What are the best marketing tools for engineers

Believe it or not, there’s no simple answer to “what digital marketing tools are best for engineers” (sorry).

It’s impossible for me to tell you what you should be using for digital marketing for your business, because the amount of options and strategies that you have at your disposal are absolutely endless.

“So what’s the point of this blog post then, Richard?!”

I hear you say.

Well, I wanted to write this post to help you avoid a very common marketing mistake we see all too often, a practice that costs you money and delivers very little in return.

One of the biggest mistakes that engineers make with their digital marketing, is they look at what other people are doing and follow suit. They look at the tools that others are using, such as Facebook, Instagram, Google Ads etc and they think to themselves:

“I should use that too! It works for Joe Bloggs down the road, it should work for me too”.

And off they go and try the new marketing tool, without really thinking too much about it. We understand the attraction to this in saving time and money, but do you think Joe Bloggs carried out any research on this tool or strategy himself and whether it really was the best option for his business, let alone yours?

Don’t get me wrong, that strategy is better than nothing. It’s much better to market yourself that way than not at all, but a much better place to start is with a question that goes something like:

“What’s the best way to market to my target audience?”

Just because a certain tool or strategy may work for Joe Bloggs it does not necessarily mean it will work for you, even if you’re in the same industry.

Here is the way we would suggest you approach using new marketing tools.

Ask yourself “who am I trying to attract?”

Draw up an image of your ideal customer / avatar? (even give them a name if you want to!):

The more you can think about that person and the more you understand them, the better you’ll be with your marketing. Trust me it works!

Understanding what they do; the challenges and pressures they come up against on a daily basis; will give you a much better understanding of how to market to them, especially in the engineering sector.

Once you have this image of your ideal customer, and once you have an understanding of their issues and/or desires, you can work on the message that you want to get across to them.

You know your capabilities and services inside out, but you need to be able to showcase it in a way that will attract your ideal customer. You need to have quality copy and images on your website to portray the look and feel of a professional business. This is SO important!

Great copy and imagery sells!

Now, if you’ve managed to do this with advertising materials; you need to back it up with a great landing page for the product/service on your website. Because this is where your customer will most likely go next.

Let’s just rewind a little bit…

You’ve got that profile of your ideal customer.

You’ve crafted your marketing media.

Then, and only then, will you be able to choose which are the best marketing tools for your business.

For some businesses the answer could be SEO, some may need Google Ads, or Facebook marketing. I have a long list of digital marketing strategies that I could go through with you today – some are ideal for you and your business, but some aren’t as they’re not where your ideal customer is ‘hanging out’ online, so to speak.

But, once you understand your ideal customers, you should start to understand which marketing tools would suit them best as you will know where they go to learn and where they go to  communicate.

An important piece of advice that I feel I should add here, is not to limit yourself to one marketing tool.

Having said that, don’t use too many at once! Our recommendation is to use two or three at the same time, as you might become swamped and overwhelmed. Why do we say this? A vital part of your digital marketing is analysing and tracking your strategies to see what’s working, and what’s not. By doing this, you can alter your ad text, your audience, your targeting etc to suit the data you’re analysing, making your marketing more effective. By only using a few different tools, you can keep on top of this side of your marketing.

And there you have it; the first steps to successful digital marketing!

Don’t follow what the other engineering companies are doing for their marketing, look at your market place first, then craft your message to them. Then and only then select the marketing tool or platform on which they will best respond to you.

I hope this helps, and I hope you have a better understanding of how to start to use digital marketing for engineering businesses. It takes longer than copying the guy down the road, but boy can it deliver better results!

This is just the beginning of the road though; as you begin your marketing, give each platform a fair chance before swapping it for the next one. Try some AB testing (where you test one advert against another), set up conversion tracking so you can see which ads convert into sales/downloads/filled in contact forms. Then analyse the data, work out which tools and ads work the best, not just in sales, but in return on ad spend and the highest returns on profit margins. The chances of you picking the right marketing tool for engineering, and getting it to convert immediately are remote, but all to often engineers give up on a selected digital marketing tool when they weren’t actually using it right!

Feel free to get in touch with us at Brookstone Innovation if you have any questions about engineering marketing, or if you’d like some help with getting started.