ThomasNet is North America’s no.1 industrial sourcing platform. It comprises of the largest and most active network of B2B buyers and industrial and commercial suppliers. These suppliers see their business grow when they become Thomas clients.
What is ThomasNet?
ThomasNet is Thomas’s website platform which serves as a supplier discovery and product sourcing tool designed to serve both manufacturers and buyers. Thomas is a data, platform, and technology company that merges product search technology with information-rich company profiles so that users can make educated decisions when shortlisting and choosing a supplier. Users such as engineers, plant managers, procurement managers, and MRO buyers can search the Thomas Network to find the supplier that best suits their needs. For suppliers, the Thomas Network can be leveraged to advertise to and connect with in-market buyers. Beyond the platform itself, Thomas’s marketing services also works with clients to target new customers and grow their businesses using digital marketing services that include web development, search engine optimization, content creation, and email marketing.
Thomas’s clients include manufacturers, distributors, and service providers. Thomas also works with these suppliers to provide strategic website development, tools, and technology to help them manage and share their product and service data internally and externally. They have a variety of marketing services available for clients.
In the first stage of starting a new industrial project, a buyer is defining the requirements of the products or services that their company needs, whether it be CNC milling services, CNC machining, packaging materials, or a custom valve. It’s crucial for potential suppliers to identify the total available market for their products or services, and to have their shipping policies and options on their website and the Thomas Network, in addition to promoting their business information through advertising and sponsored content to reach these prospects.
How Thomas Works for Suppliers
Thomas offers three key industry-focused areas of expertise: the Thomas Network, Thomas Insights, and Thomas Marketing.
The Thomas Network
When a supplier joins Thomas, the first step is creating their custom company profile. Thomas’s supplier content team makes sure that suppliers are accurately listed under the categories that best represent their products or services, gathering information from the supplier’s site or reaching out to the suppliers themselves. While the company profile is being created, Thomas’s marketing team begins to work with the supplier, depending on what kind of marketing help they’re looking for. Being listed on the Thomas Network simply allows companies to get in front of the most qualified in-market buyers in their industry.
Beyond the ability to create a company profile, the Thomas Network also allows for in-platform advertising opportunities. These include display advertising and retargeting within the search-side of the site, as well as opportunities to advertise in Thomas branded outreach such as the Thomas Industry Newsletter updates.
Thomas Marketing Services
Thomas’s audience spans across small and medium-sized companies to Fortune 500 businesses. To help these companies grow, Thomas’ services offer affordable and scalable “agency” marketing that includes a team of search engine optimization (SEO), marketing strategy, and website development experts.
Thomas’ marketing services include content marketing, website design, pay-per-click/SEM, social media marketing, email marketing, and SEO. Working directly with clients, Thomas’s marketing specialists create content such as videos, blogs, eBooks, eBlasts, and social media content to drive targeted traffic and leads to their clients’ websites. Having built over 5,000 websites in the industrial market space, Thomas also boasts years of experience in website design and eCatalog builds for clients.
Leveraging HubSpot to power clients’ marketing automation, Thomas’ marketing strategy can boost lead generation, reduce cost-per-acquisition, and improve retention. The marketing team’s largest and fastest growing program, SEO, focuses on securing new traffic and leads for client sales teams to nurture in their pipelines. Suppliers can use one or more of Thomas’s marketing services to attract new business.
Thomas Insights
With a finger on the pulse of industry, Thomas Insights, the news and analysis section of the Thomas platform, provides actionable information for industry professionals. Covering topics like supply chain, engineering and design, career development, and manufacturing innovation, Thomas Insights provides readers with the information they need to grow their businesses and advance their careers. Thomas Insights also distributes a daily newsletter, the Thomas Industry Update, and invites readers to share their unique perspectives on the industry by contributing as Market Experts.
Thomas Insights also publishes a weekly Thomas Index Report examining the latest sourcing trends from across ThomasNet. Every Monday, the video report provides an in-depth look at a product or service with significant sourcing growth on the platform and examines the market factors affecting the sourcing activity.
Technical Sourcing Guides for Procurement Professionals
To address the needs of their core audience of procurement professionals, engineers, and facilities management, Thomas maintains a knowledge base of technical content which offers actionable information to assist industry professionals in sourcing and specifying various materials, products, and services. The technical content resources provide the audience with the deep knowledge they need to understand the subject matter and thus be able to make informed decisions when considering which product or service to select and from which supplier.
By way of example, the Thomas Technical Content provides answers to address common questions like these:
- What are the various types of CNC machining operations available?
- How do A/C Motor Controllers work?
- What is the difference between type 6061 vs. type 6063 aluminum?
- What do the R-values for insulation mean?
- Who are the top suppliers of bearings in the U.S. and worldwide?
- What are the key specifications that need to be defined to source a Shell and Tube Heat Exchanger?
Armed with the answers to these questions, Thomas’ audience is better equipped to make intelligent selections among the myriad of choices for suppliers of products, materials, and services, saving both valuable time and making their sourcing process more efficient.
