Content Marketing for Technical and Manufacturing Companies

By Rick Novy

In an increasingly complicated and competitive world, technology and manufacturing businesses need any edge they can get. Why, then, do so many of these companies leave their internet presence at a minimum?

Marketing to engineers tasked with making a recommendation to the person with the checkbook can be especially difficult. This book is written from the perspective of the challenging task of marketing to those engineers, the very people who can kill a sale before the decision-maker even learns your name.

In this book, Rick Novy, a writer with two decades of engineering experience, teams up with Steven Groves, a top-notch internet marketing expert. Learn why your business should be online, what content marketing is, ways to reach those engineers, and how it can help bring in new leads.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Rick Novy
• Release date: Oct 16, 2016
• ISBN: 9781370212859

Rick Novy

Rick Novy makes his home in a suburb of that great metropolitan desert region of Arizona known as Phoenix. He grew up in the frozen tundra of Wisconsin and graduated from the University of Wisconsin at Whitewater with a bachelor of science degree in physics and mathematics (double major).He moved to California and lived in the Bay Area for a decade, during which he earned a masters of science in engineering at San Jose State University. In 1999 he moved to Arizona (it’s a wry heat).Rick spent 14 years as an engineer in the semiconductor industry. He is currently adjunct faculty in the mathematics department at a local community college.Rick has more interests than he has time to devote. He is a fish keeper suffering from MTS (multiple tank syndrome). One tank features difficult to find purebred Endler’s Livebearers, a species he keeps because it is nearly extinct in the wild from habitat destruction and is being crossbred with guppies by shortsighted breeders and pet shops to the extent that uncrossed Endlers are nearly impossible to find.

Book preview

Content Marketing for Manufacturing and Technology Companies

RICK NOVY

TECHNICAL EDITOR: STEVEN GROVES

Copyright 2016 Rick Novy

All rights reserved.

Published by Rick Novy at Smashwords

This book also available in print at most major online retailers.

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite ebook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

DEDICATION

This book is dedicated to all the hard-working engineers and entrepreneurs trying to be successful in a world of ever-increasing complexity and competition. May it spark ideas and serve you well.

CONTENTS

Acknowledgements

Foreword

1. Introduction

2. Content Marketing and Why Might I Need It?

3. Strategy

4. The Blog

5. LinkedIn

6. Facebook

7. Twitter

8. Google+

9. YouTube

10. Other Social Media Sites

11. Tech Info - What Engineers Want to See

12. The Dangers of Stagnation - Why we Must Engage

A1 White Paper on Problem-Solution White Papers

A2 White Paper on Content Marketing for Tech Companies

About the Author

Thanks

Fiction Titles by this Author

Connect with Me

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The author would like to thank Steven Groves for his invaluable input on this project. His years of experience in content marketing helped make this the book it became.

And what a beautiful day it is!

Cover background image: Circuit Board Photo

Copyright Paydasmersin | Dreamstime.com

Cover inset image Metal Machining Industry. Worker Operating Cnc Milling Machine Photo Copyright Kadmy | Dreamstime.com

All social media logos copyright their respective owners.

All infographics copyright Rick Novy

All other images public domain no attribution. Sourced from Pixabay.com

Return to Table of Contents

FOREWORD

The world of online communities and social media have equalized the playing field for manufacturing & technology companies in a way never before possible. A small company, with a budget, can look as formidable & strong as a company two or three times their size who doesn’t invest in their online presence. If you see connecting with your customers and prospects as important to you, there is little to keep you from doing so anymore. If you’re less social type of individual and you shun outside connections, then the company may be paying the price and could lose business to those who are more open to a two-way conversation via online & electronic forums.

It is the advent of the world wide web and the use of social media which has changed the dynamics of the world of business. Communications are now nearly instantaneous around the world and translation is available real-time – barriers to conversation & language are falling away. Likewise, oppressive regimes and bad-actors on the international stage can no longer hide behind local control of the print & television news – the end of eons of tyrants and despots is upon us.

This is important for manufacturers large and small – all of us are entering a time when we must adopt & be open to a more transparent communication model than ever before. Customer reviews matter. You cannot expect to do a poor job, one after another, and hide because customers do not talk to each other. They can & do review your work between themselves, away from a company’s influence. I’ve not seen data relating to how business-to-business companies (B2B) are using review sites, but for a consumer product, over 80% of purchasers say that other customer’s reviews matter. It means that if we did a bad job on a batch of parts & it’s our fault, we need to remake the batch. It also means that a deadbeat client who doesn’t pay their bills is found out and soon enough, no one in the industry will accept their project.

Where sourcing of new customers was once the mystical task of the sales or business development guy, social media and online tools have brought the process closer to a much broader audience. This is where content marketing for manufacturers comes in. After having surveyed the online presence for dozens of manufacturers and technology companies across the US, we know what works in an online presence and what doesn’t.

What works is simply an honest and persistent presence in those places your customers frequent online. It might be LinkedIn, it might be some other special-built online community that focuses on a section of the manufacturing industry, or it might even be Facebook. When we read the tea leaves, we know that Facebook has an audience of people in the manufacturing industry – when it covers over 1.7 billion people on a planet of 6.6B people, we know our customers are there.

In most every situation, the use of online and social technology will disrupt the status quo in favor of the more transparent option. Marketing via the use of content is upon us and, like the innovations that proceeded it, the more relevant and transparent we are the better we will fare. The future of content marketing for manufacturing & technology is here – welcome!

Steven Groves

Charlotte, NC

Return to Table of Contents

1. INTRODUCTION

With the world changing at an ever-increasing pace, businesses must adapt in their ability to find new customers and help existing customers. Companies failing to do this risk a drop in business. This book will examine many of the realities and dynamics of the new market and how to find customers using digital tools & tactics.

We experienced something similar in the 1990s,

Reviews for Content Marketing for Technical and Manufacturing Companies

[Andrea Deimichei · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

second hand material nothing here is really original, more a collection of what's around