Content Marketing Strategy 2015

INTRODUCTION

I came across an interesting survey this week published by the Content Marketing Institute that I thought had a lot of useful information on the  state of content marketing in the B2B realm. There were plenty of implications for the B2C content marketing segment as well.

Below you will see some of the results I have put together in a simple infographic. These have a direct  correlation with how the B2C bloggers should handle their planning, posting schedule, and measurements of their expenses (ROI) as they run their online marketing business.

Here is my infographic:

DETAILS

The survey was designed by the Content Marketing Institute (CMI) and their partners for the survey, Business Marketing Association, and Brightcove. These are three of the biggest players in the content marketing industry in the world.

Together they have done an annual survey for the last 5 years, so they can now track changes in the concerns, areas of focus, and future plans of a variety of content marketing  operations in a wide swath of industries.

CMI is a leading global content marketing , educational and training organization, while Brightcove is a leading global company that provides a variety of  cloud based solutions for clients across connected device types.

The Business Marketing Association provides education for the marketer, and membership is currently over 640,000, and they are scattered throughout the globe. They keep members up to date do virtual conferences, and generally teach members how to apply the information they learn about and share.

For the survey, 5.167 recipients from across the globe were asked to participate. They purposely sent it to companies of different sizes and industries to get as clear and accurate picture as possible. There were 1820 respondants (better than 30% action takers, a pretty good ratio!), of which 1572 stated that they did use content marketing as a segment of their marketing program.

RESULTS

Most of the ones I thought were pertinent can be found in the infographic, but there are a few additiional points I would like to pount out over and above what you see above.

There was one section that addressed comparisons between the future actions that B2B versus B2C were planning to take. Figures under B2B and B2C represent the percentages of the content marketing segment in each niche that were addressing the subject queried.

Subject                                                                                                              B2B     B2C

Creating a Mobile Strategy                                                                       58        74

Raising their understanding of content marketing strategy   70       77

Leveraging user- or fan- generated content                                     48       70

Real-time content  marketing                                                                    47       58

Content personalization                                                                               64      70

Developing a channel plan for social media                                      67      75

As can be easily seen, it appears that the B2C segment is more aware of and attuned/eager to address client concerns that can have a direct and impactful on their bottom line.

CONCLUSION

Taking stock of where the industry is and will likely be over the next year is a very useful undertaking, and this surveyu provides a wealth of information helping you to address potential weak or problem areas in your business. When you do, this should increase your effectiveness, provide a better ROI, and help you focus on your clients in ways that will keep them back again and again.

Please take a few moments and drop me a comment below. I truly am interested iin your feedback or ideas and I am sure others visiting are also! Thanks and have a Blessed day!

Kind Regards,

Dave