In the world of content marketing, the only thing constant is change. Perhaps nobody knows this better than the marketing teams who represent business-to-business and business-to-customer enterprises, otherwise known as B2B and B2C organizations respectively. Each year, the Content Marketing Institute surveys representatives from B2Bs and B2Cs, and reports on various content marketing trends from year to year. You can use the most recent findings from Content Marketing Institute, also known as CMI, to update your content marketing strategies in 2014.
B2B and B2C marketers do content marketing and they do it well
The Content Marketing Institute found that more business marketing teams post content on the internet in the hopes of marketing their goods and services in 2014 than ever before. CMI also noted that marketers felt more confident that their content marketing efforts were effective.
The survey made it clear that more B2B and B2C marketers are using content marketing this year than last year. In the 2014 CMI survey, 93 percent of B2B and 90 percent of B2C marketers said they use content marketing.
An increased number B2B and B2C marketers see themselves as effective content marketers this year, with 42 percent of B2B and 34 percent of B2C marketers believing they do a good job of content marketing. Marketers with a documented content strategy are more likely to consider content marketing efforts to be effective; having a documented content strategy means you are actively engaging in content marketing, create a brand story and develop a plan to market in each channel. A content marketing agency can help B2Bs and B2Cs develop a documented content strategy to optimize their content marketing efforts.
Facebook, LinkedIn, Blogs and Other Social Media Tactics
Marketers often use a variety of social tactics to get the word out, including Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, blogs, eNewsletters, website articles and more. Marketers used the same number of tactics this year as they did last year, with B2B marketers employing an average of 13 tactics and B2C marketers typically using 12.
Social media other than blogs, such as Facebook and LinkedIn, was the most widely used tactic among both B2B and B2C marketers. An overwhelming 92 percent of B2B marketers flock to LinkedIn but the largest increases in usage from last year to this year were in SlideShare, Google+ and Instagram. B2C marketers, on the other hand, seemed to prefer Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. LinkedIn had the biggest jump in usage among the B2C crowd in 2014.
After social media, website articles, eNewsletters and blogs were the second, third and fourth most widely used content marketing tactics for B2B and B2C marketers.
The use of infographics has seen the largest increase in usage. A year ago, only 38 percent of B2B marketers used these handy informational graphics; today, 51 percent of B2B marketers use them. Infographics use is up among B2C marketers too, from 33 percent last year to 40 percent this year.
Content marketing is effective for creating brand awareness, increasing your customer base and improving your bottom line. Whether you are marketing a B2B or B2C, you can reshape your marketing efforts to take advantage of the content marketing trends of 2014.
Lynn H is a medical writer and content marketing specialist. She works with B2B and B2C organizations to promote brand awareness and increase sales.
