INTERNET POWER: A Youngsville company jump-starts its online presence.

Trimm, Inc., is a producer and supplier of DC power distribution panels and electrical accessories, such as breakers, fuses, amps and adapters.

The 40-employee company in Youngsville, a town of about 2,100 residents 45 minutes northeast of Raleigh, has an onsite manufacturing facility and a large national and international customer base in the telecommunications industry.

To increase business, remain immediately accessible to customers and be more competitive in a worldwide digital society, Trimm contacted the Small Business and Technology Development Center [SBTDC] office at N.C. State in June 2022 about participation in its Digital Jump Start program designed for mid-sized businesses.

The result is a thorough, five-page Executive Summary and five-page Digital Media Audit that assess Trimm's digital presence with recommendations to "jump start the client's digital shift."

"What we wanted was an independent review of our website and suggestions of how we could expand our marketing presence to reach other markets," says vice president Ricky Brummitt, who also heads Trimm s sales and marketing. "What we're doing with the SBTDC is we wanted a more modern website--that was one of the keys --because it needs that, then we can expand on it in the future. We're also adding to our social media, like Twitter, and we created a Facebook page and Instagram, and we're expanding more on LinkedIn."

The LinkedIn account, he says, helps target personnel for Trimm to contact.

"It's not like we can advertise on a billboard," he says. "We need to contact the decision-makers within different companies."

Keeping pace with the continual evolution of social media is vital.

When the firm was founded by Walter Trimm more than 100 years ago in 1922, it had one, solitary communications device: APOTL.

"Plain of telephone line," says current owner and president Will Newton, who has been with the company about 15 years and is a third-generation owner, though he's been involved with Trimm for a while. (His grandfather bought the business in 1980, and his father took over 10 years later. Newton bought it in 2010.)

"Back in 1999 we had dial-up internet, then one of the changes was to an ADSL [Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line], in about 2000, and we were spending so much per line," Newton says. "We've had a website since around 1998.1 was involved in one of our first website rebuilds, and so this is about our fourth--or fifth-generation website. Back then it was mostly...