The RFQs used to come in every week. Now the form sits quiet, and nobody can say why.
In our experience, it’s rarely the market. Buyers check ChatGPT and Google first. Your site doesn’t give them an answer, and your competitor’s does.
When your specs live in PDFs, AI search can’t read them. It names a competitor whose site it can read instead.
Good web design for manufacturers gives every product its own page and quote request. Each page lists the specs in plain text that Google and ChatGPT can read.
Write Good Code builds manufacturing websites from $2,450, live in about 4 weeks for sites up to 10 pages.
RWA Ventilation came to us after 9 months with a nationwide agency and zero sales. Organic traffic grew 239% in 6 months, and they had the best revenue year in company history.
At a glance
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What a manufacturing website needs to bring in RFQs
A manufacturing website brings in RFQs when buyers can check specs and request a quote fast.
After almost a decade working on industrial-grade websites, we’ve found these 6 pieces matter more than the design.
1. A page for every product and replacement part
Every product and replacement part gets its own page, with specs typed out in plain text. That means the part number, dimensions, materials and ratings.
Buyers search by part number. When that number is on the page, Google and AI search can match it.
AI search rarely quotes a PDF. Across 19,279 answers from 5 AI engines, only 80 cited a PDF. That count comes from a study of PDF citations by AmICited, a company that tracks AI citations.
| PDF spec sheet | Specs typed on the page | |
|---|---|---|
| Google can find it | Sometimes | Yes |
| ChatGPT can quote it | Almost never | Yes |
| Easy to read on a phone | No | Yes |
| Shows up in a part number search | Rarely | Yes |
Keep the PDF for download, and put the same specs on the page as text.
2. Capability and certification pages
Capability pages list your machines, tolerances, materials and part size limits.
Certification pages name only what you hold, like ISO 9001, AS9100 or ITAR registration.
Procurement checks both before they approve a new supplier.
3. A quote request on every product page
A quote request goes on every product page, so you know which product brought in the lead.
The Contact link in your menu sits on every page, so buyers stop seeing it. It’s buried in plain sight. A quote button next to the specs gets used.
The form asks for quantity, material and deadline. Buyers can upload a drawing or CAD file with it.
Your phone number shows on every page, for buyers who prefer to call.
After we built quote forms for Heinlein Supply, a Chicago industrial distributor, a quote takes minutes instead of hours.
4. Pages for the industries you serve
Industry pages describe the job you do for each type of buyer. One page might cover stainless enclosures for food plants. Another might cover titanium brackets for aerospace.
AI search matches a supplier to the buyer’s job. Of B2B professionals who use AI at work, 53% noticed vendors that matched their use case, in a Semrush survey of 519 US B2B professionals.
A few of the industries a manufacturing website can speak to:
5. A where-to-buy page for reps and distributors
A where-to-buy page sends each buyer to the right rep or distributor for their area.
Without one, a buyer who can’t order direct leaves, or calls the wrong office. A dealer locator, searched by state or ZIP code, fixes both.
6. Fast pages that AI tools can read
A manufacturing website should load fast on a phone and let AI tools read every page.
We check that ChatGPT, Claude and other AI search tools can read every page.
Medicanix, a Connecticut medical equipment supplier, had pages that took over 10 seconds to load. We got them under 4.
How a manufacturer shows up in ChatGPT and AI search
ChatGPT recommends manufacturers whose websites state facts it can quote.
It looks for short, clear answers: what you make, the specs, the certifications and the industries you serve.
You don’t need to rank first on Google for this. Of all AI Overview citations, 62.2% come from pages outside Google’s top 10. That figure comes from Ahrefs’ study of AI Overview citations, an SEO software company that checked 4 million cited links.
AI search also checks what other sites say about you. Industry directories like Thomasnet and your trade association listing should use the same company name, address and description as your website.
No agency can guarantee a ChatGPT recommendation, and we don’t promise one. We make every fact on your site easy to find and easy to quote.
If AI search can’t quote your site, it can’t recommend you.
5 weeks after we launched a new site for Hillco Distributing, a Chicago heating distributor, ChatGPT named Hillco in 8 of 18 buyer answers we tested, first every time.
To bring more buyers to the site after launch, see SEO for manufacturing companies. AI search is included with our SEO package. See our AI search service page.
Should a manufacturing website be a catalog, a store or a quote cart?
Manufacturers who price by quantity or by job get the most from a Quote Engine.
A Quote Engine works like an e-commerce store, with product pages, quantities, Add to cart and a cart. Only payment is missing, so checkout sends you a quote request.
| Website | What the buyer does | Price from |
|---|---|---|
| Informational site | Reads the page, then calls or sends a form. Best for custom work and job shops. | $2,450 |
| Quote Engine | Adds products to a cart and sends a quote request. Best for catalogs priced by quantity or customer. | $5,500 |
| E-commerce store | Adds products to a cart and pays. Best for standard parts at fixed prices. | $6,000 |
What the buyer does
- Searches online
- Product page
- Add to cart
- Checkout
Typical e-commerce store
Pay nowThe buyer pays. You handle fraud, shipping and returns.
Quote Engine
Request QuoteThe quote request goes to your inbox. You contact the buyer and quote the price.
