--- title: How to Get Specified by Engineers and Architects. description: Specification happens long before the RFQ. What engineers and architects need to find, and how to be written into the spec rather than bidding against it. image: https://www.cobaltsalesgroup.com/hubfs/featured-image-Oct-14-2026-03-51-23-6169-PM.png --- [![Input Sans Font Color](https://www.cobaltsalesgroup.com/hs-fs/hubfs/Input%20Sans%20Font%20Color.png?width=240&height=55&name=Input%20Sans%20Font%20Color.png "Input Sans Font Color")](https://www.cobaltsalesgroup.com) - [612-361-6725](tel:%20612-361-6725) - [Blog](https://www.cobaltsalesgroup.com/learning-center) [Contact Us](https://www.cobaltsalesgroup.com/contact-us) 1. [Home](https://www.cobaltsalesgroup.com) / 2. [Blog](https://www.cobaltsalesgroup.com/learning-center) / 3. Getting Specified by Engineers and Architects # Getting Specified by Engineers and Architects ![Bob Engelhart](https://www.cobaltsalesgroup.com/hs-fs/hubfs/Bob_Engelhart-webp.webp?width=80&height=80&name=Bob_Engelhart-webp.webp) By [Bob Engelhart](https://www.cobaltsalesgroup.com/about), President, Cobalt Sales Group Published: TBD ·  Last updated: September 17, 2026  ·  13 min read If a manufacturer keeps losing on price, the explanation is often not the price. It is that the job was decided weeks or months before the quote request arrived, by an engineer at a desk choosing how to solve a problem. What makes that moment different from the rest of industrial selling is that the decision is effectively made before the manufacturer is invited to bid, and often before he knows the project exists. This article covers who that person is, what he needs to find, and what it takes to be the product he writes down. It sits alongside the other buyer roles in [Getting Found by the People Who Actually Buy](https://www.cobaltsalesgroup.com/learnig-center/getting-found-by-the-people-who-actually-buy), and the full picture is in [How Modern Manufacturers Get Found](https://www.cobaltsalesgroup.com/learnig-center/how-modern-manufacturers-get-found). The short version: by the time a quote request goes out, the governing document often already describes a particular product. The answer to how to get specified by engineers is to be findable and usable during design, with technical material an engineer can put straight to work. Table of Contents ## **How do you get specified by engineers?** By being present, and usable, at the design stage rather than the quoting stage. A specification is the document that governs what gets bought: the written requirements, and often the named products, that a purchase must satisfy. Being specified means your product is named in it, or your performance characteristics are written into it. The consequence of that timing is where the money is. A manufacturer named in the specification is competing on fit, because the document already describes his product. Anyone arriving afterward has to give the buyer a reason to deviate from what is written, and the easiest reason to offer is a lower price. Two companies can quote the same job from completely different positions, and neither one's sales effort explains the difference. The research says this happens without you. In the [2026 GlobalSpec State of Marketing to Engineers survey](https://advertising.globalspec.com/state-of-marketing-to-engineers-research-report), technical buyers report that 62 percent of the buying process happens online before they engage with a vendor, and only 10 percent say they would prefer not to talk to a salesperson at all. The willingness to talk is there. The talking just comes later than it used to, after the research that shaped the requirements is finished. ## **What technical documentation do engineers need to find?** A sample of what that means in practice, with the emphasis varying by industry: dimensional data, performance curves, computer-aided design (CAD) and building information modeling (BIM) files, material certifications, application notes, and three-part specifications where the construction trades use that format. These are working documents, not marketing collateral. Format matters as much as content, because a specification writer needs material he can use directly. A CAD model that drops into the assembly, a BIM object that lands in the project file, a data sheet with the numbers on it. The [EETech 2026 Buyer Journey Study](https://www.eetech.com/buyer-journey-study-2026), a survey of 750 engineers largely buying semiconductor components, describes discovery as fragmented and self-directed, with friction at any step removing a vendor from consideration and downloadable design assets functioning as deal-breakers rather than extras. Which raises the form question, and the research supports a more careful answer than the usual advice. GlobalSpec found that 85 percent of technical buyers are willing to provide their information for technical content they find valuable, with ebooks and guides (47 percent) and white papers (37 percent) the most likely to earn a form fill, and CAD drawings lower at 34 percent. So forms are not fatal. The distinction that matters is between an asset and a tool. A genuinely valuable educational asset can reasonably sit behind a form. Routine working data cannot, because at the design stage an equivalent is one search away, and a specifier comparing three manufacturers will usually finish the drawing with the two whose numbers he could reach without negotiating for them. ## **How do engineers find your products online?