10 data-based facts that illustrate today’s content marketing landscape
Content marketing – if you’re in marketing or leading a firm today, you’ve heard people singing the praises of this approach so much you might be tired of hearing the term. That’s fair, but there are solid reasons why content marketing is such a hot trend. It’s also a broad approach with so much variety that you’ll have to pick and choose where to focus your energies, unless your firm has unlimited marketing resources.
A company called iScribblers has created an infographic that brings together no fewer than 64 different statistics, all related to various aspects of content marketing. You can see the entire infographic here and examine the data sources iScribblers used, shown at the bottom of the infographic. If you’ve got the time to dig in, go to it! We’re all busy though, so here are the ten statistics from it that I found most interesting and persuasive:
- 9 of 10 people who make B2B purchasing decisions report that online content significantly contributes to their ultimate choice.
- LinkedIn is by far the most effective social networking platform – 277% more so than Facebook or Twitter in terms of lead generation.
- Blogging is the single most popular content marketing tactic used by B2B businesses today (65% of them), followed closely by social media and case studies, which both come in at 64%.
- Writing effective blogs takes time and skill, so it’s no surprise that 64% of B2B marketers opt to turn the writing over to an outsourced provider.
- Companies that employ content marketing see six times as many conversions as those that don’t.
- Of the top four challenges in content marketing for B2B businesses, #1 and #3 are about the content itself (producing engaging content and producing content consistently, respectively), while #2 and #4 relate to the difficulty of measuring its effectiveness and ROI.
- A whopping 92% of marketers believe the content their organization creates is a business asset, and 74% observe a drastic increase in the number and quality of leads when they employ an informed content strategy.
- Just over half of B2B marketers (51%) intent to spend more on content marketing in the coming year.
- 93% of B2B brands today are relying on content marketing as part of their strategy, which is a smart decision considering that…
- 95% of buyers perceive this type of communication as trustworthy when they are considering companies in a B2B context!
Content marketing is powerful, effective and cost-efficient. The data points above are only a tiny sampling of the overwhelming evidence proving that this is one marketing approach your firm needs to take seriously.
