Many heavy industry companies do not have a good factory website. And why should they, one may ask. It’s mostly a B2B sphere, which means that clients are few and all handled personally. How many website visitors would you have? Ten? Twenty?..

Furthermore, factories are often managed by technical gurus who tend to view business from a strictly utilitarian standpoint. When you have to deal daily with fine tuning of production mechanisms, facility maintenance, defect elimination, logistics etc., it would seem that having a bright website is not a pressing concern.

But it would only seem so. A good industrial company website is capable of giving your business a number of decent perks which will boost your sales and improve your cross-industry reputation. Let us see how it can be achieved.

The face of your business

Anyone would agree that a website is the face of your business. In pre-Internet era, you would invest in neat courtyard and stunningly looking front gate to greet newcomers, but now this role is taken over by websites. Your partners may be half a world away, but looking at your website, they will get the impression of your factory as though they have visited it.

Regardless of what the factory is producing, your clients and investors have to be sure that your facility is up-to-date, your quality and safety standards are up and above the ceiling, and your operating staff are all seasoned professionals. A poorly designed website will never give them that impression. People tend to translate the quality of the website onto the company’s products and services. If your website has any flaws, your clients will subconsciously expect them in your products.

On the other hand, a well done website is capable of the following:

• PR, reputation, social responsibility, mass media communication;
• showcasing, not only the ready products, but the process of their making;
• opening your own sales channel, be it bulk or retail trade;
• attracting new investors or reporting to existing ones;
• converting visitors into clients. Even if you have only 10 visitors per month, and the good industry website brings you two clients instead of one – this is conversion doubled for you!

Components of excellence

All right, let’s cut the small talk. How do good factory websites look? And how to define if an industrial website design is good enough? To do this, let us take a look at one of our recent projects, the Artel Plast website.

Artel Plast is a factory that produces various items from fiberglass, acrylic, polyurethane and other polymers. The factory is capable of producing custom items such as designer chairs, water skis, spare parts for aircrafts and drone propellers.

When we took the case, we identified two primary goals for the website:

• present the company in such way that it would appeal to the potential customer;
• prove that the company’s capability of item customization is virtually unlimited (broaden the product range, attract cross-industry customers).

The first goal was complicated by the fact that the factory had two target audiences - B2C and B2B. They have different needs, but we managed to build the front page that appeases both groups. For B2B, there is a prompting central section, which takes the visitor to relevant product description pages. For B2C, we introduced a client chat window, where the client can let the sales manager know what they are looking for. The background is filled with a series of short video clips, showing the production process of various items.

The second goal was achieved by the Ideas page. This page showcases a selection of custom items that the factory is capable of producing, without regard to the regular product range (e.g. auto tuning, stadium seats, arcade machine carcasses etc.) Having looked at this page, the visitor understands that the factory does not only produce stereotypical products of their industry, but is able to make almost anything.

So, it is safe to say that your industrial website is good, if:

• it appeals to your target audience;
• It focuses on your business priorities (bulk, retail, supply etc.);
• It keeps in touch with your partners and employees alike;
• It portrays your factory’s full potential.

How a good web agency can help your factory

Here at Vintage, we have a knack for creating complex websites that make our clients look impeccable online. A website made by Vintage would mean the following for your heavy industry business.

Firstly, we will handle your factory’s online marketing by representing your capacities and products online. In heavy industry, PR is often insufficient or underestimated. We will use polished images, short video clips and animated design elements to make your website showcase the brightest of your works.

Secondly, we will bring your factory from local to international level. Companies who look for suppliers of heavy industry products will most likely do it online, and may do it from mobiles. The website which catches their attention would most likely be preferred. We will integrate multiple language versions into your website, and adjust it for all screens and devices. We will also eliminate the contact barriers between you and your potential partners.

Last but not least, we will create you one of the best industrial company websites. Your competitors will not come even close. Compare our Artel Plast website with Yujin or Zaporizhstal. See how our site tells the story, while others simply inform?

To sum it up for you, here are the five most prominent benefits of investing in a great factory website.