Manufacturing Marketing AgencyA new B2B marketing research study has revealed that manufacturing and engineering companies are not utilising marketing to the same levels as IT companies and are showing fewer results for it.
The independent Q1 2023 research study among 150 manufacturing and engineering businesses was conducted by Motion Marketing, an international B2B marketing agency specialising in manufacturing, engineering and IT, and Sapio Research.
Of the 300 companies interviewed over 50% state they are obtaining quality B2B leads on a weekly or daily basis. But it is quite different when you compare sectors. 72% of IT companies are receiving daily or weekly leads, but within manufacturing and engineering, this is down to 44%. Specifically on companies receiving daily leads IT is more than double what manufacturing and engineering companies are achieving.
Looking at website performance, one key success factor for IT is that they are investing more in SEO (Search Engine Optimisation), in both keyword SEO and Technical SEO. Only 27% of manufacturing and engineering organisations are actively including technical SEO activity in their marketing plans for the next 12 months. There are several core activities to achieve a successful website, and SEO is absolutely one of them.
It is however manufacturing and engineering that have put their top priority as website improvement for the next 12 months, whereas IT has social media as their top priority. This could be that IT organisations already have advanced their website, hence the better lead results. Social media took a big step up during the pandemic, but it seems results are ongoing as the budget continues to be directed that way, more so in IT. We can qualify that our clients are still seeing strong results from business social media such as LinkedIn when targeting and focusing effectively.
Both sectors conclude that your online digital brand is more important now than it was 3 years ago pre-pandemic. 78% of respondents believe that visual brand identity has a reasonable or high influence on the cost value of what they sell. More manufacturing/engineering companies (34%) are currently planning brand enhancements than IT (27%). In general, we see visual identities lagging in the manufacturing/engineering sector so this recognition of brand importance is positive.
Although 88% of respondents have outsourced some marketing activities in the past 3 years, it is IT that has outsourced more. The IT sector was 3 times more likely than manufacturing/engineering to rely on outsourcing for most of their marketing, plus manufacturing/engineering was twice as likely not to have outsourced anything in the last 3 years. If we look at the results, 74% of businesses who outsourced most of their marketing are enjoying quality web leads weekly or daily, but only 47% of those who haven’t outsourced any marketing are achieving that frequency of leads. Plus those getting daily leads are nearly 3 times more likely to have outsourced most of their marketing compared to just specific elements. IT has used outsourcing a lot more for specific projects or product solutions pushes.
Overall IT are much happier with the results and understanding of their agencies than the manufacturing and engineering sector. But it is also clear that IT organisations have found more industry-specific marketing agencies, obtaining an agency with a clear industry understanding shows higher results in the research.
Rob Cullum, Lead Marketing Consultant at Motion Marketing commented:
“We work with a mixture of IT and manufacturing/engineering sector clients daily, our niche is the technical world. The research does generally show that the manufacturing and engineering sector is behind IT on marketing utilisation. But what is key is that there is more recognition of marketing value, like the importance of a strong online digital brand.
Even with a recession looming we are seeing solid sustainable investment in marketing from manufacturing and engineering companies. No doubt the pandemic has accelerated this, exhibition budgets were redirected and companies began to see real digital marketing results. What is also clear is that the IT sector has aligned with IT-experienced marketing agencies to maximise success, and the manufacturing and engineering sector should do the same.”
To read Motion Marketing’s findings in more detail, download the full report pdf www.motion-marketing.com/b2b-marketing-survey-2023
Research Overview
A recent independent research study was completed by Sapio Research for Motion Marketing. 150 respondents working in the IT sector and 150 in Manufacturing and Engineering businesses in the UK. This press release is focused on the IT sector results.
Surveys completed by: Owners, CxOs, Sales Directors, Marketing Directors, and other heads of department. Companies ranged in size from SMEs to businesses with up to 750 employees and £500m+ in annual turnover.
About Motion Marketing
Motion Marketing is a niche marketing agency that has 50% clients with IT and 50% clients within manufacturing and engineering. Many of our team come with technical education and background, we live and breathe tech, from strategy to creative to content creation. Our clients are involved with cyber security, digital transformation, AI, IoT, IIoT, Industry 4.0, data science, connectivity and more. We deliver a full marketing service, from brand to website to focused campaigns. Inbound, outbound and account-based marketing. The marketing mix is different for every client, but a mix is always needed for success.
For more information, visit https://www.motion-marketing.com/
Contacts
For further information, please contact Motion Marketing.
Rob Cullum, Lead Marketing Consultant
rob.cullum@motion-marketing.com +44 (0)1285 323 626