Industrial Contractor Websites: What Plant Owners Check Before Calling

Before a plant engineer or maintenance manager calls an industrial contractor, they check four things on its website: which trades the company performs with its own crews, what jobs it has done for plants like theirs, what its safety numbers are, and whether it can staff and badge a crew for their site. Prequalification platforms such as ISNetworld, Avetta and Veriforce handle the paperwork later, but the shortlist usually gets made earlier, on a phone between meetings. A contractor website that answers those questions in plain numbers gets the call. One that says "full-service industrial solutions" over a stock photo of a hard hat gets skipped.

Why does an industrial contractor need a website if owners use ISNetworld?

Because prequalification and shortlisting are two different steps, and they are done by different people.

Prequalification is the formal check. ISN describes ISNetworld as a platform that "collects and reviews health, safety, quality, insurance, training, cybersecurity, and sustainability information," with documents reviewed against regulatory and hiring client requirements. Avetta describes its supplier prequalification the same way: clients publish requirements, suppliers complete questionnaires and upload documents, and Avetta verifies them. Veriforce positions itself around contractor management, safety, compliance and training. That work usually lives with a contractor safety coordinator or procurement team.

Shortlisting happens before any of that. A reliability engineer needs a pump base regrouted, a maintenance superintendent has a tank floor that failed inspection, a project manager is planning a turnaround and wants a third piping contractor to bid. They search, they ask a colleague, they ask an AI assistant, and then they open your website. If the site cannot tell them in a minute whether you do the work, where you work and how safe you are, they move to the next name and you never learn you were considered.

Getting onto an owner's approved vendor list is its own process, covered in depth in our guide to getting on a contractor approved vendor list. This article is about the page that comes first.

Should each trade have its own page?

Yes. A single "Services" page with twelve bullet points tells a buyer nothing they can act on. Plant buyers search by trade and by problem ("structural steel erection refinery," "aboveground storage tank repair contractor," "millwright pump alignment"), and each of those searches needs a page that answers it.

Give every trade you self-perform its own page, and be honest about what you subcontract. Owners care about that line because it decides who is on their site, who supervises them and whose safety record applies. On each trade page, cover:

Real scope. Not "piping services," but what you install and repair: carbon and stainless process piping, small-bore tubing, hot taps, hydrotesting, pipe supports.
Materials and sizes. Alloys you weld, pipe diameters you handle, the heaviest lift you have rigged, the largest tank diameter you have repaired.
Codes and qualifications you actually work to, such as welding procedures and welder qualifications, stated plainly.
Typical work types: new construction, plant maintenance, emergency repair, shutdown and turnaround support.
Two or three related projects, linked to their full project pages.
A bid request button that carries the trade into the form.

For a contractor that does piping and mechanical, welding and fabrication, structural steel, millwright, concrete, earthwork and tank services, that is seven pages. Each one can rank for its own searches, and each one can be the page a buyer forwards to the person who approves the bid list. Our guide to writing a capabilities page covers the structure in more detail.

What should a contractor project page include?

A project page is proof that you have done this exact kind of work before. Plant buyers read them for four facts:

Owner type. "Gulf Coast refinery," "food processing plant," "municipal water utility," "chemical plant." Use the client's name only with written permission. Most owners will not allow it, and the industry and region tell the buyer what they need.
Scope. What your crews did, in quantities: linear feet of pipe, tons of steel, cubic yards of concrete, equipment set and aligned.
Schedule. Planned versus actual, and the conditions. "Completed in a 9-day outage window, 24-hour operations, two shifts" is the line a turnaround planner is looking for.
Outcome. On time, on budget, recordable-free, punch list closed. If you cannot say it truthfully, leave it out.

Add one or two real photos from the job if the owner allows photography (many plants do not, so check). A clean photo of your crew and equipment on a slab is worth more than a dozen stock images. Ten honest project pages, sorted by trade and owner type, will outsell a gallery of fifty unlabeled pictures.

What safety numbers should a contractor publish?

The two numbers owners ask about first are TRIR and EMR. Publish both, for the last three years, with the year next to each number. If you hide them, buyers assume they are bad.

TRIR: total recordable incident rate

TRIR is your OSHA recordable injury and illness rate, normalized to 100 full-time workers. The Bureau of Labor Statistics gives the formula as:

(Number of injuries and illnesses x 200,000) / Employee hours worked = Incidence rate

BLS explains that 200,000 hours is the equivalent of 100 employees working 40 hours per week, 50 weeks per year, which lets a 40-person contractor and a 400-person contractor be compared on the same base.

"Recordable" has a specific meaning. Under OSHA's recordkeeping rule (29 CFR 1904.7), a work-related case is recordable if it results in death, days away from work, restricted work or transfer to another job, medical treatment beyond first aid, or loss of consciousness, or if it is a significant injury or illness diagnosed by a physician or other licensed health care professional. The numbers come straight from your OSHA 300 Log, and your 300A annual summary already lists the total hours worked.

A worked example: a contractor with 2 recordable cases and 180,000 hours worked in a year has a TRIR of (2 x 200,000) / 180,000 = 2.22. Show the hours next to the rate. A rate of 0.00 on 15,000 hours means much less than 0.80 on 500,000 hours, and experienced safety managers know it.

