3 Manufacturing LinkedIn Posts That Drive Engagement

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LinkedIn has more than 575 million users and provides manufacturing salespeople an incredible opportunity to share their voice, harness the power of content, and improve both their personal brand and company reputation. Often we are asked, “What should I post on LinkedIn?” Below, learn 3 styles of manufacturing-focused posts that you should utilize on your LinkedIn profile with some stellar real-life examples from manufacturers we admire!

Strong Manufacturing Post #1– The Interactive Experience

Tiffany Bryson, Direct Regional Sales Manager at Grob Systems, Inc. does an excellent job of providing value to her followers on LinkedIn.

The post above is an excellent example of an engaging post because:

  1. It’s interactive, offering a virtual plant tour.
  2. It’s educational.
  3. Comments and engagement are encouraged!

Providing your audience with a virtual tour is an excellent way to give them a peek behind the curtain of your processes, products, and innovative plant. Don’t have the budget for a virtual tour? No worries. Consider utilizing shorter videos of a unique process or area of your business and then, as Tiffany did, ask people to comment on what they learned!

Strong Manufacturing Post #2– Take a Stand

Nora Toure, founder of Women in 3D Printing, is a LinkedIn powerhouse (that you definitely should follow!)

This post is an excellent example of taking audience interaction to the next level because:

  1. It takes a stand about an important issue.
  2. It makes you think about ways to take action and find a solution.
  3. It encourages engagement with 3 thought-provoking questions.

Nora’s post is a great example of taking a strong stance on an industry issue in a respectful way. She stated the facts about the lack of women in her industry and implored her audience to help find a solution. Also, we love that instead of simply asking for suggestions on how to address the problem, she took it a step further by asking 3 thought-provoking questions. Clearly, as you can see from the screenshot, she had a considerable engagement on this post, and this screenshot was taken only 1 week after this post went live. We continued to see it on our feeds for over a month and the engagement continued to rise.

Don’t be afraid to share your thoughts on LinkedIn (as long as your post isn’t overtly political or religious, you’re fine!) Reshoring, the manufacturing talent gap, and the manufacturing supply chain amid COVID-19 are 3 different examples of current hot topics that you could take a stand on in a LinkedIn post. Also, consider using Nora’s 3 question approach on your future posts to encourage audience comments!

Strong Manufacturing Post #3– Problem & Solution

Matt Covele, Senior Sales Representative at ChemStation, does an excellent job of listening to the feedback and questions of his customers and then utilizing it as LinkedIn content.

Matt’s post is an excellent customer-focused example because:

  1. It addresses and answers a commonly asked customer question.
  2. It showcases Matt and his team’s expertise in a helpful and non-salesy way.
  3. It links to a LinkedIn Pulse article Matt wrote which is an excellent tactic to get his blog read by other LinkedIn users that could utilize his services.

Matt does an incredible job of educating his audience and building a relationship through trust. Instead of posting salesy content about why his company is the best, he chose to write from the perspective of his customers and address a common customer issue and how to fix it. We also love that he utilized LinkedIn Pulse to share this information.

If you have expertise in a certain area, we suggest writing a Pulse post, which is essentially LinkedIn’s version of articles, that can be self-published by members. 500-750 words are the perfect word count. Any more than that and your connections won’t read on.

By using appropriate keywords and hashtags, you can attract a much larger audience to your Pulse article, your personal LinkedIn page, and the company page. Recently the president of Felber PR & Marketing, Rob Felber wrote a Pulse post and the majority of his readers were 2nd connections! So it just goes to show that Pulse is a great way to expand your audience and build credibility and respect in your industry.

Struggling with what to write your first Pulse article about? We suggest you review social media and website form first. Look for themes of commonly asked questions and if you don’t already have content that addresses it, write it!

Interested in learning more about LinkedIn strategy. We recently launched our Leveraging LinkedIn 2.0 eBook, which will teach you everything from optimizing your LinkedIn profile to growing your network, and sales strategies. The eBook also includes helpful templates to help you along the way!

