Section six:
Content content everywhere
In the world of B2B marketing, ‘content’ has long been recognised as a powerful weapon for growing a brand, generating demand and converting leads. It’s also a somewhat fluffy, overused term.
So, what kinds of content do buyers want to see most? And do marketers agree?
Again, there is no standout magic bullet. Buyers find a wide range of content types useful.
The top three, in order, are web articles, research reports and webinars. But these were only marginally ahead of all the other usual suspects of ebooks, videos, infographics and events (live and virtual).
This means that any approach to content strategy needs to offer a broad range of options – both in terms of the core information provided and the formats it’s delivered in.
There were a couple of interesting discrepancies however…
While over a fifth (21%) of marketers have seen the value of ‘writing the book’ on their particular area, just 11% of buyers find traditionally published guides and thought leadership valuable.
of marketers have seen value of ‘writing the book in their particular area’
of buyers find traditionally published guides and thought leadership valuable
And, in what might be a blow to the various analysts and their eye-wateringly expensive ROI and TCO reports, just 9% of buyers see value in this kind of content. Considering both of these are time-consuming, expensive options, marketers could divert budget elsewhere and see no drop in performance.
