MATS Ltd

MATS Ltd is a packing machinery specialist based in Whitstable, Kent — installation, calibration, repair and parts supply, UK-wide, with more than thirty years in the trade. Matt Thacker, the director, came to me needing a proper digital presence: something that reflected the depth of the business and made it easy for new clients to get in touch.

There was no structured site to refresh. This was a build from scratch — the kind of project where the work is excellent but the online presence has never caught up.

Built for a technical trade

Machinery buyers decide quickly. They want to see what you do, proof you can do it, and a fast route to contact — often from a phone between jobs. The site needed to feel competent and established from the first click, not like a generic template with a logo dropped in.

Structured around how MATS actually works

The build mapped directly to how the business operates: clear service breakdowns, confident copy for a technical audience, and enquiry paths that work whether someone is on a factory floor or at a desk planning a line upgrade. Professional design, mobile-first layout, and SEO foundations included from day one.

Why a trade business can go thirty years without a website

MATS had decades of relationships and a UK-wide reputation before I got involved. That is exactly why there was no site: when the phone rings because someone worked with you in 2011, a website feels like a nice-to-have.

The problem shows up later, and quietly. The people who knew you retire. A buyer at a new plant searches for calibration or a relocation quote and finds nothing they can evaluate. You are not losing enquiries you can see; you are missing ones that never reach you. That is the case for building, and it is a harder case to make than "your site looks dated" — because nothing is visibly broken.

Writing for a technical buyer

The copywriting was as much of the job as the design. Packing machinery is a field where the buyer usually knows more about the equipment than the person writing the website, and they can tell within a paragraph whether you actually do the work or resell someone who does.

So the language stays specific. Installation and relocation. UKWF calibration. Diagnostics and repair. Parts supply. Consultation and custom machinery solutions. Each named plainly, each with its own section. No "solutions-focused partner" filler, because a specifier reading that assumes you are a middleman.

Two devices, two very different visits

Machinery enquiries arrive from two places, and they behave differently. One is a phone on a factory floor — someone with a line down, wanting a number to ring in under ten seconds. The other is a desk, weeks ahead of a planned upgrade, comparing three suppliers properly and reading everything.

A site that only serves the second visitor buries the phone number under an about section. A site that only serves the first is a business card with no substance. The MATS build carries both: contact routes visible at every scroll position, and enough depth underneath for the desk visit to be worth making.

What I would take from this one

• No site is not the same as a bad site. The pitch is about the enquiries you never see, not about appearance.
• Specificity is credibility in technical trades. Name the actual services, in the language buyers use.
• Design for the emergency visit and the research visit — they need different things from the same page.
• Thirty years of history is an asset if you put a number on it. "More than thirty years" does more work than any adjective.

The result — and a repeat client

The site was live in two weeks. Matt’s feedback was straightforward: communication was clear throughout and the result was exactly what they needed. He was happy enough with the MATS build that he came back within months to commission a full ClippaNet rebuild as well.

Read the full case study for the complete breakdown of the build.