The document summarizes key findings from a report on content marketing trends among B2B marketers in North America in 2014. Some of the main findings include:
- 42% of B2B marketers consider themselves effective at content marketing, up from 36% the previous year. Having a documented content strategy and person overseeing strategy are linked to increased effectiveness.
- Common goals of B2B content include brand awareness, lead generation, and customer acquisition. The most effective marketers prioritize lead generation more.
- Popular tactics include social media, articles, blogs, videos and more. Best-in-class marketers rate blogs as most effective while others rate in-person events highest.
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Overview: The State of B2B Content Marketing IN NORTH AMERICA
Greetings Content Marketers,
We have good news to report! B2B content marketers in North America are making strides: 42% consider
themselves effective, up from 36% last year.
Moreover, we also can begin to understand why marketers are feeling more confident: For the first time, we
asked marketers whether they have a documented content strategy (44% do) and a person who oversees
content marketing strategy (73% do). Our findings tell us that there are distinct differences between those who
have a strategy and those who do not. Marketers who do are not only more effective but also less challenged
with every aspect of content marketing.
Even though we’ve made great strides, the industry is clearly still in the early adoption phase. However, some
marketers are seeing substantial success. Read on to find out what a best-in-class content marketer does
differently and delve into many other findings as well.
On with the content marketing revolution!
Ann Handley
Chief Content Officer
MarketingProfs
Joe Pulizzi
Founder
Content Marketing Institute
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Percentage of B2B Marketers
Using Content Marketing
93%use content
marketing
7%do not
use content
marketing
2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
93% of B2B marketers use content marketing.
USAGE
Last year, 91% of B2B marketers
said they used content marketing.
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42% of B2B marketers say they are effective
at content marketing.
Last year, 36% of B2B marketers said
they were effective at content
marketing.
OVERALL EFFECTIVENESS
How B2B Marketers Rate the
Effectiveness of Their Organization’s
Use of Content Marketing
9%
33%
41%
14%
2%
Very Effective
Not At All Effective
100 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
5
4
3
2
1
2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
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Profile of a best-in-class B2B content marketer.
OVERALL EFFECTIVENESS
Comparison of Most Effective B2B ContentMarketers
with Least Effective B2B ContentMarketers
Hasadocumentedcontentstrategy
Hassomeonewhooversees
contentmarketingstrategy
Averagenumberoftacticsused
Averagenumberof
socialmediaplatformsused
Percentofmarketingbudget
spentoncontentmarketing
Challengedwithproducing
engagingcontent
MostEffective Overall/Average LeastEffective
66% 44% 11%
86% 73% 46%
15 13 10
7 6 4
39% 30% 16%
35% 47% 61%
• “Most Effective” = Respondents who rated their organization’s use of content marketing as 4 or 5 in terms
of effectiveness (on a scale of 1 to 5, with 5 being “Very Effective”)
• “Least Effective” = Respondents who rated their organization’s use of content marketing as 1 or 2 in terms
of effectiveness (on a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 being “Not At All Effective”)
2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
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44% of B2B marketers have a documented
content strategy.
B2B marketers who have a documented
content strategy are far more likely to
consider themselves effective (66% vs. 11%).
48% of smaller B2B organizations (10-99
employees) have a documented content
strategy, compared with 41% of large
organizations (1,000+ employees).
STRATEGY
Percentage of B2B Marketers Who
Have a Documented Content Strategy
44%Yes
49%No
6%Unsure
2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
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73% of B2B organizations have someone in place
to oversee content marketing strategy.
The majority of the most effective B2B
marketers (86%) have someone who
oversees content marketing strategy;
however, only 46% of less effective
marketers do.
Small companies (10-99 employees) are
more likely than large companies (1,000+
employees) to have someone who oversees
content marketing strategy (78% vs. 58%).
STRATEGY
Percentage of B2B Marketers
with Someone Who Oversees
Content Marketing Strategy
73%Yes
22%No
5%Unsure
2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
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73% of B2B content marketers are producing more
content than they did one year ago.
78% of the most effective B2B marketers
are creating more content than they did
one year ago, compared with 57% of
their least effective peers.
B2B marketers who have a documented
content strategy are creating more
content than they did one year ago,
compared with those who do not have
a documented strategy (80% vs. 66%).
