B2B marketers use content for a variety of reasons, including demand generation and CX improvement, and accordingly have made content a key priority for budgets this year. As regards demand generation, B2B marketers overwhelmingly believe that content marketing produces the leads with the highest ROI, according to a recent study [download page] from Chief Marketer in association with OneTrust.
The 116 B2B marketers surveyed for the report were asked to indicate which 3 channels produce leads with the highest ROI for them. By far the leading response was content marketing, as cited by 62% of respondents. No other channel produced a majority share of respondents, with live events (41%) and email (39%) the next-most commonly cited channels.
Perhaps not so surprisingly, then, respondents are also most apt to be investing in content creation marketing technologies this year. Asked to choose up to 3 types of martech that they plan on investing on this year, 46% pointed to content creation, followed by 37% for analytics and 30% for automation.
As regards content types, articles/blog posts (59%) were the most frequently cited for their effectiveness in moving prospects through the funnel, ahead of video (52%) and reviews/testimonials (48%). There was less enthusiasm for podcasts (14%), although separate research suggests that these are becoming a popular source of thought leadership.
In other highlights from the report:
- Respondents are 3 times as likely to say their marketing budget will increase (37%) as decrease (12%) this year, with the remainder staying the same (42%) or not sure (9%).
- LinkedIn is clearly the most effective social channel for respondents, with YouTube and Facebook trailing distantly.
- For most (53% of) respondents, it typically takes at least 3 months to close a sale, with 31% share saying it takes 3-6 months and an additional 22% saying it takes 6 months to a year.
About the Data: The results are based on an October 2022 survey of 116 B2B marketers working on the brand side (61% share) and agency side (39% share). The majority (62%) work at companies with under 500 employees.
