Picture this…you’re launching your latest product. It may have taken years of engineering, tireless testing and a whole lot of expertise to build. But when someone reads your website, it shouldn’t require an engineering degree to understand what it does or why they should care.
Therein lies the challenge with marketing industrial products. Naturally, what you sell can be complex. Your approach behind it shouldn’t have to be. If buyers have a hard time figuring out what matters, why it matters and whether your product is right for them because of technical jargon, then it’s time to go back to the marketing 101 drawing board.
Go too far in the other direction, though, and you risk stripping away the technical substance that makes it credible in the first place.
So, what’s the happy medium?
Effective technical marketing should do more than make something high-level sound simple. It should break down this information in a way that easy to digest and understand without losing what makes it technically accurate.
Simplify the Message…Not the Product
Simplifying content isn’t the same as making things “too simple.” There’s a big difference between the two.
When you simplify, you make it quicker and easier for buyers to find the information they need. When you oversimplify, you take away key information they might need to do that.
Changing the order of the conversation is a great place to start. Instead of leading with what the product is right of the bat, start with what it allows the customer to do. Once buyers know why they should care, you can move into how your product delivers it and provide the proof to back it up.
If you want to remember how to market to buyers in technical industries, think outcome> mechanism>proof approach. You don’t need to make something with complex features sound simplistic; you simply make it easier to understand. As Prolific Studio points out, buyers don’t always want to know how your solution works before they know what it can do.
Remember, the goal isn’t to “dumb down” the message. It’s to remove unnecessary friction or noise from it.
Know Who Needs to Understand It
Speaking of friction, the person reading your website may not be the only person involved in the purchase, which is generally true most of the time.
Industrial and manufacturing buying decisions often include multiple stakeholders, and each may be approaching the solution to the problem from a different angle. LATT SEO lists three groups commonly involved in manufacturing purchasing decisions: engineering, operations or plant stakeholders, and procurement/purchasing.
Simply put, different groups want different things. Engineers care about specs and function. Operations, on the other hand, generally cares more about reliability and day-to-day use. Purchasing wants to know about costs, availability and supplier confidence. Leadership may be looking at productivity, risk or return on investment.
With that, instead of creating nine different versions of your marketing for each person reading your page, make it easy for them to find what they need.
Lead with information that establishes why the product matters, then direct interested parties to where they can dig deeper. A purchasing manager shouldn’t have to decipher an engineering diagram, for example, to understand the business value. An engineer shouldn’t have to sift through tons of marketing speak just to see if your product will work.
Good industrial product marketing should be the best of both worlds that gives them somewhere to go.
Translate Features Into Benefits Buyers Will Understand
Nobody is saying that features aren’t important. Honestly, if you’re selling to technical buyers overlooking specs could be counterproductive, but simply listing product features or specifications doesn’t automatically translate into a compelling value proposition.
Let’s say you’re marketing a component made from a new high-performance material. That may sound great, but to a buyer, that’s just…information.
What does that material allow the part to do that others can’t? Can it withstand higher temperatures? Last longer? Require less maintenance? Do better under extreme conditions?
Whatever the case may be, that’s what your buyers care about. And that’s where the translation layer comes in.
Successfulbob breaks down the job of summarizing the role marketing plays in technical industries. Instead of talking about what your product does, focus on what problems it solves. Translate features into benefits, then give buyers context into familiar applications they can relate to.
Show Buyers What It Looks Like in Action
Your amazing prose can tell customers what your solution does, but if you really want your buyers to truly grasp your product, show it to them. Remember, “a picture is worth a thousand words.”
Product pages are great, but what about an application page that shows what else it’s used for? How about an industry page that speaks to specific challenges customers in that sector face?
Visual aids can also go a long way, especially when trying to describe how something works. Diagrams, photography, animation and video, for example, can explain relationships or processes much faster than a few hundred words of text. As Prolific Studio points out, some technical concepts are simply easier to show than explain.
That matters even more when you’re marketing engineered products. Let a few well place diagrams do the heavy lifting for you.
The question shouldn’t always be, “How do we explain this better?”
Sometimes it should be, “Would this be easier to show?”
Give Buyers Access to the Technical Info They Want
Fun fact, making information easier to understand doesn’t mean removing technical depth.
It’s actually quite the opposite.
Many times, when buyers understand the value your product provides, they want to know more. Give them the ability to do that with spec sheets, certifications, technical white papers, comparison information and more.
FAQs also add another bonus layer especially when they’re built around questions customers are already asking. Talk to sales. Talk to service teams. Look at the questions that repeatedly come up during RFQs, demos and customer conversations.
Those are probably the topics your buyers want more information on.
Technical specifications can also be helpful in establishing credibility. Proof, specificity, application information and technical resources give buyers something more useful than another round of “innovative,” “best-in-class” or “cutting-edge” claims.
Back Up Your Claims With Proof
Or better yet, show what happened when somebody used your solution.
Case studies are particularly valuable, in fact one of the best ways, in industrial marketing to show your B2B buyers that your technology works. Vive Marketing suggests using case studies built around the problem, the approach you took to solve it and how your technology helped provide the solution.
Case studies can speak to each group differently. Engineers can learn how something works. Purchasing teams can get proof that it has worked before. Leadership can understand how your product helped create value for another customers.
Plus, one solid case study can serve many functions. It can support countless sales materials, email, social content, trade shows and other marketing efforts as well.
Just remember, proof tends to make the difference.
Involve Your Experts in the Marketing Process
Who are the experts? Your engineers, technicians and subject matter experts know your products better than anyone and should have a say and even a seat at the marketing round table.
Just as your marketing team has a responsibility to make your offering easy for buyers to understand, your technical experts have products that buyers need to know about. Couple those groups together with insight from sales and you’ve got quite the winning recipe.
Final Thoughts
Industrial product marketing is about helping the right people quickly understand what the solution does, why it matters and where they can find the information, they need to evaluate it.
Because when you make something complex more easier and tangible to understand, you also make it to consider, and ultimately, to buy.
At Cain & Co., we help manufacturers and industrial brands turn technical expertise into clear, useful marketing that connects with the people who need it.
Ready to strengthen your search strategy? Let’s talk.
Industrial Product Marketing FAQs
How do you market a complex industrial product?
Start with the problem the product solves or the outcome it creates, then explain how it works and provide technical proof. Build enough depth into your content for buyers who want specifications, certifications and supporting resources.
Should technical marketing avoid jargon?
Not necessarily. Industry terminology can be useful when your audience understands and searches for it. The key is avoiding jargon that makes the message harder to follow without adding meaning.
What content works well for industrial products?
A strong mix can include product, industry and application pages, technical resources, FAQs, case studies, diagrams, photography and video. The right format depends on what the buyer needs to understand.
