Summary of 2015 Nonprofit Content Marketing Report

The 2015 Nonprofit Content Marketing Report was recently published by Blackbaud and The Content Marketing Institute.

Here are some of the findings:

• 35% of the respondents said their content marketing is effective in their organization.
• The top two goals for nonprofit content marketing are brand awareness (87%) and engagement (84%)
• The top three metrics used to measure content marketing success are increased event attendance/participation (55%) , website traffic (54%) and increased fundraising (44%). Website traffic and increased fundraising were also the top three metrics last year.
• 50% of the respondents created more content over the past year compared to last year.
• The average number of marketing audiences is 4.
• The top six ways nonprofits market their content are social media content-other than blogs (93%), in person events (89%), e-newsletters (88%), articles on website (86%), illustrations/photos (86%), and videos (82%). 
• The social media site used the most is Facebook at 94%. Facebook was also the most used last year.  Last year's data showed Twitter as the second most used site at 69% and this year it is also the second most used at 84%.  It is interesting to note that each social media site used has increased over the past year. 
• Facebook is also the most effective social media site used.
• 48% of nonprofits publish new content daily or multiple times a week.
• The top three challenges nonprofit marketers face are lack of budget (56%), measuring content effectiveness (52%), and producing engaging content (49%).
• Nonprofit marketers are currently working on becoming better storytellers (66%), creating visual content (63%), creating more engaging/higher quality content (62%), better understanding of audience (59%), and organizing content on website (59%).