A Quote Engine puts your full catalog online. You skip payments, shipping and returns.
Let buyers build the order. You set the price.
Want to dive deeper? Read how a Quote Engine works.
What a manufacturing website costs
A manufacturing website from Write Good Code costs $2,450 to $7,500, fixed, with content included.
Sites with a product catalog cost $5,500 to $11,000, depending on how many products you have.
| Website | Size | Fixed price |
|---|---|---|
| Foundation | 3 to 5 pages | $2,450 |
| Growth | 6 to 12 pages | $4,450 |
| Dominate | 13 to 20 pages | $7,500 |
| Quote Engine | 1 to 100 products | $5,500 to $10,500 |
| E-commerce store | 1 to 100 products | $6,000 to $11,000 |
The site price and the catalog price don’t stack. A Quote Engine with 30 products costs $7,500 in total.
You get the fixed price in writing before any work starts. Hosting runs on an account you own.
How many orders does it take for a website to pay for itself?
A manufacturing website pays for itself once the profit from extra orders covers its price.
A 6 to 12 page Growth site costs $4,450. At a $5,000 average order and a 25% gross margin, each extra order earns $1,250. The site is paid for by the 4th extra order.
Change the numbers to match your shop. The chart counts gross profit and uses our published prices. Your order size and margin move the result more than the site price does.
When does a manufacturer need a new website?
A manufacturer needs a new website when the site no longer matches the business, or stops bringing in leads.
| What you see | What it costs you |
|---|---|
| A rebrand or new product line the site doesn’t show | Buyers see the old company |
| Whole product lines missing from the site | Buyers searching for them find a competitor |
| Specs, product details or contacts out of date | Buyers stop trusting what they read |
| Lead forms that break, go nowhere or fill with spam | Real RFQs get missed or ignored |
| New leadership, and a site that still shows people who left | The site looks abandoned |
| The developer is gone, and nobody can update the site | Every change waits, or never happens |
| Answers that live only in your sales team’s heads | Your team repeats itself, and Google and AI search can’t find them |
The last one matters most. Put what your sales team knows on the website. They stop answering the same questions, and every answer becomes a page Google and AI search can find.
If none of these fit, you may not need a new site. Improving the one you have can be enough.
How to choose a web design agency for a manufacturing company
Choose an agency that has built manufacturing websites and gives a fixed price and launch date.
Ask every agency you talk to these 6 questions.
- Can we see 3 live websites you built for industrial companies?
- Who writes the content for every page?
- What is the fixed price, and when do we launch?
- Who owns the domain, the hosting and the site files?
- How will we know which pages bring in RFQs?
- What is your plan for AI search?
Write Good Code answers all 6 on the first call.
Common manufacturing website mistakes we see
Specs locked in PDFs are the most common manufacturing website mistake we see. These are the rest, most common first.
- The quote form hides on the contact page. Buyers on a product page don’t go looking for it.
- One Products page holds hundreds of products. Buyers can’t find the part, and neither can Google.
- Stock photos. A buyer who sees the same factory photo on 3 supplier sites subconsciously trusts none of them.
- The site looks abandoned. The blog hasn’t been active since 2022, and the products don’t match what sales is selling.
- The quote form breaks without anyone knowing. Nobody gets an alert, and you find out when sales asks where the leads went.
- Animation over answers. A site full of motion is hard to use, and AI search can’t quote what it can’t read. Why beautiful websites kill sales explains why.
None of this is the marketing team’s fault. It’s what happens when the developer who built the site is gone and nobody knows how to update it.
Website Design for manufacturers, fixed price and live in about 4 weeks
Our Website Design service builds manufacturing websites at a fixed price, live in about 4 weeks for sites up to 10 pages.
You work directly with the senior strategist you meet on the first call, backed by a team of remote specialists.
How the build works
- Discover your business: a 30-minute call to learn what you sell and what a good lead looks like, then a roadmap call with a fixed price and a launch date.
- Content and design: you approve the content for every page, then a mockup of the first page, before we build the rest.
- Review and launch: a video walkthrough of the finished site, three rounds of changes, then launch.
How we protect your Google rankings during a rebuild
A rebuild shouldn’t cost you the rankings your old site earned.
We redirect every old page to its new address. We set up the on-page SEO each page needs and improve weak content along the way.
Replacing a site you already have? See Website Redesign.
See if we’re a good fit
We work with a select group of manufacturers and keep our client list short.
On a no-cost call, we’ll learn what you sell and tell you honestly if our web design for manufacturers is the right fit.
Client results
-
Knape Associates
in 4 months
-
RWA Ventilation
in 6 months
-
Heinlein Supply
in ad spend, and a record revenue year
Questions we get
What happens to our website if we stop working with Write Good Code?
Your website stays yours if you stop working with Write Good Code. You own the domain and the hosting account, so another developer can take over without starting from scratch. Ongoing SEO and Google Ads are month to month, never a requirement for keeping the site.
How long does a manufacturing website with a large product catalog take?
A manufacturing website with a large product catalog takes 8 to 12 weeks to build. Sites up to 10 pages without a catalog launch in about 4 weeks. You get the launch date in writing with the fixed quote, before any work starts.