January 22, 2014

How Content Marketing Can Help You Generate Leads

Many businesses look to content marketing as a great way to build up their reputation as a thought-leader in a given industry. By adding white papers, case studies, featured articles and blogs to their website—and by distributing such materials through e-newsletters or various other methods—any company can become viewed as being more active and engaged within their industry. Even more important than reputation, though, is results.

Consider that after just 36 months of using content marketing, companies have been found to generate as many as 31 leads per $1,000 spent, which is three times more than is typically generated from a paid search. That’s just one of the statistics that a new article by Business2Community illuminates, showing the ways in which leads are being generated through content marketing as consumers and business leaders grow more interested in content marketing overall.

Let’s take a look at some other key statistics from the article:

  • Over 90 percent of CMOs think that custom content strengthens the bond with consumers, having a positive effect on audience attitudes.
  • Seventy percent of consumers have said that they prefer getting to know a company through articles rather than ads.
  • Ninety percent of consumers find custom content to be useful.
  • Eighty percent of business decision makers prefer to get company information in a series of articles versus an advertisement.
  • Seventy-eight percent of consumers believe that organizations that provide custom content are interested in building good relationships with them.

What these statistics speak to, specifically, are the ways in which content marketing has distinguished itself from other forms of promotion. By focusing on getting consumers and business leaders the information that they need in order to make important decisions about the future of their industries, content marketing is growing in influence and importance.

image via shutterstock

The lessons learned by these statistics also point to the need for content marketing articles and blog posts about your company to be produced at a high level of quality. Doing so will ensure that content marketing can continue to distinguish itself from mere advertising. The room to grow within the content marketing world is vast with general content marketing for your company leading to the possibilities for the promotion of specific products.

Avenues such as social media have so far been used to help promote content, but Twitter and Facebook offer potential to grow as content providers for your company in their own right. Facebook’s recent trending topics launch has been encouraging in this regard, as it explains not just why an article or video is popular, but also details the reasons why it is trending. E-newsletters, case studies and white papers are a few of the additional avenues that can expand as content marketing grows overall.

As your business moves forward with its own plans regarding content marketing, keep in mind the big-picture statistics presented above and also to know that when consumers and decision makers tell you something (such as that they prefer articles over advertisements), it’s important to take their advice seriously. 




Edited by Justin Reynolds



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