eMarketer Webinar: B2B Content Marketing—It's Not Just Lead Gen

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B2B Content Marketing:

It’s Not Just Lead Generation

Mike Hudson

Analyst

September 4, 2014


Agenda

The current state of content marketing

– Optimistic outlook with budgets rising

– Widespread dissatisfaction with results

What’s causing this disconnect?

How to bridge the divide

Twitter – #eMwebinar


What we mean when we say “content marketing”

Blog posts, whitepapers, webinars, video and other

content …

distributed by digital means …

without an explicit sales pitch.



The Current State

of Content Marketing


Spending and expansion for 2014

In a December 2013 study by Advertising Age of US

business-to-business (B2B) marketers:

– 75% planned to increase their content budget in 2014

– 1.3% said they would decrease their content budget this year

Advertising Age “2014 BtoB Outlook: Marketing Priorities and Plans”



In a fall 2013 survey

by Webmarketing123

of US B2B marketers:

– 69% planned to

increase content

spending in 2014

– 1% planned to

decrease content

spending in 2014




In an April 2014 survey by Regalix, nearly 7 in 10 B2B

firms reported spending more than 20% of total

marketing budget on content marketing



Rising budgets, lingering dissatisfaction



42% of B2B firms said

they believe content

marketing efforts had

been effective

58% … not so much


Content Marketing Institute “2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends”



32% rated

content

marketing as

effective or very

effective

About half were

right in the

middle, giving it

a “so-so” rating




In a July 2014 survey by Starfleet Media, 35% of

respondents said they “not been successful at all”

with content marketing efforts



Confusion reigns

In a May 2014

poll by Contently

of US marketers,

only 9.4% were

“very confident”

about results

measurement

31.9% were ???



The crux of the problem: Unmet expectations

“People are saying, ‛I’m increasing my

budget so I can execute on content, but

I’m frustrated because I can’t get

what I want.’”

—Robert Rose, chief strategist at

Content Marketing Institute



In sum: The state of B2B content marketing is

marked by contradictions


What’s Causing this

Disconnect?


Lead gen and content marketing:

A legend of the game

Executives are involved with digital more than ever

They want new revenues from digital

Content marketing busted onto the scene with promises

of easy/cheap lead gen



Leads are

most often

the goal of

B2B content

marketing …

… but content

marketing creates

more than just leads



How’s the content marketing program going?

“Our video and webcast content last

quarter generated about 1,200 net

new names.”

—Mark Yolton, vice president of digital at Cisco



Go beyond “squishy” metrics

“Our video and webcast content last

quarter ... also generated $13

million in sales qualified leads

from those new names.”




Hard to judge by leads alone


Adding a step to ask questions first

“There’s a lot of ‘shoot first and

measure later’. [But ] it requires a step

in there to first understand the

purpose of content, ask what

success should look like and then align

measurement.”

—Robert Rose, chief strategist at Content

Marketing Institute



Three Questions to Gauge

a B2B Content Marketing

Program


Ask three key questions:

1. Does our content serve the audience?

2. Are we fully measuring our results?

3. Does our organization value these results?



The audience is large and growing

B2B buyer funnel has

grown considerably

thanks to digital

It’s still growing

71% of B2B email

lists grew last year



The audience is asking questions … but through

a familiar starting point

“B2B marketing was always clouded in

mystery. Now digital has opened up

the whole landscape, giving

prospective buyers a full view of

the world. And they’re looking for three

things: What the brand does, what the

competitors do and what other people say.

It starts with search.”

—Mark Kiernan, SVP of marketing at DigitasLBi



Think of search as your main starting point

80% of B2B buyers began with search:

– 71.7% began with Google

– 5.5% began with Yahoo

– 2.8% began with Bing


Pardot/Salesforce “State of Demand Generation”


Assume a

significant portion

of research will

take place on

mobile devices

Mobile use among B2B

buyers:

42.9% in 2013

55.8% in 2014

Majority of smartphone

research activities are

content consumption



Align your

content

accordingly

Consider content

that is short and

more visual



Content promotion remains fairly conventional



Make sharing

your content

easy

In a May 2014 survey of

US B2B buyers:

88% frequently used

email to share content

43% frequently used

LinkedIn to share

contente

35% frequently used

Twitter to share

contentTwitter – #eMwebinar


Maximize trust

by creating

content that

encourages

dialogue or

user-

generated

feedback



Quantitative

or tangible

key

performance

metrics are

the most

popular

Think of each metric

as a goalpost along

the path to the

ultimate goal



In part, satisfaction is a numbers game …

“We have 10 million social media

followers and fans, for instance. Leads

are really the ultimate of what we’re

searching for. But it’s important to

get that reach at the top of the

funnel in order to achieve the

revenue numbers at the bottom.”




… but quality is as important as quantity when it

comes to leads

“If we’re expecting the same number of

inferior leads that we’re getting from our

outbound direct marketing program, yeah,

we’re likely to be frustrated. Perhaps the

leads are more expensive and there are

fewer of them, but they are so much

more valuable as they are worth more

dollars in new business in the long run.”

—Robert Rose, chief strategist at Content

Marketing Institute



Ultimately, each

organization must find a

way to measure in a way

they trust

Intangible

metrics are

high on the

measurement

wish list



Make sure there is internal agreement around

intangible KPIs

“There’s an external group that actually

measures the quality and value of

different professional services firms.

When we started this effort we were

number 18 on their list. We’re now

number 2. What we sell is our ideas.

The content marketing gives people a

chance to sample our ability to deliver

insights.”

—Jonathan Copulsky, principal at Deloitte

Consulting



Internal

agreement

around

intangibles can

help overcome

measurement

challenges



Be prepared for long turnaround times …

“In the end, if we are introducing the

concept, they are more likely to see

us as a leading resource when the

time comes for them to seek out such

services.”

—Chris Reed, Chief Marketing Officer at CDK

Cobalt Digital Marketing



… especially where content programs focused

on brand awareness are concerned



Takeaways:

See the opportunity and the risk in this moment for

B2B content marketing

Ask three questions:

– Does our content serve our audience?

– Are we fully measuring our results?

– Does our organization value these results?



“This is a new muscle for many

organizations.”

—Joe Pulizzi, founder of Content Marketing

Institute

A ‘snackable’ takeaway:


‣

‣

‣

‣

‣

‣

‣

‣

‣

TRADITIONAL MARKETING DIGITAL EXPLOSIONDIGITAL GUT DRIVEN

MARKETING

Nothing has changed

‣

‣

‣

‣

‣

‣

‣ B2B buyers are now

57% of the way to a

purchase decision

before engaging a

sales rep.

‣ Competitors can

steal prospects out

of your funnel!

BUY!

START HERE

INTEREST

AWARENESS

And your funnel is under attack…

Discover Content Opportunities

Optimize Content Distribution

Track Real-Time Progress

EARNED MEDIA TRAFFIC SEO TEXT ADS DISPLAY ADS CONTENT MARKETING EMAIL

TWITTER FACEBOOK PINTEREST INSTAGRAM YOUTUBE

LINKEDIN

GOOGLE+ TUMBLR

http://trackmaven.com/summit


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Mike Hudson

B2B Content Marketing:

It’s Not Just Lead Generation

B2C Content Marketing 2014: More Money, More Pressure to

Perform

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Understand New Viewing Habits

UK Content Marketing: Meeting the Challenge of Being Seen

and Shared

eMarketer Webinar: B2B Content Marketing—It's Not Just Lead Gen

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Transcript of eMarketer Webinar: B2B Content Marketing—It's Not Just Lead Gen