New survey findings from ThomasNet.com reveal industrial professionals’ top concerns over the past year and business prospects moving forward. The results reflect a surprisingly optimistic outlook overall, supported by an agenda for revitalizing industry’s image.

Despite serious concerns about the current business environment, many manufacturers are optimistic about the rest of the year, following a year of reported growth, according to new findings from ThomasNet.com.

More than 3,700 buyers and sellers of industrial products and services in North America responded to ThomasNet.com’s latest annual Industry Market Barometer (IMB) survey, conducted in January and February 2012. Respondents were engineers and procurement agents, as well as sales and marketing executives in manufacturing, distribution and services. The majority (78 percent) represent small to midsized businesses (SMBs), and approximately 44 percent identified themselves as product or custom manufacturers.

According to the findings, nearly 46 percent of all surveyed companies grew in 2011, marking the fifth consecutive year that IMB survey respondents reported growth.

Among product and custom manufacturers, more than half (53 percent) said they grew last year. This growth was credited largely to focusing on customer service and retention (75 percent), as well as a number of other strategies and tactics, including competing more aggressively in core markets; developing new products/services; and pursuing new business both overseas and domestically.

Moreover, 75 percent of product and custom manufacturers forecast further growth this year. For this segment, the top growth markets for 2012 are fabricated metals, aerospace and defense, and automotive.

The overall growth figures were the result of real sales growth. According to the survey findings. Ninety-three percent of all respondents said cutting costs or staff had little or no contribution to their growth. At the same time, 96 percent said that reduced pricing had little or no effect on their growth.

Growth is also expected to continue, with close to 70 percent of all respondents expecting their businesses to expand by the end of 2012. Almost 90 percent were optimistic about future growth in their particular market sector.

This level of optimism underscores a new wave of investment among manufacturers preparing to meet future demand. An estimated 83 percent of manufacturers indicated they will direct more resources toward increasing production capacity, while 72 percent of product and custom manufacturers are investing in efforts to compete in core markets in 2012. They are spending on capital equipment, hardware and software to ramp up production capacity (83 percent), upgrading their facilities (71 percent) and developing new products and services (66 percent).

Moreover, nearly half (48 percent) said they are looking to bring on new staff, with openings for line workers (52 percent), skilled trade workers (48 percent) and engineers (40 percent). Another 45 percent plan to maintain their current headcount.

Industrial firms have gone to great lengths to become more competitive, and have been successful in many ways, yet they also cited a number of continuing challenges.

Chief among their business concerns: customers cutting back (56 percent), followed closely by pricing pressures (55 percent). Other key challenges include domestic (38 percent) and overseas (27 percent) competition, as well as a lack of working capital (28 percent).

Product and custom manufacturers indicated slightly different priorities. Among this group, 61 percent said they are struggling with pricing pressures, while 48 percent expressed concern for customers cutting back. There is more concern with overseas competition (39 percent) than with domestic competition (36 percent).

Even as American manufacturers continue to grow their businesses and add to headcount, many respondents reported a skilled labor shortage as a sizeable issue. Nearly 57 percent of all respondents cited this as a key challenge in recruiting efforts. For product and custom manufacturers, the issue of skilled labor shortages (25 percent) is more prevalent among manufacturers than lack of working capital (21 percent).

To help close the skills gap, many industrial professionals called for better education that targets key skills to help build the next generation of talent. In particular, they stressed the importance of science, technology, engineering and mathematics curricula and called for a return to shop classes in high school while advocating support for technical and vocational schools.

Overwhelmingly, industrial companies are pushing to restore American manufacturing to its earlier glory. Many said the public perception of the manufacturing sector is part of the problem, and called for a revitalized image to better reflect the realities of their industry, which would ultimately boost the overall economy.

For more on ThomasNet.com’s comprehensive IMB survey findings, see our next biweekly issue, in which we’ll parse the data to uncover what the figures mean for U.S. industry at large and industrial professionals’ own careers.