May 18, 2021 How One Manufacturer Jumped Up the Google Rankings

Manufacturer Delta ModTech realized that a sales force alone wouldn’t cut it. They needed to find a way to reach customers in new ways.

Converting machine manufacturer Delta ModTech realized that more and more B2B prospects were searching for information about their products and services online before they made a purchase. However, the company hadn’t done much in terms of digital marketing.

The year was 2016, and while trade shows continued to be the dominant form of lead generation for the company, the trend toward researching products online was already prominent in manufacturing marketing.

According to CSO Insights, more than 70 percent of B2B buyers fully define their needs before engaging with a sales representative, and almost half identify specific solutions before reaching out. Note: This study took place in 2018, pre-Covid. The numbers are likely to be significantly higher.

Delta ModTech knew they had to improve their online presence, so they’d be there when clients were researching their products. That involved improving their digital marketing, particularly their search engine optimization (SEO).

Challenge: How to build relevance AND authority

Search engine optimization is the process of optimizing your website content for search engines, so that when a prospect searches for a keyword, your page appears in the search results.

Marketers tend to place too much emphasis on some of the technical aspects regarding search engine optimization, but you need to meet the following two results to rank high with search engines:

1. Relevance: Your online content needs to have keywords in it to show search engines that you are writing about a relevant topic.
2. Authority: Other companies or publishers need to link to your content from their websites (this is called a backlink). This is an indicator to Google and other search engines that your website is a trusted and reliable source of information.

People understand the relevance component of SEO, but they struggle with authority. How do you get other websites to link to your product and services pages, so they’ll rank for keywords?

The answer is simple: You don’t. Delta ModTech, with the help of the manufacturing content marketing company Winbound, showed them a different way.

Solution: Creating win-win content by partnering with other industry experts

Delta ModTech knows that their machinery is just one component of helping converters improve their performance. They work with a number of different partners in the industry to create content that shows how converters can improve their overall performance.

The company decided to leverage these relationships to create blog content that focused on overall converting problems, interviewing other industry professionals and sharing their solutions.

Partners loved the free publicity, especially gaining access to Delta ModTech’s large and very targeted email list (the content was shared via a monthly newsletter). They also enjoyed seeing a respected player in the industry showcase their services.

The benefits were great for Delta ModTech, especially for their SEO.

Results: Collaboration example — generating over 659 backlinks from 33 domains

When Delta ModTech published this top of funnel content with the help of manufacturing marketing agency Winbound, the partners they featured often linked to the content from their own websites, as did other industry publications.

This solved the authority problem with SEO. By featuring helpful content that wasn’t self-serving, and integrating other authoritative solution-providers into the mix, Delta ModTech was producing exceptional, link-worthy content.

The results were soon apparent. When the manufacturing content marketing agency Winbound started this strategy with Delta ModTech in 2016, they had only 3 keywords ranking on the first page of Google search results. Over the years, the number has increased exponentially.

Today, they have over 212 keywords ranking on the first page of Google search results. One particular collaborative post has generated over 659 backlinks from 33 domains. This kind of performance has led to numerous #1 rankings for highly-valued product keywords.

Focus more on helping other manufacturers solve problems

Search engine optimization has long been regarded as a type of mystical art by manufacturing marketers, or at least one that requires a deep understanding of website technology. But the underlying concept for how SEO works is not that complex: Relevance and authority are the keys.

It’s a simple premise, and one that can be executed through strategic, top of funnel content that focuses less on your products and services, and more on helping people solve problems.

Read Winbound’s full Delta ModTech case study here.

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