Notes for owners · Websites and conversion
Certifications buyers ask for: ISO, test reports and what to show on the website
Show each certificate with its number, scope, issuing body and validity date, and link the PDF, so a buyer's quality team can check you before they ring.
The GullySales team · Updated 17 Oct 2026 · 5 min read
On this page
Show every certificate as a small card with four facts: the number, what it covers, who issued it, and the date it runs to. Link the PDF from the card. A logo in the footer says you once held a certificate. The card lets the buyer's quality team check that it still covers the part to be bought, which is what they were going to ring and ask anyway.
What the buyer's quality person does with your page
A purchase manager in a pump company shortlists three foundries. The website does not decide the castings. The manager forwards the link to a quality engineer, who has a vendor approval form with a line reading "certificate, number, validity".
The engineer opens your site looking for that line. If it is a logo, an email has to go asking for the copy. That email is one more step between you and the next stage.
Put the line on the page and the engineer can fill the form without writing to you.
The certificate card
One card per certificate, in the same order every time. Here is a layout you can paste into your page builder:
Quality management system
Certificate no.: (as printed)
Standard: (as printed, with the year)
Scope: (the words on the certificate, not your summary)
Issued by: (certification body)
Site covered: (plant address or unit name)
Valid until: (date printed on the certificate)
[ Download the certificate, PDF ]
Copy the scope word for word. Auditors and buyers both read scope, and a paraphrase that sounds wider than the certificate is how a small difference turns into a lost vendor code.
Treat the "site covered" line as seriously. If you have two units and only one was audited, say which one.
What a certificate does not say
An ISO management-system certificate usually describes how a site is run. It does not approve each product that leaves it. Say that plainly on the card or the page, in one sentence, because a buyer who assumes more will feel misled later and blame you.
Product approvals, type tests and the marks that apply to a particular trade are a separate matter. Electrical goods, chemicals, food and similar lines carry rules that differ by state and body and change, so check with your own adviser or the regulator before you describe any approval on the site. List only what you hold, with the number, and leave the interpretation to the issuing body.
Test reports: public or on request?
Reports fall into two groups, and they need different treatment.
| Kind | Example | On the website? |
|---|---|---|
| Your own routine evidence | A sample material test report with the customer details blanked | Yes, as an example of format, marked "sample" |
| A lab's report on your standard product | A lab report on a catalogue item | Yes, with the lab name and report number, if it is not tied to one customer |
| A report made for one buyer's part | Dimensional report on the buyer's drawing | No. Send on request, to that buyer only |
| Third-party audit report | A customer's own audit of your plant | No. It belongs to the customer |
Name the laboratory and say whether it holds an accreditation. If you do, give the accreditation number as printed and let the buyer check it with the body. If you cannot show it, do not hint at it.
An invented case: a grey iron foundry in Coimbatore
Take an invented foundry in Coimbatore whose footer carries three round logos: ISO, a council badge and "Approved Supplier". The quality engineer of a pump maker in Kalapatti asks for the certificate. The foundry sends a scan. The engineer notices the scope reads "machining of components", while the foundry sells castings, and the validity had passed three weeks earlier.
Nobody was dishonest. The scan was the old file and the renewal letter was in a drawer. The order went to a competitor who had the line on the page, and the foundry's own renewal took another six weeks to settle.
The foundry rebuilt the page around cards. Each card carried the scope exactly as printed on the new certificate, the audit body's name and the validity date. At the next surveillance audit the owner also asked for the scope to read castings, which meant extra audit time and cost that the foundry had not budgeted. The "Approved Supplier" badge came down, because nobody in the office could say who had approved them.
Keeping the page true after it goes up
A card with a stale date is worse than no card, so give the upkeep to one named person. Three small habits do the work.
Put each expiry date in the office diary sixty days ahead, with the certification body's contact. On the day a new certificate arrives, swap the PDF and the date on the card before you file the paper copy. And when the scope or site changes at an audit, change the card and the sentence on your product pages on the same day.
Also check the file name. A PDF called "ISO final 2 copy.pdf" gets forwarded into a buyer's approval folder and stays there. Name it plainly, with the standard and the validity year, so the version a buyer holds can be told from the current one.
When to put less on the page
Skip the badge row if your certificates do not fit your product. A tidy "pending" line is better than a mismatched scope. And if you hold only one certificate, show one card; four empty frames look worse than none.
Do not show a customer's approval letter unless that customer agreed in writing. Some buyers treat their vendor list as confidential.
Put it on the page this week
Pull out each certificate you hold and check the scope, the site and the date against the card above. Fix whatever does not match, then give the cards one page and link it from the footer and the product pages. If you want help with the wording, website content writing is the service, the manufacturing hub has more for factories, and you can tell us what you need.
