As a marketing or sales leader for a plastics manufacturing business, you know you need SEO. The problem is, you have absolutely no idea where to start.
With consumer demand continuing to grow for a variety of products made from different types of plastics, and demand from businesses for various raw materials with which to make those products, it’s clear that plastics aren’t going anywhere soon. This fundamental material is deeply ingrained in countless aspects of our lives, and with companies making meaningful strides with sustainability, opportunities will continue to abound.
As a plastics manufacturer, the past two years undoubtedly were complex for your business. Production slowed, rocketed back up, and then slowed again — all due to a variety of economic and political factors. While manufacturers can’t always control these outside influencers, what is in manufacturers’ hands is the ability to shift gears and position themselves growth based on key opportunities. Search engine optimization, or SEO, for the plastics manufacturing industry is one of these opportunities.
What is SEO for the Plastics Manufacturing Industry?
SEO for the plastics manufacturing industry is the long-term strategy of creating and optimizing website pages and other digital assets that rank in search engines. Optimized content performs better, resulting in higher rankings. Higher rankings that speak to searchers’ intent results in a click on your link. Over time, more clicks tells search engines that your links are informative and helpful, and they continue to rise in rank.
This is the goal: to have optimized, helpful content that answers searchers’ queries, to rank well for those searches, and to hold that ground. It’s akin to being the first in line when someone starts looking for a solution. If you’re in the first spot, and what you put forward in search results speaks clearly and well to the searcher, they’ll give you a shot — and a click. But what all goes into SEO and creating an effective strategy?
- Research — This is the first step and often where most people who attempt SEO without any experience get hung up. You need to find out what people are searching for. There are a variety of tools to do this, but what matters most is thinking about how people search. The terms companies use to describe their own products, services, and even industries aren’t always the same as those that customers or outsiders use or search for. This is important. Don’t make the mistake of using terminology or jargon that you use in your own business. Think about how your customer searches for what you offer.
- Data — It’s important to understand the performance data of the terms your customers use to search for your offerings. Again, different tools report this differently, but you’ll want to understand how many times this is being searched for during a given time period and what factors will influence your ability to rank. For example, if other companies are advertising on terms you want to use, that will limit the number of spots available on the first page of Google search results. This makes that keyword more competitive and impacts that likelihood of your content to rank. Whether you use a third-party SEO tool to research terms or base it off trends, make sure you understand what you’re spending your time on before proceeding.
- Content — Once you have the keywords you want to rank for, you’ll need to either start creating content for them or optimize existing content assets (e.g. pages on your site) for them. If you’re new to SEO for the plastics manufacturing industry, it’s important to understand that this doesn’t mean stuffing the living daylights out of your content with those keywords. Search engines can recognize this and will penalize you for it. Use the keywords a few times here and there in logical, meaningful ways. Search engines are smart and will understand whether the keyword makes sense in how it’s used.
- A Strong Site — In addition to properly optimized content, your website itself needs to be strong. Things like site load speed, URL structure, site hierarchy, image usage, and other technical factors all play into how search engines give credibility to your site. If you have a pile of improperly formatted images, too many fonts, a wonky URL structure, and don’t have a mobile-friendly site, you’re going to get penalized and deprioritized in search results. Keep your site healthy, and SEO will benefit from it.
- Consistency & Flexibility — Another important note: SEO takes time. You can create all the content you want, but it just takes time to really start performing. Be consistent — and patient — with your SEO efforts, and you’ll start to see the results you’re looking for. Additionally, be flexible — as you dig into your site search performance data, you’ll find new opportunities that may be worth pivoting for. You also might create a content asset that over time will start to lose its momentum. Re-optimizing that content to keep it relevant is a good approach to ensuring the work you’ve put into your site will continue to yield dividends.
Feeling Overwhelmed? Don’t Worry, We’re Here to Help
SEO for the plastics manufacturing industry requires both a thorough knowledge of that market itself as well as an SEO strategy. As the owner or leader of a plastics manufacturing business, you likely don’t have the time or capacity to tackle this yourself. Even if you have a marketing team, SEO requires consistent attention to produce results — attention that your team may struggle to provide based on other marketing and sales needs.
Athena SWC supports plastics manufacturers across the U.S. with their SEO, marketing, and sales needs. Our unique approach combines inbound strategies such as SEO with outbound sales best practices to create a truly holistic program for our clients. Using this non-traditional solution, our team has been able to produce significant results — and we’re ready to do the same for you.
Learn more about SEO and its power to help you grow. Connect with us today.