Survey: 77% Of B2C Marketers Use Content Marketing, But 21% Fail To Track Its ROI

In a follow up to its B2B Content Marketing survey results, the Content Marketing institute released its B2C Content Marketing report, revealing 77 percent of B2C marketers surveyed are using content marketing tactics.

While the B2B content marketing report included 1,800 survey responses from B2B marketers, only 307 of the marketers polled in this report identified themselves as B2C marketers  – a significantly smaller sampling compared to the B2B report.

Produced in conjunction with MarketingProfs and EnVeritas Group, the B2C Content Marketing: 2015 Benchmarks, Budgets and Trend survey participants included marketers from across the globe, and working in a range of industries and business sizes.

Of the 307 B2C marketers surveyed, 77 percent claimed to use content marketing, with 37 percent claiming their content marketing efforts were effective.

(Marketers were asked to rate their effectiveness on a scale of 1 to 5 with 1 being “Not at all effective” and 5 being “Very Effective”; a 3 rating was “Neutral”.)

How Effective Is Your Use of Content Marketing

Only 23 percent of the survey participants claimed to be successful, or very successful, at tracking their content marketing’s ROI. Twenty-one percent said they are not tracking their content marketing results.

How B2C Marketers Rate Their Success At Tracking Content Marketing ROI

For those actually measuring their content marketing efforts, 62 percent rated website traffic as the most often used metric.

Metrics Used To Measure B2C Content Marketing Success

Forty-five percent of the B2C marketers who are doing content marketing have a dedicated content marketing group, while 21 percent said they were planning on building one.

When it comes to content marketing goals, B2C marketers most often relied on content marketing for customer retention (88%), engagement (88%) and brand awareness (87%).

Organizational Goals for B2C Content Marketing

Sixty-nine percent of survey participants said they were creating more content than they were last year, with 48 percent creating content daily or multiple times per week.

How Frequently Are Marketers Publishing New Content?

Of the content being published, more than 90 percent of content marketers are creating social media content (excluding blog posts).

B2C Content Marketing Tactic Usage

While social media leads the list of the most often used content marketing tactic, it ranked fourth when marketers were asked to rate the effectiveness of their tactics. The most effective content marketing tactic was eNewsletters, which is the second most often used tactic.

Effectiveness Ratings for B2C Tactics

B2C marketers are most often using Facebook (94%) and Twitter (84%) to distribute their content marketing, with YouTube (76%) coming in third.

B2C Content Marketing Social Media Platform Usage

Of the B2C marketers surveyed, more were using Google+ than Pinterest to distribute content marketing, even though Pinterest ranked ahead of Google+ when marketers were asked to rate which social platforms were most effective for distribution.

B2C Social Media Platforms Effectiveness

Ninety-two percent of the B2C content marketers used at least one paid channel to distribute content. Most used print or other offline promotions, while 63 percent took advantage of search engine marketing, and 60 percent used social ads.

Paid Advertising Channels Used To Promote Content Marketing

The most often used paid distribution channel – print or other offline promotions – didn’t even make the top three when marketers ranked the effectiveness of their paid advertising methods.

Effectiveness of Paid Advertising Channels Used To Promote Content Marketing

The average amount of a B2C marketer’s total marketing budget allocated to content marketing is 25 percent. Content Marketing Institute claims there is a correlation between an organization’s effectiveness at content marketing and the amount of money spent on it.

[blockquote cite=”Content Marketing Institute”]The most effective B2C marketers allocate 29%, on average, whereas the least effective allocate 17%.[/blockquote]

Surprisingly, 26 percent of the B2C marketers polled were “Unsure” how much they spent on content marketing.

Percentage of Total Marketing Budget Spent on B2C Content Marketing

When looking ahead to next year, 59 percent of the B2C marketers polled said they would be increasing their content marketing budget; although, 46 percent of marketers claimed a “Lack of Budget” as their primary content marketing challenge.

Most content marketers (51%) cited “Measuring Content Effectiveness” as their biggest challenge.

Challenges that B2C Marketers Face