Skip to main content

Where your content marketing strategy might be falling down


Content marketing involves connecting with buyers through unique, consistent and genuinely useful content. It taps into the idea that buyers no longer follow a linear journey to purchase and instead value an engaging, relationship-based approach. Marketers regularly debate the value of content marketing but there’s no doubting its popularity. Found in 88% of B2B marketing strategies worldwide, it’s lauded for being efficient, effective and highly adaptable to almost any business and industry.

Some common mistakes

A 2014 survey by Forrester found that more than half of B2B marketers rated their content marketing strategy as ‘very mature’, yet 87% also admitted that creating engaging content that connects with buyers is a significant challenge. This reveals a disconnect between the perceived potential of content marketing – and the reality. The same survey revealed three main mistakes marketers make – which may be why they value the techniques but undervalue the results of content marketing:

1.     Focusing too much on the channel

Around 60% of marketers admitted producing content only on a campaign-by-campaign basis – which is a method that fails to tackle the whole customer experience. Just under half focused solely on ‘owned’ channels (their website, email and corporate social media profiles). Overall, the data showed that marketers hone in on acquisition over the rest of the customer journey.

2.     Failing to make content a priority

If marketing’s job is to communicate with customers, advocates, influencers, and the wider world, content must be its principle vehicle. However, 72% of marketers surveyed said that less than half their department was devoted to content marketing activity. It follows, therefore, that marketing ends up revolving around more traditional techniques, and fails to make the most of content marketing’s potential for reaching and engaging target customers.

3.     Breaking the connection between content and return on investment

Almost every marketer surveyed by Forrester said that content marketing was a priority, yet a staggering 85% ranked it as only somewhat effective – or less – at generating revenue, retaining customers, or creating lasting loyalty. When asked to evaluate their last 12 months of content marketing activity, less than 15% gave their strategies and practices good marks for return on investment.

Diversifying your strategy 

Gartner predicted that, by 2016, gamification would become the norm for marketers looking to generate brand engagement and customer loyalty. Gamified environments may have one up on other types of content in that they drive customer motivation. If designed and delivered well, gamification could lead to empowered, educated customers who will want to engage with you and your products time and time again.

That’s why we developed Simulcation Datacenter. Connect with your customers at every stage of their lifecycle by becoming an advertising partner. Through unobtrusive native advertising and featured products, new customers will experience your offerings as a natural part of their virtual experience, clicking through to learn more and purchase. You’ll also get a set number of ‘sponsored users’, depending on your subscription tier. These are accounts you can assign to your staff, partners and customers, together with a custom leaderboard to foster even greater engagement and lasting loyalty.

Experience the power of a new form of content marketing – contact us about becoming a partner.


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Why sales contests really work

Sales force compensation takes up the single biggest portion of marketing spend for most B2B companies, according to the HBR . Together, US corporates spend more than $800 billion on motivating their sales teams each year – that’s three times their advertising spend. Contests buck that trend by offering tangible, meaningful rewards that may, in some cases, beat cold hard cash. Whether it’s simply to drive revenue growth, encouraging new software adoption, or getting buy-in on changing processes, competition always breeds results. But the world of sales is changing. Now, managers need to look beyond motivating the individual, and devise contests that boost problem-solving and collaboration: the hallmarks of modern sales representatives. Keeping sales teams inspired, not just informed Where do you rank motivation in your list of factors that impact sales? Are raw sales skills more important? The truth is, motivation is the driving force behind all of your team’s

What pilots, surgeons and datacenter managers now have in common

Pilots and surgeons are responsible for the lives of those in their care. While that may not be quite as true for datacenter managers, they are the masters of balancing competing demands. On the one hand, they need to constantly improve efficiency and productivity, while at the same time keeping costs low and well-trained staff retained. That’s all in the context of an increasingly mobile end user, who wants more data and more availability. Then there’s maintenance, support and reducing the risk of failures and downtime. Given the huge financial, operational and reputational risks datacenter managers deal with every day, it should come as no surprise that a training simulation has been developed. Handling risk and complexity With the huge number of variables, making clear, well-founded decisions is one of the greatest challenges facing any datacenter manager. In the same way that a pilot or surgeon must make precise movements, datacenter managers must weigh up all the demands an

Why gamification should be the staple of your content marketing strategy

Content marketing and gamification are both in the limelight. But do their similarities run further – could marketers harness the power of gamification as part of an innovative, effective content strategy? What is gamification? Gartner predicted that gamified strategies would become the mainstay for cultivating brand engagement and customer loyalty by 2016. Now estimated to be worth over $10 billion by 2020 (ten times its market value in 2015), gamification shows no signs of slowing down. Gamification is defined as ‘the application of typical elements of game playing (such as point scoring, competition, rules of play) to other areas of activity – typically as an online marketing technique to encourage engagement with a product or service.’ What’s really in it for marketers? By appealing to our inherently competitive and playful nature through things like leader boards, missions, points and badges, marketers can foster deeper, longer relationships with custo