With Maturity Comes Results for Australian Content Marketers [New Research]. How mature are Australian companies with their content marketing? First things first: Let’s look at how marketers assess their organizations’ content marketing maturity. What are these mature organizations doing differently? Their organization is focused on building audiences Many marketers who are getting started with content marketing consider their organization’s content to be their asset, but it isn’t. It has been proven over time, with the greatest content marketing examples as well as the best-known media models, that building a platform leveraging (for the most part) one content type on primarily one channel is a winning formula versus the publish-everywhere model. Once a subscriber base is established via the one-content-type/one-platform model, then innovative companies diversify into other areas. But many companies in the young/first-steps stage have the right mindset While young/first-steps content marketers can learn many things from their more mature peers, one of the most striking — and encouraging — observations about those in the early phase is that 71% agree that their organization is focused more on building long-term relationships than on getting quick results from content marketing. That tells me that many Australian organizations that are just starting out with content marketing have the right idea — content marketing is an opportunity to create ongoing value. If you can do that, adjust your strategy as needed, fully commit to the approach, deliver quality content on a consistent basis through carefully considered channels, give your efforts time to produce results — and, keep your focus on creating value (versus sales) — you’ll be well on your way toward producing long-term business results.
Content marketing success increases with experience — and now we have data to prove it.
Our new research report, Content Marketing in Australia: 2017 Benchmarks, Budgets, and Trends, produced in partnership with the Association for Data-Driven Marketing and Advertising and sponsored by LinkedIn Marketing Solutions, shows how organizations in the sophisticated/mature phase of content marketing differ from those in the early stages.
How mature are Australian companies with their content
marketing?
First things first: Let’s look at how marketers assess their organizations’ content marketing maturity. The chart below explains how the survey defines content marketing maturity levels, and shows the percentage of marketers that identify with each segment.
One key difference between these groups is that 56% of sophisticated/mature marketers consider their organization’s approach to content marketing to be extremely or very successful, compared to 25% of the overall sample and 3% of young/first-steps marketers. What are these mature organizations doing differently?
What early-stage content marketers can learn from their
sophisticated peers
The chart below summarizes other important differences we found, but read on to get some ideas on how to get started with some of these things — or to improve what you are doing.
They are very committed
To succeed with content marketing, you need to be committed — and truly believe in — the benefits of content marketing. Of course, this is much easier when your efforts are more mature, as you are seeing results in the form of cost savings, sales, and better customers. But it’s equally important that marketers who are getting started have a committed mindset. In fact, I recently advised marketers to go all in or do nothing.
Using only organic methods, it takes organizations 12 to 24 months to see great results. We see the formula work time and time again. Simple to understand? Absolutely. But it can be difficult to follow.
They have a documented content marketing strategy
Sophisticated/mature marketers also understand the value of a documented content marketing strategy. Your strategy can certainly evolve as your efforts mature, but you need to get your plan in writing (our research consistently shows that a verbal strategy isn’t nearly as effective). While there is no one...
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