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Content marketing is one of the leading sources of generating website traffic. When content marketing is analytically keywords-driven, it is a proven source of search engine optimized page rankings. Content marketing can also play an important role in social media. Content marketing can serve as a vehicle for giving prospects and customers reasons to interact with your brand. While social media can help build awareness and relationships, it can also serve as an important conduit for driving education, engagement and action.
Many companies and brands don’t inherently have a following for their products and services. They need to work harder at generating a social media following. Content marketing can provide reasons to communicate with customers and prospects. Content marketing can serve as a way to engage these constituents and social media can serve as a delivery channel for these messages.
Most social media channels allow for brief messages. These channels serve better as teasers than as a vehicle to deliver comprehensive content. Here are 7 facts that underscore one of social media’s greatest roles: to deliver content marketing.
1. Nearly 90% of all B2B marketers distribute their content through social media.1
Business-to-business marketers may be further along in leveraging social media for delivery of content marketing than the average marketing organization. Statistics demonstrate that 87% of all B2B marketers are using social media platforms for content distribution. That is a pretty significant number, but plausible that B2B marketers understand how social media can create traffic and readership of solid content.
2. 78% of CMOs say custom content is the future of marketing.2
Social Media Today reports that nearly 80% of all CMOs believe that content marketing will remain an intrinsic part of a marketer's arsenal. This is an amazing fact, but with so many channels and messages competing for prospects and customers’ attention, marketers realize substantive content with compelling reasons to engage is going to win out in the end. Content marketing is an empowering channel for many users as it allows them to interact when they want, on their terms.
3. One of the major reasons people follow brands through social media platforms is "interesting content."3
One of the top three reasons cited as to why most people follow brands on social media is to obtain "interesting content." In today’s age, users are hungry for information. Content marketing can provide relevant, engaging information to satisfy that hunger.
4. Nearly half of all consumers will look up information on blogs about potential purchases.4
Peer-to-peer marketing has been a concept that has really gotten traction over the last few years. Users like reviews, referrals and other information that doesn’t look “corporately” published. While blogs are often vetted through several layers of an organization, they have the appearance of informality. This might be one of the reasons that 42% of all consumers will look at blogs for information regarding their purchases, and that over half of these consumers find that blogs impacted their decision on whether to purchase a product. Social media can play a strong role in helping blog articles and information get found.
5. Attaching a video to a blog post will attract up to 3 times as many inbound links.5
Videos are on the rise as one of the most popular forms of content marketing. Integration of videos in blog posts has proven to increase the amount of inbound links tremendously; videos are a particularly captivating area of content marketing. And social media is a proven effective conduit to videos.
6. LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook are used by the majority of B2B marketers to distribute content.2
While content marketing can be an effective means to generating web traffic, social media is used by marketers to extend its reach. According to Social Media Today, over 80% of all B2B marketers use LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook to distribute their content marketing after it has been created.
7. Blogs for bucks: B2B companies that blog are able to generate 67% more leads.2
The most common form of content marketing to promote in social media are blog articles; however, it isn’t the only format that should be considered. Ebooks, checklists and other downloadable content are appropriate and effective at driving engagement through social media. Business-to-business marketers might be leading the trends in blogging, taking a problem/solution format. According to Social Media Today, companies that dedicate some of their budget to blogging will generate almost 70% more leads than their non-blogging competitors.
Content marketing is a leading source of lead generation for many marketers. Strong integration of content marketing with social media ensures maximum exposure and effectiveness. If you don’t have a strong content marketing strategy in place, you might be missing a critical component to your marketing mix. Sign up for our personalized content marketing assessment and see where you can improve your strategy today.
Sources:
1. Content Marketing Institute, http://contentmarketinginstitute.com/2012/10/2013-b2b-content-marketing-research/
2. Social Media Today, http://socialmediatoday.com/brianna5mith/2039861/20-marketing-statistics-will-influence-decisions-2014
3. BrandWatch, http://www.brandwatch.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/Brands-on-Twitter-report-2013.pdf
4. Leaders West, http://leaderswest.com/2013/06/09/infographic-content-marketing-as-an-seo-tactic/
5. Moz, http://moz.com/blog/what-makes-a-link-worthy-post-part-1
Topics: Inbound Marketing
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