Here are some of the findings that I thought were interesting:
- The key theme from the research is to have a documented content marketing strategy. 35% have a documented content marketing strategy, 48% have one not documented, and 14% do not have a strategy.
- 84% said brand awareness was their most important goal of content marketing.
- Website traffic (at 63%) was the metric used the most to assess content marketing success. The lowest metric was subscriber growth at 30%.
- Content marketing tactics used the most was social media at 92%, e-newsletters at 83%, website articles as 81%, and blogs at 80%.
- The top four challenges marketers face are producing engaging content (54%), producing content consistently (50%), measuring content effectiveness (49%), and producing a variety of content (42%).
- Creating more engaging content is the top content marketing initiative. 69% are currently doing this and 19% are planning to do this within the next 12 months.
- 55% are currently trying to have a better understanding of what content is effective and what isn't. 31% plan do this within the next 12 months.
- 63% are currently trying to find more and better ways to repurpose content. 23% plan to do within the next 12 months.
- 63% are currently trying to better understand their audience. 21% plan to do this within the next 12 months.
- 62% are organizing content on website. 21% plan to do this within the next 12 months and 12% said it is not a priority.
- 55% of the respondents that have a documented content strategy publish new content daily or multiple times a week.