How an industrial manufacturer drove 257% revenue growth through strategic digital marketing
Business owners frequently ask, “How often do I need to refresh the design and content structure of my website?”
USDP’s partnership with RUF Briquetting, an industrial manufacturing company, serves as a testament to the power of holistic digital marketing, and a good-looking, up-to-date website has played a huge role in their success.
Since RUF started taking marketing seriously, they’ve experienced a 24% annual revenue growth rate and a 257% revenue increase. That’s real marketing momentum. Over the last 6 years, we’ve taken RUF Briquetting from a non-existent marketing program to a strong foundation with “leads coming out of their ears.” More on that later. By implementing the right content for their target audience and clean visuals for a pleasant user experience, RUF has transformed their brand and business to the tune of multi-millions in profits.
Starting the journey with RUF
RUF Briquetting sells, you guessed it, briquetting machines. But what’s that?
The process of briquetting is a cost-effective and efficient way to take processing waste from industrial manufacturers, like excess metal, wood, and biomass waste, and turn it into something useful. Wood waste gets turned into fuel, metal briquettes can be resold or remelted, valuable fluids can be extracted from sludge, and biomass waste can be recycled or used for energy.
The team at RUF Briquetting was referred to us by a friend in 2020. At the time, they were not dedicating any resources to digital marketing and leaving a lot of potential on the table. Most sales were coming through referrals, repeat customers, and trade shows. There, they could demonstrate their briquetting machines and meet face-to-face with prospects. But during the global pandemic of 2020, this main source of leads came to a grinding halt.
RUF needed a partner that was going to jump right in and build them a marketing roadmap from scratch. We were ready and willing to get our hands dirty and help RUF craft this strong plan.
RUF's Roadmap
Digital Advertising: Starting somewhere
With no history of digital marketing, but an urgent need to make up for trade show business, we started with digital advertising.
Getting the ball rolling with paid search: We decided to start RUF’s marketing journey with some paid search advertising through both Google and Bing, targeting those who needed to get rid of different kinds of waste.
Making do with a subpar website: RUF’s existing site was outdated, busy, poorly written, and not user-friendly. The images were old, the site wasn’t mobile-ready, and it didn’t communicate the true value of briquetting. But we decided to prove that digital advertising could work before blowing up the site.
Online leads began to materialize: Digital ads began generating leads that turned into sales. Things were looking up, and the RUF team was getting excited.
Videography and Photography: Dealing with pandemic constraints
RUF needed a dynamic way to showcase their team and machines on their website.
Filming trade show collateral: As the world continued to adjust to post-pandemic restrictions, the RUF team wanted some video components to submit to virtual trade shows. Our team traveled to Cleveland to shoot footage both at their facility and a customer install facility. The footage was used in trade show videos and on the website.
Making incremental website improvements: The video and photos of machines in action brought the website to life and better displayed the capabilities of RUF’s products. This was invaluable in a world where face-to-face trade shows were on pause indefinitely.
Content Marketing: Emails, case studies, and an evolving roadmap
RUF had historically relied on their referral network and face-to-face interactions at trade shows for generating new business. We helped them branch out to inboxes and consistently pointed readers back to their website.
Reaching the RUF audience through email: After consistently running ad campaigns and boosting the website with some fresh photos and videos, we expanded our efforts into email marketing.
Displaying RUF’s expertise through case studies: We rewrote RUF’s online case studies to showcase their capabilities and the magic of briquetting for manufacturers. Because of the success with advertising, videos, and email marketing, the RUF team was eager to reconsider the whole website experience.
Website Redesign: A much-needed facelift and content restructure
The first of RUF’s two website projects was heavily focused on both design and messaging.
RUF’s first website makeover: Our team went all in on making the RUF website clean, clear, and functional. We wrote the copy, completely redesigned the pages, and built it on a new WordPress content management system.
A deadly combination: Once the website was up to snuff, digital advertising and all other aspects of marketing flowed with ease. The RUF team had more leads than they knew what to do with. Jim Wiest, the president at RUF, famously said: "I don't know what you all are doing over there, but we've got leads coming out of our ears!"
The 2025/26 Website Refresh: A content overhaul.
After 5 years of consistent digital marketing efforts, RUF had plenty of information on site visits, traffic, and return on ad spend. But their sales process had been evolving, and language around briquetting was shifting. Using these data points, RUF wanted to tweak their messaging, update the website images, revisit the sitemap, and expand content. So we got to work building upon the foundation we had laid 5 years prior.
They had outgrown their messaging: When we started years ago, RUF’s product message had been focused on cutting waste recycling costs. They were telling clients that briquetting could capture value from recycling by reusing the waste and making money from it. By 2025, RUF was ready for a messaging refresh. We worked with the team to ask important questions: “What was working? What was outdated? What were customers resonating with?”
Broadening the story: While the recycling aspect is still a huge benefit of briquetting, RUF wanted to tell a bigger story. Our team worked on messaging that explained how briquetting machines actually fit into the manufacturing process, making it more efficient and clean. We also communicated the value of briquetting on the environment.
Publishing 60+ new FAQs: We wanted RUF to increase their inbound traffic, show up in AI results, and rank better for SEO, so we published over 60 frequently asked questions (FAQs) on briquetting. RUF became the online authority for industrial briquetting. The rich content became a great place for ad campaigns to land. More content offer more opportunities for visitors to educate themselves, and we began to see how potential leads were exploring the site.
Subtle design and component updates: We kept the original design mostly intact with 12 new components for user-interface improvements, all within the existing WordPress framework.
Some sitemap changes: Since we added dozens of new pages to the website, some sitemap changes were necessary to improve the content flow.
Going beyond the Results
Throughout their marketing journey, the RUF team has been determined to achieve and we’ve had a wonderful partnership built on trust. Over the last 6 years, RUF has consistently increased profits thanks to their zeal for results, their dedication to digital marketing, and their support for the work we do at USDP.
RUF’s 24% annual revenue growth rate and 257% revenue increase are a sign that they’re doing something right. This substantial growth over the past few years has enabled them to recently invest in a new North American 100,000-square-foot production facility in Cleveland, Ohio.
Since the 2025 content refresh, we've continued to execute on a full stack of services to support RUF’s digital marketing progress. We’ve designed trade show campaigns, written white papers, built email marketing, and more, all to support this incredible marketing momentum. And we’re still just getting started.
Our team has been honored to work with RUF over the years on quality digital marketing as they’ve endured uncertainties like the pandemic and rejoiced in the successes of milestones like their new facility.
We’re grateful to RUF for the trust they’ve put in our team, and we’re excited for many more years of successful partnership.
A Note from Jim at RUF
What I attribute today’s growth to is marketing, reaching out. We knew who needed the machines, we knew how the machines worked, we could fix them, we could make them work, but we never knew how to really market and sell them. Today, thanks to our commitment to growth through marketing, we’ve invested $10 million cash into a new facility.”
– Jim Weist, President, North America