Related blogs:

5 Unique Ways to Prospect on LinkedIn

How to Create a Successful LinkedIn Content Marketing Strategy

How to Export Contacts from LinkedIn for Ultimate Sales Opportunities

 

 

 

5 Stellar Manufacturing Sales Qualifying Questions You Need to Use ASAP

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Let’s face it, not every prospect is the right fit for your products or services. Utilizing qualifying questions in the sales process is key to helping you uncover if the prospect you are courting will result in new business. Are the questions you are using leading to a higher close rate?

Keep reading to learn 5 manufacturing sales qualifying questions we suggest using in your sales process. 

1. What is the manufacturing challenge you are trying to fix? 

Your manufacturing prospects are risk-averse, and they know that implementing a new product, or service can be a huge undertaking. If your prospect didn’t have a real problem or strong reason to make a switch, they wouldn’t. Do not assume you understand what they feel is their biggest pain. You need to ask questions and probe to uncover the real answer.

2. Have you tried another process/service to solve this issue in the past? If so, why do you think it didn’t work? 

Oftentimes, your prospect has tried other solutions before coming to you. Maybe they tried to solve the issue in-house, which caused them a considerable headache. Perhaps they tried another solution with a competitor, only to have that solution fail.

It’s important for you to have a crystal-clear understanding of what your prospect has tried in the past and why (they think) it didn’t work for the application or their company. That way, you know if the solution your company can offer will be a better fit for your prospect. Another key reason to understand why something failed is so the solution you (and by extension your company) is not tainted by their previous vendor experience; past failures, internally or externally, should not be associated with your offering.

3. If you make no changes, what will happen?

If your prospect answers, ‘it won’t make that much of a difference’, they do not have a strong conviction that your product or service is the solution. At this point, manufacturing salespeople can make the determination if this prospect should be disqualified as a lead or if there is an opportunity to explain the risk ahead. If you cannot uncover enough pain, you very well might not have a prospect.

4. How are decisions typically made on your team, and is there anyone else who will be involved?  

Asking your prospect to describe a similar purchasing decision will provide insight into their process, risk tolerance, and help uncover potential roadblocks. As a salesperson, there is nothing worse than when you think you are consulting with the final decision maker, only to find out there are more people that need to be brought into the decision. It is also important to understand who has budget authority on their team and the hierarchy of those participating. 

5. Are you currently considering other services as your solution? 

Many times, your prospect is considering multiple solutions. Maybe your prospect is considering you vs. your biggest competitor.  Or, are they discussing completely different processes targeting the same result. For example, maybe your prospect is considering your company (a die caster) vs. a 3D printing firm to produce their parts. You never know where the prospect is in their buying process unless you ask. For all you know, your prospect may have an offer on the table from your competitor but are feeling price pressure from upper management and need to present other options. Carefully listen to their response so that you can better understand where they are coming from and how to best guide in their decision-making process.

We hope you found our list of qualifying questions valuable. Whatever questions you choose to use in your sales process, make sure you customize them to fit your company and speak to your prospects in a way that will resonate with them. Taking the extra time to craft a strong list of qualifying questions your entire sales team can use ensures that you are all using the same messaging and have a clear understanding of how to evaluate if a prospect is actually a good lead. 

Related Blogs:

How to Adapt Your B2B Manufacturing Sales Strategy for the COVID-19 World 

Incorporating Video Into Your B2B Manufacturing Sales Strategy

How to Write Automated Sales Emails That Don’t Feel Generic

5 Marketing Tips B2B Manufacturers Should Implement Right Now

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We hear it all the time. Manufacturers get a majority of their sales through word-of-mouth and loyal repeat customers. However, it is important now, more than ever, that manufacturers embrace the value of digital marketing. 

At Felber PR & Marketing, our clients leverage content and thought leadership principles to attract prospects, drive lead generation and sales, and retain customers. 

Learn 5 valuable strategies your B2B manufacturing company can utilize to get started developing a strong digital marketing strategy:

Develop a thought leadership strategy

In order for your company to see success with its marketing strategy, it is important to be positioned as a leader in your industry. To establish your manufacturing company as a thought leader, we recommend developing a strong content strategy. Tactics such as company blogging, expert interviews, white papers, hosting or sponsoring webinars on industry ‘hot topics’, or exhibiting at notable trade shows help position your company as a trusted leader and expert in your industry. 