CONTENT VOLUME
Change in Amount of
B2B Content Creation
(Over Last 12 Months)
32%Significantly
More
41%More
20%Same Amount
5%Less
2%Unsure
2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
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B2B marketers use an average of 13 content
marketing tactics.
Tactic usage has
remained relatively
consistent when
compared with last year.
Infographics has seen
the largest year-over-
year increase in usage.
Last year, 38% of B2B
marketers were using
infographics, compared
with 51% this year.
TACTIC USAGE
B2B Content Marketing Usage
(by Tactic)
0
20
40
60
80
100
SocialMedia–OtherthanBlogs
ArticlesonYourWebsite
eNewsletters
Blogs
CaseStudies
Videos
ArticlesonOtherWebsites
In-personEvents
WhitePapers
Webinars/Webcasts
ResearchReports
Microsites
Infographics
BrandedContentTools
MobileContent
eBooks
PrintMagazines
Books
Podcasts
MobileApps
DigitalMagazines
PrintNewsletters
AnnualReports
Licensed/SyndicatedContent
Games/Gamification
87%
76% 76%
64%
OnlinePresentations
63%
44%
40%
51%
38%
34%35%
30%
VirtualConferences
25%
28%
22%
24%
10%
73% 73%
81%
80%
68%
62%
38%
27%
26%
25%
2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
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B2B content marketers have increasing confidence
with most tactics.
For the fourth year in a row, B2B
marketers overall have rated in-person
events as the most effective tactic they use.
Best-in-class B2B marketers,
however, rate blogs as the most
effective tactic (79%), which surpasses
how they rate in-person events (76%);
only 29% of their least effective peers
rate blogs as effective.
TACTIC EFFECTIVENESS
Confidence Gap
Effectiveness Ratings of Tactics Among B2B Users
70% 30%
35%
37%
38%
41%
41%
40%
42%
43%
65%
63%
62%
60%
59%
59%
58%
57%
BelieveIt’sEffective BelieveIt’sLessEffective
100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
In-personEvents
CaseStudies
Webinars/Webcasts
37%63% Videos
Blogs
eNewsletters
ResearchReports
WhitePapers
eBooks
ArticlesonYourWebsite
2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
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B2B marketers are using social media more frequently
than last year.
B2B content marketers use an average
of 6 social media platforms, up from 5
last year.
B2B content marketers are using every
social media platform listed here more
often than they did last year.
Social media platforms that had the
biggest increase in use from last year
to this year are SlideShare, Google+,
and Instagram.
SOCIAL MEDIA USAGE
0 20 40 60 80 100
91%
85%
81%
73%
55%
34%
22%
40%
16%
15%
14%
22%
14%
LinkedIn
Twitter
Facebook
YouTube
Google+
Pinterest
SlideShare
Vimeo
Flickr
StumbleUpon
Foursquare
Instagram
Tumblr
14% Vine
B2B
2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
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Although adoption rates for social media are high,
B2B marketers are unsure of its effectiveness.
After LinkedIn, large companies
(1,000+ employees) consider YouTube
to be second most effective, whereas
small companies (10-99 employees)
say SlideShare and Twitter are second
most effective.
49% of small companies consider
SlideShare effective, compared with
38% of large companies.
SOCIAL MEDIA EFFECTIVENESS
Confidence Gap
Effectiveness Ratings of Social Media Platforms
Among B2B Users
62% 38%
50%
52%
55%
70%
74%
60%
77%
78%
79%
50%
48%
45%
40%
30%
26%
23%
22%
21%
BelieveIt’sEffective BelieveIt’sLessEffective
100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
LinkedIn
Twitter
YouTube
SlideShare
Vimeo
Facebook
Pinterest
Vine
Google+
Instagram
2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
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Brand awareness continues to be the top organizational
goal for B2B content marketing.
B2B marketers have consistently cited
brand awareness as their top goal for
the last four years.
80% of the most effective B2B content
marketers cite lead generation as a goal,
compared with 64% of their least
effective peers.
ORGANIZATIONAL GOALS
Organizational Goals for
B2B Content Marketing
82%
74%
71%
57%
68%
64%
57%
47%
45%
BrandAwareness
LeadGeneration
CustomerAcquisition
CustomerRetention/Loyalty
ThoughtLeadership
Engagement
WebsiteTraffic
Sales
Lead Management/Nurturing
100 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
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B2B marketers have cited Web traffic and sales lead quality as
their top content marketing metrics for the last three years.
