We reviewed 220 US manufacturers and chemical company websites. Here's what we found.
We've spent the last several months reviewing 220 manufacturing and chemical company websites across the US market. The goal was straightforward: understand how well these sites actually support the buyers using them. We're still working on the full industry report, but the early data is clear enough to share now.
If your site were in this review, which side of the data would it be on?
We believe that every manufacturer should be able to run this kind of audit on their own site without hiring anyone. That is why we have launched a free self-diagnosis tool: healthcheck.xfive.co based on the same framework.
How We Audited 220 US Manufacturer Websites
Each site was assessed individually by a researcher across seven areas:
- SEO and visibility,
- UX and navigation,
- product catalog quality,
- lead generation,
- brand and credibility,
- Compliance,
- technical infrastructure.
The tool is designed for companies ranging from small specialists to global enterprise players.
These are the reasons why manufacturing websites fail to convert
Visually strong sites often don't convert.
Among companies scoring highest on visual quality, 57% had no way for a buyer to request a sample or quote from a product page — just a generic contact form.
Most sites don't cover the basics of B2B purchasing.
Only 7% offer both a sample and a quote request directly from product pages. 51% have nothing beyond a generic contact form, and 12% have no call to action at all — including large companies with significant marketing budgets.
Technical specifications are hard to use.
48% present specs as PDFs or plain text only. 27% have nothing that allows cross-product comparison, and only 3% offer a comparison tool.
Distributor information is frequently out of date.
18% give buyers no purchasing information at all. 29% rely on static distributor pages that are only as current as the last internal update, a real problem given how frequently distribution networks change.
Certifications exist on most sites, but not where buyers look for them.
36% have no visible certification information. A further 31% keep it on a compliance page that a buyer browsing product specs won't naturally reach, and ISO, REACH, FDA and GMP status are checked early in manufacturing procurement.
GDPR compliance is more exposed than most companies realize.
42% have a material cookie consent failure. For manufacturers selling into pharmaceuticals, food production or aerospace, this matters commercially — supplier qualification in those sectors increasingly includes basic digital compliance checks.
AI search is changing who gets found.
Procurement teams increasingly use AI tools to identify and prequalify suppliers before contacting them. Those tools draw from structured product data and technical documentation. A site built around internal structure rather than buyer search behavior is poorly positioned for this shift, regardless of traditional SEO performance.
What Separates the Sites That Work
15% of reviewed companies had both a dedicated CTA and structured technical data on the page. 22% had distributor information useful enough to help a buyer find a regional contact. Only 1% had both.
The sites that worked weren't more polished or visually appealing; they were better structured. Specification table, datasheet, certifications and request button in one place, organized around how a buyer actually evaluates a product rather than how the company organizes itself internally.
Free Website Audit for Manufacturers
The framework we used across 220 sites is available as a free website audit for manufacturers at healthcheck.xfive.co. It covers the same seven areas, takes around 30 minutes, and gives you a scored result with specific priorities to address.
The problems it surfaces are rarely surprising in hindsight — they're structural and not obvious from the inside until someone looks systematically. Completing the diagnostic also puts you on the list to receive the full industry report when it publishes later this year.
FAQ
How do I know if a manufacturing website is underperforming?
The clearest signs are a sales team fielding questions the website should answer, low-quality or infrequent inbound enquiries, and product pages that don't give buyers a way to take the next step. A structured audit across SEO, UX, product catalogue, lead generation and compliance will show you exactly where the gaps are. We built a free one for manufacturers: healthcheck.xfive.co.
Why is the manufacturing website not generating leads?
Usually it's a structural issue — no quote or sample request on product pages, specifications buried in PDFs, certifications on a compliance page buyers never reach. Our review of 220 US manufacturer websites found that 57% of the highest-scoring visual sites had no conversion pathway at all. A site can look professional and still give buyers nowhere useful to go.
What does a manufacturing website audit cover?
A useful audit goes beyond SEO and load speed. For manufacturers, it needs to cover how product data is structured, whether technical specifications are accessible on the page, where certifications are visible, how buyers can request a quote or find a regional distributor, and whether the site is compliant with cookie consent requirements. Our free diagnostic at healthcheck.xfive.co covers all seven of these areas.
How can a manufacturer improve website lead generation without rebuilding the whole site?
Start with product pages. Adding a quote request, making specifications scannable on the page, and surfacing certifications in the product research flow address the most common reasons buyers leave without making contact. These are content and architecture changes, and don't require a full redesign. At xfive, this is typically where we start when working with manufacturers on their digital presence: fixing what buyers actually encounter before considering anything more structural.
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