Companies in the industrial sector are spending more on marketing and allocating a greater portion of their budgets to online marketing, according to the 2007 Industrial Marketing Trends Survey from GlobalSpec, which surveyed marketing and sales executives and managers in the sector.

More than half - 55% - of respondents said their companies would spend more on marketing in 2007 than in 2006; only 10% said they would spend less.

Other findings from the 2007 GlobalSpec Industrial Marketing Trends Survey:

• 61% of respondents said online marketing would take up more of their marketing budget in 2007 than it did in 2006; only 5% said they would spend less online.

• 37% said they would spend at least one-third of their marketing budget online.
• 73% of respondents said customer acquisition or lead generation is their primary marketing goal in 2007
• Respondents most often selected customer acquisition, budget & resources or new market development as the biggest marketing challenge facing their company in 2007.

• Social media has yet to make an impact in the industrial sector: Fewer than 10% of respondents expected to increase spending on blogs and podcasts in 2007

Previous GlobalSpec surveys found that 91% of engineers use the internet to find components and suppliers, and 45% spend more than six hours/week online for work-related purposes.

Companies are apparently shifting more of their marketing resources to capture these engineering, technical and industrial professionals in an effort to achieve their customer-acquisition and lead-generation goals, GlobalSpec said.

About the study: GlobalSpec in February 2007 conducted its second annual Industrial Marketing Trends Survey of marketing and sales professionals in the industrial and manufacturing sectors. The survey addressed marketing objectives, trends and expenditures within the engineering, technical and industrial communities.