B2B marketers cited each of these criterion a
bit more frequently than they did last year,
with the exception of direct sales, qualitative
feedback from customers, inbound links,
and increased customer loyalty, all of which
decreased slightly. Subscriber growth was
a new option.
The least effective B2B marketers place more
importance on direct sales, citing it as their
fourth top criterion (tied with social media
sharing). The most effective marketers rank
direct sales as their eighth most important
criterion.
Over the last four years, direct sales has
consistently gone down in importance as a
measurement criterion.
MEASUREMENT
2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
Metrics for B2B
Content Marketing Success
54%
50%
48%
39%
39%
44%
40%
34%
29%
21%
24%
14%
6%
63%
100 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
WebTraffic
SalesLeadQuality
SocialMediaSharing
SalesLead Quantity
DirectSales
SEORanking
InboundLinks
32%SubscriberGrowth
Cross-selling
CostSavings
BenchmarkLiftofCompanyAwareness
IncreasedCustomerLoyalty
BenchmarkLiftofProduct/ServiceAwareness
Time Spenton Website
Qualitative Feedback from Customers
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58% of B2B marketers plan to increase their content
marketing budget over the next 12 months.
More B2B marketers plan to increase
their content marketing budgets this
year, compared with last year (54%).
All B2B marketers plan to increase
content marketing spending at similar
rates, even those who rate themselves
as least effective.
Moresmallcompanies(10-99employees)
thanlargecompanies(1,000+employees)
plan to increase their content marketing
budgets over the next 12 months
(60% vs. 52%).
BUDGET
B2B Content Marketing Spending
(Over Next 12 Months)
10%Significantly
Increase
48%Increase
32%Remain the
Same
8%Unsure
1%Decrease
2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
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On average, 30% of B2B marketing budgets are
allocated to content marketing.
The average amount allocated to
B2B content marketing rose from 26%
in 2012 to 33% in 2013, and has now
settled firmly in between.
The most effective B2B marketers
spend a higher percentage (39%) of
their budgets on content marketing
than their least effective peers do (16%).
BUDGET
Percent of Total Marketing Budget
Spent on B2B Content Marketing
5%
11%
15%
21%
12%
11%
2%
20%
2%
0 10 20 30
100%
75%-99%
50%-74%
25%-49%
10%-24%
5%-9%
1%-4%
0%
Unsure
Average Spent: 30%
2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
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Large B2B companies outsource content creation
more frequently than small companies.
There has been no change from last
yearinhowmuchcontentB2Bmarketers
create in-house and how much they
outsource.
There are no real differences between
how much content the most effective
and the least effective B2B marketers
outsource.
INSOURCING VS. OUTSOURCING
Insourcing vs. Outsourcing
of B2B Content Creation
In-houseOnly
OutsourcedOnly
Both
Overall/Average
LargeCompanies
(1,000+Employees)
SmallCompanies
(10-99Employees)
56% 28% 66%
1% 1% 1%
43% 72% 33%
2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
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Writing and design are the two functions most likely to
be outsourced.
INSOURCING VS. OUTSOURCING
Functionsthat
B2B Marketers Outsource
64%
54%
30%
22%
13%
8%
5%
Writing
Design
ContentDistribution/Syndication
Editing
Measurement/Analytics
ContentPlanning&Strategy
BuyerPersonaCreation
100 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
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B2B marketers most often tailor content based
on industry trends.
Nearly all (95%) B2B marketers segment
their content in at least one way.
The most effective B2B marketers tailor
content more often by every category
listed here.
SEGMENTATION
How B2B Organizations Tailor Content
59%
55%
43%
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
ProfileofIndividualDecisionMakers
65%IndustryTrends
CompanyCharacteristics
4%None
StageintheBuyingCycle
11%Competitors’Content
21%PersonalizedContentPreferences
2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
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Challenges have remained fairly consistent year
over year.
Aside from lack of time, B2B marketers
consistently cite producing enough content
and producing the kind of content that
engages as their top challenges.
Challenges are fairly similar to those of years
past; however, B2B marketers are gaining
strides in their ability to produce a variety
of content.
