Time to read: 9 minutes
Here’s Why Manufacturing Companies Need to Leverage Social Media for Their Business
This post was originally published in August 2017 and has been updated to reflect industry changes. Last updated March 5, 2026
Social media is becoming an ever-growing presence in the manufacturing world, offering opportunities to increase brand awareness, drive engagement, and even enhance online visibility. And in the era of AI, you need to be showcasing your expertise on more than just your own website.
With that in mind, let’s look at some key statistics and quick win tips for how you can optimize your social media presence in the world of marketing for manufacturing.
But just how impactful is social media in the manufacturing sector? Before we get into our tips, below are some important stats that reiterate why utilizing social media, even as an industrial brand, is important.
The Role Social Media Plays In Manufacturing Marketing Strategies
For manufacturers, social media is more than just a branding tool – it’s a powerful channel for increasing visibility, connecting with industry professionals, and driving real business results. From showcasing products through video content to networking with industry leaders, a well-planned social media strategy can be the key to growing your business.
TikTok
- Behind-the-scenes content – Show the manufacturing process, from raw materials to finished products, to highlight craftsmanship and innovation
- Quick tips and hacks – Share industry insights, production tips, or fun facts about manufacturing to educate and engage viewers
- Employee spotlights – Feature team members to create a personal connection with your audience and showcase company culture
- Before & after transformations – Show the evolution of a product or project in a time-lapse video to capture attention
- Hashtags and sounds – Use popular industry hashtags like #Manufacturing and #Industry40 to increase discoverability and pair videos with sounds to boost engagement
- A Day in the Life – Share images of company bonding experiences and team building to show what it’s like inside your company.
- The Fans – Facebook business pages are about the fans, and fans help you gain online authority. Prompting likes and shares through directives, branded images and statistics on your product success will drive people to engage.
- Lead Form Ads – Create a lead form advertisement so potential manufacturing clients can be led directly to a page to enter contact information. This can be an alternative to gaining business leads through your website landing page.
- Facebook Live – There are many ways to optimize the FB live experience in creative ways, as shown in this decor8 blog article. Hosting live polls on products with sites like GoUpLive or rolling out a new product via the stream will create a unique way for customers to view your work life and products.
- Video for Cover Photos – Create a montage video that showcases your manufactured product as your background image for your business page. It is a quick way for customers to see the versatility of your product as they first see your page and start to engage with it.
- Link Building – Write a blog post about other manufacturers to follow on Instagram, then reach out to them to see if they’d want to share the post on their Instagram bio.
- Hashtags – Hashtags, like #manufacturing, connect you to a network of manufacturers and clients talking about your industry.
- Join Interest Groups – Join industry-related topic groups to bounce professional ideas off other experts in the manufacturing industry. This network acts as a resource for people in your industry and also potential clients.
- Create Your Own Community – Starting a LinkedIn group can allow you to make your company the featured website for a group. This will increase exposure to other manufacturers.
- “Bites” of Information – Create content for your social media that is stripped down and focused on the meat of what you are trying to get across. A good rule of thumb is to write your content out, and then cut it down to HALF of what you had initially written. Just think: If I’m not going to read that “whole thing,” who will?
- Target Posts – Posting targeted updates can optimize your audience outreach and help you to specifically reach manufacturers and targeted geographic areas related to your business. This is a free service that is available on your company page once you have 300 followers.
YouTube
- Product Demos – People love action shots, and this is the perfect time to show these off. Use video for your product to display:
- How it works
- What is does for customers
- What its features are
- Why it surpasses the competition
- This video by Wonderful Engineering is a great example representing the four possibilities above.
- No Mission Statements – You should avoid at all costs the slideshow video format with the company’s mission statement as a voice-over. People want to view things at their leisure on social sites that are going to entertain, not parrot your “brand identity.”
- Clear Descriptions – Optimize your video with text captions for people without sound to improve accessibility to your company and emphasize the purpose of your video.
- Interactive Thumbnails – Create a thumbnail that includes a play button and a time stamp to prompt engagement. This will let viewers know the exact duration and act as an additional prompt for them to start the video.
X (Formerly Twitter)
- Community Chats – Engage in daily, weekly, or monthly conversations with manufacturing industry followers via chats. Post the hashtag of the chat and engage with other industry experts. A great one to consider is the monthly #mfgchat hosted by National Industrial Supply (@NISchain).
