Marketers Put Content Marketing On A Pedestal For 2017

Number three on the list is marketing automation, favoured by 10.3% of marketers, a good 10-point drop. In that sense, the dominance of content marketing shouldn’t be seen as coming at the expense of other techniques, but it is nevertheless interesting that the industry still puts the most weight behind our beloved content and the data that guides its strategy. Content marketing has actually topped this list for the last three years running. And, even with new trends on the up, a solid and documented content strategy is still likely to be one of the most effective marketing techniques. Indeed, according to research by Smart Insights and Hubspot, more than 40% of businesses now employ a documented, strategic approach to content marketing. A lot of this change in attitude is down to better content personalisation and an enhanced overall customer experience. Recently, the Content Marketing Institute outlined why some businesses do not have a documented strategy, and the problems that lie therein. Meanwhile some brands say their teams are too disparate or cannot agree on a strategy as their needs are too different. Build your audience in 2017 The fact that content has retained its top spot in the mix seems down to the fact that a large contingent of savvy companies recognise that 2017 is about building more engaged, loyal audiences – using content strategically, with an attitude of constant refinement to create an ever more personalised experience. Equally, the fact that content marketing is top of the bunch also reflects that there is still work to be done for the remaining 60% of brands that perhaps aren’t using it correctly.

Author: Jonathan Bright / Source: Business 2 Community

Well there’s a nice welcome into the new year for us – content marketing is hot stuff for ’17. And, encouragingly, the industry views it with more importance, it seems, than other marketing trends. Despite this, there are too many businesses that know full well what they need to do, but still lack a proper strategy for doing it.

Industry expert Smart Insights recently released the results of its Digital Marketing Megatrends 2017 research, in which over 2,300 marketers worldwide were asked to “select one marketing activity that you think will give your business (or client) the biggest incremental uplift in leads and sales in 2017.”

Incidentally, my colleague quite rightly pointed out that the word ‘digital’ does not appear in that sentence. This is perhaps a sign of the times or a slight oversight, but the responses were nevertheless overwhelmingly of a digital ilk.

Top-rated content

The top-rated technique was content marketing, favoured by 20.3% of respondents. This was closely followed by big data (which includes the use of market and customer insights, and predictive analytics), which was stated as the most effective technique by 20.2% of respondents.

There’s a fair margin between these two and the rest of the pack. Number three on the list is marketing automation, favoured by 10.3% of marketers, a good 10-point drop. Other notables on the list include mobile marketing (9.2%), social media marketing (8.8%), SEO (4.1%) and online PR (3.3%).

This list is a canvassing of opinion on what will have the biggest influence in 2017. In that sense, the dominance of content marketing shouldn’t be seen as coming at the expense of other techniques, but it is nevertheless interesting that the industry still puts the most weight behind our beloved content and the data that guides its strategy.

Content marketing has actually topped this list for the last three years running. And, even with new trends on the up, a solid and documented content strategy is still likely to be one of the most effective marketing techniques.

Indeed, according to research by Smart Insights and Hubspot, more than 40% of businesses now employ a documented, strategic approach to content marketing. That, coupled with the fact that big data ranks equally as highly as content, suggests businesses are aware of their potential for adding to the online content fog without really targeting their wares to their audiences, and are changing their ways.