CHALLENGES
Challengesthat
B2B Content Marketers Face
69%
55%
47%
39%
38%
33%
26%
25%
25%
23%
10%
15%
LackofTime
ProducingEnoughContent
ProducingtheKindofContentthatEngages
LackofBudget
ProducingaVarietyofContent
InabilitytoMeasureContentEffectiveness
LackofIntegrationAcrossMarketing
InabilitytoCollectInformationfromSMEs
LackofKnowledgeandTraining
LackofBuy-in/Vision
LackofIntegrationAcrossHR
FindingTrainedContentMarketingProfessionals
100 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
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Marketers at large companies face different challenges
than marketers at small companies.
CHALLENGES
Biggest B2B Content Marketing Challenge
(by Company Size)
LargeCompanies
(1,000+Employees)
SmallCompanies
(10-99Employees)
16%
15%
13%
11%
7%
5%
4%
4%
2%
1%
1%
8%
1%
9%
8%
13% 34%
5%
13%
6%
2%
3%
2%
2%
ProducingtheKindof
ContentthatEngages
LackofIntegration
AcrossMarketing
LackofBudget
LackofTime
LackofBuy-in/Vision
InabilitytoCollectInformation
fromSMEs
ProducingEnoughContent
InabilitytoMeasure
ContentEffectiveness
LackofKnowledgeandTraining
ProducingaVarietyofContent
FindingTrained
ContentMarketingProfessionals
LackofIntegrationAcrossHR
2014 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
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B2B Content Marketing: 2014 Benchmarks, Budgets, and Trends—North America was produced by Content
Marketing Institute and MarketingProfs and sponsored by Brightcove.
The fourth annual Content Marketing Survey, from which the results of this report were generated, was mailed
electronically to a sample of marketers using lists from Content Marketing Institute, MarketingProfs, Brightcove,
Blackbaud, King Content, The Association for Data-driven Marketing & Advertising (ADMA), the Direct Marketing Association
UK (DMA), Industry Week, and New Equipment Digest. A total of 4,397 recipients from around the globe—representing a full
range of industries, functional areas, and company sizes—responded throughout July and August 2013.
B2B Content Marketing: 2014 Benchmarks, Budgets, and Trends—North America reports on the findings from 1,217 (out of
the total 4,397) respondents who identified themselves as B2B marketers in North America.
B2B Industry Classification
Advertising/
Marketing
27%
Other
18%
Consulting
Software
Manufacturing
Internet/Online
Services
Publishing/
Media
11%
12%
10%
5%
5%
5%
4%
3%
Business
Services (Other)
Healthcare/Medical/
Pharmaceutical
Banking/Accounting/
Financial
Size of B2B Company
(by Employees)
Micro
(Fewer than
10 Employees)
30%
Small
(10-99 Employees)
31%
Midsize
(100-999
Employees)
Large
(1,000+ Employees)
22%
19%
B2B Job Title/Function
7%
6%
4%
4%
Sales/Business
Management
Consultant
Advertising/Marketing
Communications/PR
40% Corporate
Management/Owner
25%
9%
Content
Creation/
Management
Marketing
Administration/
Support
General
Management
Other
5%
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About Content Marketing Institute:
Content Marketing Institute (CMI) is the leading global content marketing education and training organization. CMI
teaches enterprise brands how to attract and retain customers through compelling, multi-channel storytelling.
CMI’s Content Marketing World, the largest content marketing-focused event, is held every September, and Content
Marketing World Sydney, every March. CMI also produces the quarterly magazine Chief Content Officer, and provides
strategic consulting and content marketing research for some of the best-known brands in the world. CMI is a 2012 and
2013 Inc. 500 company. View all original CMI research at www.contentmarketinginstitute.com/research.
About MarketingProfs:
MarketingProfs (www.marketingprofs.com) is a marketing education and training company that offers actionable
know-how designed to make you a smarter marketer. More than 600,000 MarketingProfs members rely on our free daily
publications, virtual conferences, and more to stay up-to-date on the most important trends in marketing—and how to
apply them to their businesses.
About Brightcove:
Brightcove Inc. (NASDAQ: BCOV), a leading global provider of cloud services for video, offers a family of products used
to revolutionize the way organizations deliver video experiences. The company’s products include Video Cloud, the
market-leading online video platform and Zencoder, a leading cloud-based media processing service and HTML5
video player technology. Brightcove has more than 6,300 customers in over 65 countries that rely on Brightcove cloud
content services to build and operate video experiences across PCs, smartphones, tablets, and connected TVs. For more
information, visit http://www.brightcove.com.