Benefits of Thomas
What are the benefits of Thomas? It’s a company backed by 120 years of industry experience that targets each stage of the buying process with its different products. Suppliers should use Thomas if they’re unsure how to cope with the changing industrial marketplace because Thomas stays up to date with all the latest buying trends and helps suppliers keep up too.
A smart, targeted program on the Thomas platform connects suppliers to decision-makers at every stage of the buying cycle. Engineers, procurement managers, plant managers, MRO buyers — they come to the Thomas Network when they’re serious about supplier discovery and product sourcing. For more information on the company, check out ThomasNet reviews on Glassdoor.
Products
Thomas’ products are the Thomas Network, WebTrax, Connect, and Navigator. The Thomas Network is industry’s largest and most active buying community. Suppliers can get listed on Thomas for free, make changes to their profile, and upload their certifications and diversity information.
Thomas’ WebTrax lets suppliers track in-market buyer activity across various digital marketing efforts. It tracks, stores, and presents the data in one dashboard. It follows buyers visiting the supplier’s website, their ThomasNet profile, viewing their eCatalog, downloading their CAD or BIM files, or even calling them by phone. WebTrax can be customized to let the supplier choose the characteristics of their ideal customers and tracks these users to see how they’re interacting with the website. Many suppliers qualify for a free WebTrax account, and Thomas’s analytics platform so far has over 11,000 users.
Thomas Connect is a simple way for OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) to deliver approved product data across various sales channels. Thomas’ clients can create and maintain that data, publish it online, give it to their distributors, and put it their ThomasNet profile. In doing so, Thomas Connect makes it easy for distributors to populate their websites with real-time, OEM-approved data.
Thomas Navigator is an online product catalog designed for complex industrial products and allowing suppliers to provide potential customers with CAD models and product specifications. It has advanced search and configuration capabilities, which helps professionals find products by keyword, part numbers, characteristics, and dimensions.
Is Thomas Right for Suppliers?
Yes, Thomas is right for suppliers. Thomas works, and has a proven track record of helping suppliers grow. After being a Thomas client for five years, a 100-year-old glass fabrication company in New York averages 200 more orders a day. A family-owned custom plastic extrusions company in California was having a hard time competing with overseas manufacturers until they became a Thomas client. In 2016 they averaged 4.1 new customers a month after Thomas revamped the company’s website. One raw metals distributor in Florida says, “I would not have a business today if it weren’t for ThomasNet.”
Recent Supplier Testimonials
Here are just a few of the recent supplier testimonials from ThomasNet:
“Our website with ThomasNet has already paid for itself. For a custom machine shop, it’s all about getting requests for quotes. And we’re getting about 10 to 15 RFQs per week. And for every 10 to 15 RFQs we get, we estimate about 20 phone calls.”
-Marcus Wendling, Sales Manager and VP of Industrial Grinding, Inc.
“We recently received a contract for a company in Guam, who found us through ThomasNet. We currently supply them with parts on a weekly basis. We fly them ahead so that when the ship comes into port, they can be retrofitted promptly. This has been worth at least another 25 to 30 thousand dollars per year. And this is the business we would not have had if it weren’t for ThomasNet.”
-Steve Katz, President of Emerson Bearing
“I’ve referred ThomasNet to all my inner circle of friends in manufacturing. Mostly because they know how to build a site for custom manufacturers like myself. And the success, the numbers that people want, they’re there. I’m coming up number one on Google; I’m getting the million-dollar customers. I’m getting almost 2000 qualified buyers coming to my website every month, and that’s what I need to grow my business.”
-Matt Eggemeyer, President, Keats Manufacturing Co.
“As the economic downturn worsened, I believe that we had to invest in advertising. So for every dollar we saved, I invested 50 cents in advertising. Most of it with ThomasNet, and our new Website and the online catalog. It ended up driving significant traffic to our site, and to Maxi Container, which translated into increased sales.”
-Rick Rubin, President of Maxi Container, Inc.
“ThomasNet brings qualified buyers to us, both in the chemical side and the metal side. We wouldn’t be in business today if it wasn’t for what ThomasNet does for my business.”
-Don Ascione, President of Continental Chemical USA
“We needed a partner who understood both the internet and the industrial landscape. And also who had the technology and expertise to back it up. Other companies offered us different solutions, but the ThomasNet solution was the complete package. The ThomasNet Navigator Platform was exactly what I was looking for because it covers all of the bases.”
-Alistair Brixey, Vice President, Sales and Marketing, of Bunting Bearings and Bronze LLC
Summary
Thomas leverages its experience with B2B industrial buyers to help the half-million suppliers using its network to grow their business. Over a million buyers, engineers, and other purchase decision-makers use ThomasNet to find suppliers. Thomas has been continuously adapting to new technologies and is still developing new products to help its clients. In 2019, its customers still see growth and success. Industrial suppliers can turn to Thomas.