EMR: experience modification rate

EMR, also called the experience mod, comes from workers compensation insurance, not OSHA. NCCI's ABCs of Experience Rating explains that it compares an employer's payroll and loss experience with the average employer in the same classification, usually over the latest available three years of data. A mod of 1.00 is the unity factor. A mod below 1.00 is a credit mod, meaning better-than-average loss experience, and a mod above 1.00 is a debit mod.

Two cautions. First, NCCI's plan does not apply in every state; its guide lists several, including California, New York, Pennsylvania and the monopolistic state-fund states such as Ohio and Washington, where mods are produced differently. If you work there, say which rating bureau or state fund issued your number. Second, do not guess at a cutoff. Many owners set their own EMR and TRIR limits, and they vary by owner and by the risk of the work. Publish your numbers and let the buyer compare.

Round out the safety page with what sits behind the numbers: your written safety program, how you staff site safety on larger jobs, the training your crews carry, and how you handle stop-work authority and incident review. Keep it specific and short.

What capacity details do plant buyers look for?

After trade and safety, the next question is whether you can actually show up. Answer it on an "About" or "Capacity" page, in numbers:

Detail	What to publish
Craft headcount	Typical and peak craft workers by trade (pipefitters, welders, ironworkers, millwrights, operators)
Supervision	Number of superintendents and foremen, and how many years they have been with you
Equipment owned	Cranes and capacities, welding rigs, excavators, hydrotest and pipe machining equipment you own versus rent
Geographic coverage	Home base, states you regularly work in, and how far you travel for a turnaround
Emergency response	Whether you take call-outs after hours, and the number to call
Site access and badging	Credentials your crews hold for the facilities you serve

Badging deserves its own line because it decides who can walk onto a site on day one. For maritime work, the Coast Guard's TWIC rule (33 CFR 101.514) says all persons requiring unescorted access to secure areas of vessels, facilities and OCS facilities regulated under the Maritime Transportation Security Act must possess a TWIC, the Transportation Worker Identification Credential that TSA issues after a security threat assessment. If you work at docks, terminals or waterfront plants, say how many of your crew hold one. The same goes for any site-specific or plant safety orientations your workers already carry.

What should a bid request form ask?

Keep it short. A maintenance manager filling out your form at 6 a.m. will not answer twenty fields. Ask for:

Site: facility type and city, so you know if it is in your area and what badging applies.
Scope: a free-text description, the trade from a dropdown, and an upload for drawings, photos or a scope of work.
Window: when the work has to happen, and whether it is tied to an outage or shutdown.
Contact: name, company, phone and preferred contact method.
Walk-down: a checkbox asking if they want a site visit before you price it.

Put a phone number next to the form for emergency work, and tell people when to expect a reply. Our guide on how to get more RFQs from your website covers form design and follow-up in more depth.

Common mistakes on industrial contractor websites

One page covering every trade, so nothing ranks and nothing convinces.
Safety claims with no numbers, such as "safety is our top priority" with no TRIR or EMR in sight.
Client logos used without permission, which can cost you the client.
Projects with no scope or schedule, just a photo and a city.
No emergency contact, when after-hours call-outs are often how a contractor gets its first job at a plant.
A contact form that asks for budget first, when the buyer wants a price from you.

Industrial contractors win shortlists the same way manufacturers win RFQs: specific pages, real numbers and an easy way to ask for a price. Our industrial contractor website design page covers how a contractor site can be organized, and our working demo sites show what a finished industrial site can look like. Exhibit Domain plans are $99, $199 and $499 a month billed annually. Monthly-only billing costs 25 percent more and cancels any time, and annual plans carry a 7-day refund window. Hosting and SSL are included. See our pricing page, or request a quote for a custom project.

Frequently asked questions

How do you calculate TRIR for a contractor?

Multiply the number of OSHA recordable injuries and illnesses by 200,000, then divide by total employee hours worked in the same period. The Bureau of Labor Statistics explains that 200,000 hours equals 100 employees working 40 hours a week, 50 weeks a year. For example, 2 recordable cases on 180,000 hours gives a TRIR of 2.22.

What is a good EMR for an industrial contractor?

NCCI treats 1.00 as the unity factor. A mod below 1.00 is a credit mod, reflecting better-than-average loss experience, and a mod above 1.00 is a debit mod. There is no single passing number. Many owners set their own cutoff, so publish your last three years and let buyers compare.

Should a contractor name its clients on its website?

Only with written permission. Many refineries, chemical plants and utilities do not allow contractors to use their names or logos. Describe the owner by type and region instead, such as a Gulf Coast refinery or a Midwest food plant, and put the detail into the scope, schedule and outcome.

Do contractors need a TWIC card for maritime facilities?

Workers who need unescorted access to secure areas of facilities and vessels regulated under the Maritime Transportation Security Act must hold a TWIC, under Coast Guard rule 33 CFR 101.514. TSA issues the card after a security threat assessment. If you work at ports, terminals or waterfront plants, say on your website how many of your crew carry one.