B2C Marketers Begin to Get Some Serious Traction with Content Marketing

Content Marketing Institute Releases New 2020 Research on State of Business-to-Consumer Content Marketing 


CLEVELAND, Dec. 11, 2019 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- B2C marketers are progressing nicely using content marketing as a key piece of their strategy, but many still struggle moving content performance from average to excellence. Those are just some of the highlights in new research from Content Marketing Institute and MarketingProfs, presented in the B2C Content Marketing 2020: Benchmarks, Budgets and Trends report.

To see our analysis and download the full report visit: http://cmi.media/b2c2020

B2C marketers primarily use content marketing to bring attention to their overall brand. The three most cited marketing goals in the last 12 months were: creating brand awareness (84%), educating audiences (75%) and building credibility/trust (65%). However, fewer are focused on some of the deeper journeys or core content marketing concepts like nurturing subscribers/audiences (49%), generating sales/revenue (48%) and building a subscribed audience (38%). 

“It’s exciting to see content marketing is alive and well in the B2C space,” shares Robert Rose, Chief Strategy Advisor, Content Marketing Institute. “However, when we look at B2C companies that are in the sophisticated/mature phase of content marketing, one of the biggest reasons they are successful is because their organization provides customers with optimal experiences across the entire engagement journey.” 

“B2C marketers are doing a lot of things right,” shares Ann Handley, Chief Content Officer, MarketingProfs, and author of Everybody Writes. “But they need to keep in mind there are many opportunities to keep customers engaged across the entire customer journey. They need to focus on being a credible and trusted resource for their audiences, but also value creativity and craft in creating and producing content.”

Other Key Highlights:

  • Most B2C content marketers are reporting success: Three out of four B2C marketers characterize their organization as extremely, very, or moderately successful with content marketing and say they are much/somewhat more successful compared with one year ago.
  • They rely heavily on email: Respondents rated email newsletters as their highest performing content type for securing and nurturing leads, and a close second for converting leads. For building brand awareness, blog posts/articles and social media content tied for first. 
  • The majority outsource at least one content marketing activity, with content creation being the most likely: Among the 55% of respondents who outsource, 80% outsource content creation, with content distribution a far second (37%).
  • Conversions, content quality/quantity, and audience expansion in 2020: When presented with a list of seven possible content marketing priorities for 2020 and asked to select their top three, respondents indicated improve quality/conversion of audiences (50%), focus on content quality/quantity (50%), and increase the size of our audiences (40%).
  • Facebook reigns: Facebook is both the top organic and paid social media platform B2C marketers use, and the one they say generates the best content marketing results for their organization

To view all CMI research and to subscribe to our emails visit: contentmarketinginstitute.com/research

About Content Marketing Institute

Content Marketing Institute is the leading global content marketing education and training organization, teaching enterprise brands how to attract and retain customers through compelling, multichannel storytelling. CMI’s Content Marketing World event, the largest content marketing-focused event, is held every fall in Cleveland, Ohio, and ContentTECH Summit event is held every spring in San Diego, California. CMI publishes Chief Content Officer for executives and provides strategic consulting and content marketing research for some of the best-known brands in the world. Content Marketing Institute is organized by Informa Tech. To learn more: ContentMarketingInstitute.com.

About Informa Tech

Informa Tech is a market-leading provider of integrated research, media, training, and events to the global Technology community. We're an international business of more than 600 colleagues, operating in more than 20 markets. Our aim is to inspire the Technology community to design, build and run a better digital world through research, media, training and event brands that inform, educate and connect. Over 7,000 professionals subscribe to our research, with 225,000 delegates attending our events and over 18,000 students participating in our training programs each year, and nearly 4 million people visiting our digital communities each month.

About MarketingProfs
MarketingProfs is a training and education company dedicated to helping large organizations, small teams, and individuals execute marketing campaigns that drive real results. MarketingProfs produces training programs, online events, conferences, including the MarketingProfs B2B Forum. More than 600,000 marketers globally trust MarketingProfs as their top marketing resource.

Press Contact:
Amanda Subler
Amanda.Subler@ubm.com

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Content Marketing Institute B2C Research