- Follow + Favorite – Don’t just add people—engage with your followers. Like, retweet, and message your audience with feedback on their content on a consistent basis.
- Simplify Sharing – Twitter’s main purpose is to share others’ content and ideas. Place social share buttons at the top or bottom of all blog posts on your website. That way, people will be prompted to engage with your account. Adding the number of people who have already shared the article in a box next to the icons encourages sharing. This is because people are more likely to share something that they think others are already engaging with.
- Selling Products – Many do not think of Pinterest initially as a sales platform, but adding a $ and a link back to your site or landing page can encourage viewers to buy the product. General Electric does a good job of featuring their products for sale in their “Gifts for Geeks” Board, which links out to a purchase page via Quirky.
- Be a Resource – Pinners seeking out manufacturing-related materials are looking for helpful industry tips, not a super-salesy pitch on why you’re the best industrial company. Fill your boards with infographics, instructional videos, and recommendations.
- Design for Discovery – As one Search Engine Watch article deemed it, Pinterest is “designed for discovery” where “93% of Pinteresters use the interface to plan for purchases.”Target your Pinterest theme around your brand personality—showing not only what you represent, but what kind of content you engage with outside of manufacturing. Expanding the type of content that you engage with outside of shots of equipment and trade shows will maximize your exposure on the platform.
- Trade Show Promo – Believe it or not, many companies are now using Pinterest to show previews to their stands and displays for industry trade shows. A good example of this is Business Industrial Network’s board.
How SEO and Social Media Go Hand-In-Hand for Manufacturing Companies
While social media doesn’t directly impact search rankings, it plays a key role in boosting visibility, engagement, and backlinks, all of which contribute to better manufacturing SEO performance.
Boosts Visibility
Social media helps expand content reach, helping manufacturers get their brand in front of potential customers and even prospective new employees. Platforms like YouTube and Twitter are indexed by Google, meaning optimized posts and videos can appear in search engine results.
Additionally, when people look up a company after seeing it on social media, it signals relevance to search engines, supporting SEO efforts.
Drives Backlinks
When social content is widely shared, it increases the chances of being linked to by manufacturing industry professionals and authoritative sites. For example:
- YouTube video descriptions – Linking to a website or blog post can drive traffic
- Pinterest pins – Pins with website links provide a steady source of traffic and potential backlinks
- LinkedIn articles – High-quality posts often get shared and cited on other platforms
- Instagram bio links – A well-optimized profile link can drive traffic and encourage shares that lead to backlinks
Encourages Engagement
Likes, shares, and comments extend content reach and help build brand authority for your manufacturing business. The more engagement a post receives, the more likely it is to be seen, shared, and linked to (ultimately driving more traffic to your website).
This cycle of visibility and interaction from your social media presence will strengthen your overall SEO presence over time.
Manufacturing Social Media Marketing: Key Statistics You Should Know
- 52% of businesses use social media apps as a sales channel for their products (HubSpot)
- Only 30% of manufacturing marketers believe they are effectively utilizing their web and social content (Content Marketing Institute)
- On average, users spend 28 hours each month watching YouTube on mobile devices (Hootsuite)
- 31% of brands’ Instagram budgets will be allocated to ads on Instagram stories (EarthWeb)
- 59% of manufacturers plan to expand their social media marketing efforts, with 81% prioritizing LinkedIn (Industrial Sage)
- 89% of marketers leverage Facebook for brand promotion (Statista)
- 79% of X (Twitter) users actively follow brand or company accounts (X Business)
- 53% of X (Twitter) users rely on the platform for the latest news, making it the top social media source for news consumption (Statista)
- More than 46% of company website traffic driven by social media originates from LinkedIn (LinkedIn)
- 69% of professionals in manufacturing follow social media channels related to their industry (Industrial Marketer)
Ready to Expand Your Manufacturing Company’s Online Exposure?
As you can see, incorporating a few simple social media strategy changes into your marketing approach will optimize your existing efforts tenfold. After implementing these changes, let us know your results… they might surprise you!
Also, don’t forget to reach out if you are interested in learning more about how to grow your business through digital marketing via a newly designed manufacturer website, customized SEO services for manufacturers, or even PPC marketing.