Leverage PPC (pay-per-click) ads, social media advertising, and SEO

A strong content strategy, when combined with PPC ads, social media advertising, and SEO, is essential for digital marketing success. By utilizing these tactics, you can ensure that your prospects, customers, and potential employees can find your company online. 

We have many B2B manufacturing clients who are currently utilizing digital advertising to generate strong, qualified leads. (We’re also practicing what we preach for our own lead generation – and it’s working beautifully!) Social media advertising (primary LinkedIn ads) has been especially valuable for our clients as this is the leading B2B social media platform for the industrial sector. 

When meeting with new manufacturing clients, more often than not, they tell us that they are or have utilized digital ads and saw an uptick in traffic. However, when we go further and ask how many of those website visitors converted as a lead by filling out a form, more often than not, the ads aren’t generating conversions.

Consider all this great traffic coming to your front door (website), but it’s 5:55 pm, lights are out and the door is bolt locked. Leads cannot get in! Consider our free Inbound marketing assessment to discuss your situation now, for free.

Develop a consistent schedule of content 

A strong content strategy with relevant, engaging content is the foundation of digital marketing and lead generation. A consistent content strategy helps manufacturers stay at the top of search engine results and also, solidifies your brand’s position as an industry thought leader. 

To create a sound content marketing plan, it is essential that you take the time to identify your ideal customers and uncover their unique goals and challenges. That way, you can write content that addresses your ideal prospects and helps you speak their language. This process is called creating buyer personas. Buyer personas help manufacturers identify their best prospects. The profile of your best prospect and how they buy is the buyer’s journey. Read Why Your Content Strategy is Failing (Content Mapping 101)

Once you’ve identified the buyer personas you would like to attract to your brand and eventually, close as a customer, develop a running list of content ideas that would appeal to that ideal buyer. Then, develop a content map to ensure you follow through with your new content ideas and develop a consistent stream of content! 

Don’t underestimate the power of video

Video is a powerful tool to show your audience your products, the innovative machines, and processes utilized at your plant. Additionally, we highly recommend incorporating video case studies to showcase the value of working with your company.

 Manufacturing case studies are an amazing way to show your prospects and customers your skills and capabilities. Case studies add third party credibility and could be the difference between your prospects choosing you over working with a competitor! Don’t think your customers would be willing to participate in case studies? Check out our blog “How to Convince Your Stubborn Manufacturing Customers to Participate in Case Studies” for helpful tips!

Focus on engaging current customers

While digital marketing is a great tactic to attract new prospects and customers, it’s also an incredible tool for customer retention. Develop email campaigns to target existing customers offering high-level technical content, helpful resources, and product discounts. Also, we recommend having existing customers participate in a yearly survey. Take the time to develop a survey where your customers can explain why they work with you, what you can improve upon, and what content they enjoy receiving. Then, you can tailor your content strategy, sales efforts, and messaging to not only keep current customers happy but also, attract similar prospects!

Check out these helpful related blogs to learn how to revamp your B2B manufacturing marketing strategy:

My Dog Doesn’t Know There’s a Pandemic

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A recent distraction that did some good. Prayers from Maria – Sunflower Fields of Hope https://prayersfrommaria.org/#1

Arriving home recently from another long day, I was greeted by my dog Rolo, stubby tail wagging as always. Rolo is a Pitbull mutt rescue with the most peaceful disposition (unless you’re a squirrel, rabbit, or chipmunk).  She doesn’t know there is a pandemic nor do I think she would care. She still gets two walks a day, a full bowl every morning and evening, and unlimited access to the couch and TV (yes, she watches TV).

It reminded me that we need to pause and enjoy these moments. We’re bombarded 24/7 with bad news. We never know what the next day will bring, and we know we have friends, neighbors, and colleagues going through tough times.

So, today’s Tactic Thursday departs from business, education, or tactics. Just a reminder to find those moments. Find the time for yourself. For me, working out, using the “breathing” app on my iWatch, and just falling into the couch at the end of the day with one of those Marvel movies I never took the time to watch helps. No, the pandemic and our business challenges are not going away. But, they can for a few minutes.

Let’s make this a place where we share our distractions. What are you doing to stay balanced?

Post or comment, perhaps with a photo of how you are distracting yourself from the daily stress.