Press release: 24/02/2023

For the 2nd year in a row, we are thrilled to announce that Global Road Technology has been awarded as the “Industry Leader” and the “Most Reviewed” company in the dust control and dust suppression market in Australia. 

Introduction

eKomi, the world’s largest provider of user-validated ratings and reviews, has released its 2022 StarInsights™, an exclusive report on the digital presence and consumer feedback of the top dust control and suppression company’s in Australia. After weeks of intensive research, eKomi’s team of consumer-review experts have compared the last performance of these dust suppression companies across factors such as customer reviews and ratings, online visibility, Google rankings, and website traffic.

Dust Control & Dust Suppression Market Overview

Effective mining dust suppression services are crucial for ensuring the health and safety of everyone involved, and the ability to deliver a positive customer experience can save many lives. Dust suppression has come a long way from being a traditional utility service that relied on water alone, to a tailored and innovative process that uses the best solutions to address dust at its source and improve operational efficiency. Haul roads, stockpiles, veneering, drilling and blasting, and material handling are just a few of the areas that require attention. As a result, mining dust suppression is more complex than ever and demands detailed advisory services, expertise, a genuine duty of care, and a greater focus on customer-centricity.

The Australian dust suppression service provider market, particularly in the mining industry, is highly competitive, with several top players dominating the space. These include

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, this industry relied primarily on face-to-face interactions, with business development managers and engineers visiting mine sites across the country to propose the best product for the dust issue. However, the pandemic has forced the industry to undergo a dramatic transformation, both in terms of the speed of change and the required investment in digital technology.

eKomi: Most Reviewed Dust Suppression Companies Australia

Just as positive ratings and reviews are crucial to a company’s success, they also provide a relatively reliable indicator of the quality of products and services offered. With that correlation in mind, eKomi’s StarInsights™ study examined the TOP dust suppression providers and aggregated their reviews across several platforms including Google, Facebook, Ekomi, Glassdoor, etc.

 

The table above shows the performance of six mining dust suppression companies in terms of their total reviews and average ratings in 2021 and 2022. Global Road Technology (GRT) received the highest number of reviews in both years, 2097 and 1290 respectively, with with an average rating of 4.85. Vital Chemicals had a total of 14 reviews in each year and an average rating of 4.87, while Dustaside had relatively low review numbers and an average rating of 4.6. Erizon had no reviews in either year, and Spraygrass had only three reviews in 2022, with an average rating of 4.5. Rainstorm had five reviews in 2022, with a perfect rating of 5, and four reviews in 2021.

GRT has been very active in not only collecting reviews but also dominating across all the top platforms. They are also very popular on Ekomi’s review platform and several other platforms such as Google, Facebook, Local Search, Yellow Pages, Trustpilot, etc. GRT also managed to achieve impressive employee reviews on Glassdoor, while the rest of the players have an insignificant presence.

Global Road Technology received the highest number of reviews on eKomi and Facebook, with 1201 and 596 reviews respectively, while Vital Chemicals did not receive any reviews on eKomi but had the highest number of reviews on Google with 9. RST Solutions did not receive any reviews on eKomi or Google but had 4 on Facebook and 16 on Glassdoor. Rainstorm did not receive any reviews on eKomi but had 4 on Google, 1 on Facebook, and none on Glassdoor. Dustaside did not receive any reviews on eKomi or Google but had 10 on Facebook and 3 on Glassdoor. Erizon did not receive any reviews on any of the listed review platforms. Finally, Spraygrass had only 1 review on Google and 2 on Facebook but did not receive any reviews on eKomi or Glassdoor.

“If these dust suppression providers hope to compete online, they’ll need to make a concerted effort to start collecting customer ratings and reviews over the next 12 months,” commented Michael Ambros, eKomi Founder, and CEO. Research shows that nearly a fifth of customers return to a provider and even become loyal customers when a business acknowledges and takes care of their bad experience. We would recommend every business work with negative reviews and derive value from them. It is especially beneficial for companies with ratings below 4,5 and high review-collection rates. When a company is effectively collecting consumer feedback, a low rating shows that there is room for improvement in customer service.

Online Visibility & Perceptual Mapping

The Online search visibility score is the percentage of clicks a website receives based on the organic ranking positions, across all of the keywords that a website is competing for. Search visibility score gives an overview of how well a website is performing in the organic search results on Google. The Visibility index is based on click-through rate (CTR) that shows a website’s progress in Google’s top 100 search results. A 0% visibility means that the domain isn’t ranking in Google’s top 100 results for any of these keywords, and a 100% visibility means that the domain keeps the first position in the SERP for all of these keywords. With that correlation in mind, eKomi’s StarInsights™ study examined the online visibility of the TOP dust suppression websites and projected them on a perceptual map to highlight the positioning of these websites on Google.

Global Road Technology clearly dominates Google search performance with an online visibility score of 40.01% across 85 relevant keywords on Google search results while the next best player is Dustaside at only 15.13%. Most of the players are all below 10%. GRT has an average Google ranking position of 5.93 across the 85 keywords tracked. The next best is Dustaside with a visibility of 40.01% and an average position of 48.02.

