can adjust their initiatives to focus on article topics and ad campaigns that produce the best results. Manufacturing companies can keep costs down while increasing visibility and revenue.

Failing to look at the data can result in poor decisions and put you on the brink of bankruptcy. LEGO is a tremendous case study of what can happen if you ignore the data. The beloved toy company nearly went bankrupt in 2004 because they overexpanded and prioritised creating new sets over data. Core fans felt alienated by the company’s new direction. It took a new data-driven leadership to cut costs and discontinue unprofitable business segments. 

Analysing Data

Implementing every part of the strategy without analysing data can lead to unproductive copy and ad spend. You may miss out on great opportunities and generate a loss from your efforts. Looking at the data is like looking at a GPS during your road trip. You shouldn’t look at the GPS every second, but you should check it every few minutes, especially with a fork in the road. 

Agencies know which data to prioritise. Social media analytics provide vanity metrics such as impressions that make you feel good but don’t indicate performance. Traffic, opt-in conversion rates, cost per result, and sales rates have more of an impact on your company. You should prioritise metrics like these when reviewing your data across multiple platforms. The best ad managers will run A/B split tests to provide more data points and optimise ad performance.

Get Help From Manufacturing Writers

Content marketing can help your manufacturing business reach decision-makers and get new clients. These digital strategies have many moving parts, and as a result, the work can get overwhelming for one person to manage. Goodman Lantern has streamlined marketing for its clients, ranging from small business owners to publicly traded corporations. 

Goodman Lantern’s team of manufacturing writers will provide your company with superb copy that increases your search engine visibility. We also help with your ads and improve your website for higher conversion rates. Contact us today to discover how we can help you achieve your objectives. We would love to help your company hit key business milestones. 

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