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Websites, software and maintenance

Websites for manufacturers

A buyer sourcing a component has a shortlist, a specification, and no interest in your company history.

Industrial buying is a filtering exercise

Somebody has been told to find three suppliers for a part. They search the part, not you. They open eight sites, discard six inside a minute, and take two to their purchase manager. A unit in Mancheswar or Khordha industrial estate is often being compared with one in another state, by somebody who will never visit either.

What gets a site discarded is missing specifications. Not ugly design, not a thin About page. If a buyer cannot find the dimensions, the material grade, the tolerance and the certification, they move on, because they cannot put your name in front of their boss without those numbers.

This is the sector where the least attractive websites often win, because they carry the data.

Specifications belong on the page, not in a PDF

A catalogue PDF is where product data goes to become invisible. Search engines index it poorly, phones open it badly, and a buyer comparing three suppliers will not download three files.

The same table as an ordinary web page is searchable, linkable, and readable on the phone a buyer is holding on a factory floor.

What a buyer looks for

  • The specification, in full, in a table
  • Certifications and standards, named and dated
  • Minimum order quantity and lead time
  • Whether you export, and to where
  • Somebody technical to talk to, not a sales form

What it costs

A manufacturer site with a page for each product line, full specifications and certifications is a Business plan: ₹30,000 to build and ₹18,000 a year. Large catalogues with hundreds of variants become a custom software job, because at that point you want a searchable product database rather than pages.

Prices do not include GST.

Who your website is really talking to

There are usually three people involved in an industrial purchase and they want different things. The engineer wants the specification. The purchase manager wants price, quantity and lead time. The owner wants to know you will still exist in three years.

Most manufacturer websites are written for the third person only, which is why they are full of company history and short on numbers. The engineer is the one who puts you on the shortlist, and the engineer is reading the table.

Photographs of the factory

Buyers want to see the plant. Not a stock photograph of a generic production line, but your machines, your floor and your quality lab. It is the cheapest credibility available to a manufacturer and almost nobody does it, because it feels unimportant from the inside.

  • What these businesses tell us

    • Specifications are trapped in a catalogue PDF
    • Buyers discard the site before making contact
    • Certifications are mentioned but never shown
    • The enquiry form asks for everything except the part number
  • What the site needs

    A spec table per product line, in HTML

    Dimensions, grades and tolerances sit on the page itself, so an engineer can read them on a handset and send a colleague a link.

    A certifications page with issue dates

    Names each standard you hold and when it was granted, which is what a purchase file has to contain.

    Order quantity and lead time on each product

    A buyer sees what a first order looks like before writing to you, so more of the enquiries you get are ones you can fill.

    A named technical contact with a direct line

    An engineer's name, number and email on the page, instead of a general enquiry box.

  • Most of these start on the Business plan. See the plans

  • Questions people ask

    Our catalogue is a hundred pages. Do we put it all up?

    Not as pages. Above roughly forty products you want a searchable product database, which is custom software. Below that, a page each is better and cheaper.

    Will this bring export enquiries?

    It can, and it is the cheapest way to find out. Say plainly which countries you already ship to. Vague export claims attract enquiries you cannot fulfil.

    Should we publish prices?

    Usually not in manufacturing, because price depends on quantity. Publish the minimum order and the lead time instead. Those filter just as well.

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