 

 

 

GRT is ranking at the top of Google search results for more than 74 keywords and outperforming the rest of the players by a huge margin. Dustaside and Wetearth are closing competing in the middle grid for 30+ keywords with an average Google ranking position of 40.

Overall traffic and Google ranking distribution

Ranking distribution is an overview of rankings a website has in Google’s top 3, top 10, and top 20 and top 100 organic results. Online reviews and online visibility scores clearly indicate who leads the charts when it comes to overall traffic and ranking distribution. GRT has over 54 search result rankings in Google’s top 3, 74 in the top 10, and 80 in the top 20. Dustaside and Wetearth have only around 50 search result rankings in Google’s top 100.

Semrush offers an estimated traffic score for all the keywords tracked. According to Semrush, users will click on a domain’s search result depending on this domain’s position in the SERP, multiplied by the keyword’s Volume and divided by 30 (number of days in a month). This gives us the estimated traffic score for a website. As GRT dominates the Google search results, it has a traffic score of 50.23 which is up from 35.22 in 2022 while the next best competitor Dustaside has a score of only 18.62.

“We’ve seen time and again, across a wide range of sectors, that brands who activate their reviews and ratings see a dramatic leap in search engine-referred traffic, and a corresponding boost in revenue,” commented Michael Ambros, eKomi Founder, and CEO. He further says “This research clearly calls out the impact that reviews and ratings can have on a company’s success, regardless of its size or advertising budget.”

The Crucial Importance of Ratings and Reviews

As many merchants now recognize, customer ratings and reviews are absolutely essential for success in the online marketplace – especially when those scores are integrated into Google search results. Although a comprehensive, user-friendly website is obviously crucial, public reviews build trust before visitors even click the site’s link, significantly increasing its chances of receiving traffic.

Reviews and ratings also boost revenue-generating activity and inspire even more positive reviews – setting off a “virtuous cycle” in which a well-reviewed website’s popularity continues to skyrocket. Poor reviews, on the other hand, can set off a downward spiral: a site’s sudden disappearance from top search results can abruptly destroy its customer base. With the increased use of mobile and a digital boom after the pandemic, the power of online search has continued to grow and so has the impact of user reviews.

Recent research in 2023 has shown that the impact of customer reviews on purchasing decisions is increasing. According to a study by Podium, 93% of consumers say online reviews have an impact on their purchasing decisions. Furthermore, 82% of consumers specifically seek out negative reviews before making a purchase to see if the company’s response to the issue was satisfactory. This underscores the importance for businesses to not only gather positive reviews, but also to respond thoughtfully to negative feedback. Moreover,

* 89% of customers won’t take action until they read reviews.
* 15% of users don’t trust businesses without reviews.

If users like your brand they will listen to you, but if they trust your brand, they will do business with you. This makes it clear that publicly visible feedback from real customers is a key component in a merchant’s success. And as Google’s search algorithms grow ever smarter, positive reviews and ratings are becoming especially vital in the heated competition for those all-important “above-the-fold” natural search rankings.

Additionally, research by ReviewTrackers has found that 94% of consumers would avoid a business with negative reviews, and that businesses with a rating below 3.5 stars are considered “risky” by consumers. On the other hand, businesses with an average rating of 4 stars or higher are more likely to be chosen over their competitors. This indicates that a strong online reputation is crucial for businesses looking to attract and retain customers.

Conclusion

Global Road Technology (GRT) has emerged as the clear winner of the eKomi StarInsights 2022 award, thanks to its dominance in online reviews and Google search performance. The company has outperformed its competitors by a significant margin, establishing itself as a leader in the digital space for dust control and dust suppression. In an interview with GRT’s Managing Director, Troy Adams, he attributed the company’s success to its innovative engineering technology and a team of experts, including chartered engineers, polymers chemists, and geotechnical specialists.

Adams highlighted GRT’s efforts to adapt to digital trends by launching the industry-first iOT smart technology product, an online mining products marketplace, an industry Q&A collaboration series, as well as publishing weekly industry articles on the website and engaging regularly with customers and the wider mining community on social media.

“What is becoming apparent is that the reputation of GRT for providing eco-friendly, sustainable and effective products to control particulate pollution for the purpose of protecting the environment, mining site personnel, along with local communities, is growing and was one of the core drivers of this new deal. One of the most exciting elements of our new relationship with TotalEnergies is that it will provide us the ability to promote and grow our autonomous SMART Dosing Units (Sustainable, Mining, Autonomously, Reporting Technology) that use data and automation to help in mitigating particulate pollution to the mine sites serviced by the wider TotalEnergies network.” said GRT CEO Troy Adams.

This award emphasizes the impact of customer engagement and feedback collection on the success of a business, and eKomi recommends that other players in this market should focus on collecting online reviews and increasing their digital presence to stay relevant to the rapidly evolving consumer needs and digital preferences.

Source: eKomi StarInsights 2022