In December 2016, the Content Marketing Institute released the results of a study showing how and why B2B marketers were developing their content marketing strategies. What they found was that there was a group of super-adopters that were dedicating nearly one-half (46 percent) of their total marketing spend to content marketing. On average, though, B2B marketers were allocating 28 percent of their total marketing spend to content marketing.
Based on the findings, here are quick 3 tips for creating a better B2B content marketing campaign:
TIP #1: Develop an overarching strategy first
One key statistic stood out: only about one-third (32 percent) of B2B marketers were developing any kind of coherent content strategy. Instead, their responses could be viewed as much more ad hoc – add content here, add content there, and hope it all pays off in the end.
What’s needed is some overarching strategy that will prevent all that content from just being created at a prodigious pace without any clear idea of what it’s expected to actually accomplish. At a very minimum, the strategy needs to be articulated in the form of “bringing in more leads” or “building brand awareness” or “delivering more traffic to the website.” Even such a broad strategy can be a useful guide for the people creating the content.
TIP #2: Use content marketing to complement in-person events
Another surprising finding came when the B2B marketers were asked what forms of content marketing were most effective for them. By far, the most effective was “in-person events,” cited by 75 percent of all the B2B marketers. As a result, organizations should be thinking of ways that they can use content marketing to complement their in-person events. Maybe it’s something as simple as creating blog content around an upcoming event, or engaging with prospective attendees on social media.
The key here is creating content that other people are going to share with others. For some organizations, it means using a content marketing tool like Bynder, which can help marketers create, find and use content when they need it.
It’s easy to see why social media can play such an important role here – just getting people to tweet out photos or insights from an event can be huge in terms of gaining traction with potential new customers. In the marketing world, this is known as “social proof” – or the idea that if people are talking about something on social media, it must be worth knowing more about.
TIP #3: Pick one social media platform and do it really well
For most B2B marketing departments, it’s simply too time-consuming to try to be all things to all people on social media: there are just too many channels and platforms. Just when you thought you understood Facebook, here comes Instagram. And once you’ve rolled out an Instagram strategy, here comes Snapchat. That’s why it may make sense to double-down on one social media platform, master it, and then move on to other platforms as needed.
For most B2B companies, the platform of choice is LinkedIn. According to the Content Marketing Institute data, the next most effective social media platforms after LinkedIn were Facebook, YouTube and Twitter. Any of these would be a good way to start building out a more comprehensive content marketing strategy.
By following these three tips, you’ll be able to optimize the success of your content marketing efforts and make them a key part of your overall marketing efforts.
IMAGE: Designed by Freepik
Dane
Dane Cobain is a published author, freelance writer, book blogger, poet and (occasional) musician from High Wycombe, UK. Before going freelance, he worked as a social media marker, now specialising in writing about publishing, technology and marketing.