** They arrive with constraints rather than with a supplier in mind: a temperature to hold, a material to handle, a footprint to fit, a standard to meet. Whether a manufacturer's pages are organized around those constraints, or around his own product lines, decides whether the two ever meet. EETech describes engineer discovery as fragmented and self-directed, with friction at any step removing a vendor from consideration. The mismatch is structural. Where a manufacturer's site is organized the way the company is organized, by product line and internal nomenclature, it can miss a buyer working from constraints entirely, even when the product is a perfect match. The catalog answers the question "what do we make?" The buyer asked "what holds 400 degrees in a six-inch envelope?" Closing that gap starts with language. The terms to publish are the ones the audience uses, which are frequently not the internal names on the catalog page. GlobalSpec's data on where technical buyers routinely research points to where those terms are visible: online technical publications (76 percent) have edged past supplier and vendor websites (74 percent) as a routine source, with industry directories and association groups close behind. Reading how the trade press and the standards bodies describe an application is a practical way to learn the vocabulary buyers are actually typing. The same question, asked of the assistants and the search box directly, shows which phrasings return whom. This is also the ground where "How to get specified by architects?" differs slightly from the engineering case. Architects and their specification writers work in project documents and often in BIM environments, so the format expectations tighten: three-part specifications in the trade's standard structure, BIM objects that behave correctly in the model, and documentation that can be attached to a submittal. What changes for this audience is the deliverable, not the discipline. ## **How do you reach the firms doing the designing?** Two routes, and they work on different timescales. Direct engagement with engineering and architecture firms during the design phase rather than at the quoting stage, and presence in the technical communities where these professionals already discuss products. The community half comes with a warning that should be stated plainly rather than offered as a tactic: technical communities detect and reject promotional participation quickly. The only durable approach is contributing real answers to real questions, under a real name, with no pitch attached. A manufacturer who cannot commit to that should not participate at all, because a failed attempt is worse than an absence. GlobalSpec's platform data indicates where the relevant discussion happens, with Stack Overflow and Reddit growing in value among technical buyers while X and TikTok continue to erode. There is a useful preliminary step before trying to build any of this. Some manufacturers already have reputation in these communities without knowing it, in threads where engineers recommended their product without anyone from the company being present. Finding what already exists is cheaper than creating it, and it shows which of your products the audience already trusts. ## **What certifications and technical data should you highlight?** The evidence that reduces risk for the person who has to defend the choice: certifications, test data, compliance documentation, and evidence of similar work in service. Publish the specific and verifiable rather than the general and impressive. The internal-defense point is the one most manufacturers miss. An engineer who wants to use your product may still have to justify adding it, particularly at companies running approved vendor lists. EETech's finding is that most engineers working under those constraints can introduce a new vendor if they can make the internal case, and the barrier is the effort of justifying it rather than the list itself. Published documentation is what he carries into that conversation. Every certification, test result, and documented application is a sentence he does not have to compose himself. Two pieces of research sharpen what to publish. GlobalSpec found that engineering experts at vendor companies are the most trusted authors of technical content, at 66 percent rating them very or extremely trustworthy, while generative AI tools rank last at 10 percent. Naming the engineer behind the document matters. And when two solutions look technically similar, 70 percent of buyers are likely to choose the better-known brand, though 34 percent say their most recent decision rested entirely on technical characteristics, pricing, or performance regardless of brand. Familiarity is an advantage; published specifics are how a less familiar manufacturer competes anyway. The same material serves a second audience. Specific, verifiable technical data is what an artificial intelligence (AI) system can confirm against other sources, and a capability claim is not checkable by either audience. "Rated for continuous duty at 400 degrees Fahrenheit" can be corroborated and quoted. "Engineered for the most demanding applications" cannot be checked by an engineer or by a machine. The Buyer Visibility Audit runs the application searches your buyers run and shows you what comes back: which competitors are named, which pages the answers draw on, and where your published depth falls short. Free, one to two business days, scoring Buyer Visibility, Authority Signals, AI Readiness and Conversion Ready. ***Editorial Note*** *I source from primary research where I can reach it, credible reporting of it where I can't, and leave out what I can't verify at all. Cobalt's own client figures include the measurement method and sample size.* *The recommendations reflect my experience, not a settled answer. Search and buyer behavior keep changing, your situation isn't identical to my clients', and I still get things wrong. Verify anything that matters.* ## Find out where you stand If you want to know what buyers and AI systems currently see when they look for a company like yours, the Buyer Visibility Audit will tell you. It is free, delivered in one to two business days, and scores four areas: Buyer Visibility, Authority Signals, AI Readiness, and Conversion Ready, including which competitors come up when buyers search the applications you serve. No obligation and no pitch attached to it. If what it shows is worth acting on, we can talk about what that would involve. [Request Your Free Buyer Visibility Audit →](https://www.cobaltsalesgroup.com/audit-request) Free. No obligation. 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