A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about the way marketers, despite huge innovations in the social marketing industry, still rely use content marketing techniques heavily. To be exact, I reported the results from a BusinessBolts study that showed that 74% of those marketers that they surveyed were still using content marketing heavily. So, with that study, we received the content marketing numbers for the present. Today, I found some numbers that look a bit into the future for content marketing, at least as far as the rest of this year. In an article from eMarketer, numbers from a report by Econsultancy and Adobe tell us what we can expect for content marketing in 2013.
According to this report, content marketing is moving in the opposite direction as one would think. Since last year, content marketing has grown in importance for marketers, rather than getting less important as one might expect. The numbers reported by eMarketer show that content marketing has reached the top of the list of importance when it comes to digital marketing trends. To get there, it had to be considered the top priority by 39% of respondents for 2013. In 2012, only about 29% of respondents called content marketing their highest priority.
To compare content marketing’s standings with one of today’s popularly used marketing platforms, social media engagement was only number three on the top priority list, with only 38% stating it was a top priority. In 2012, that number was higher at 39%, meaning that while content marketing has increased as a priority by 10%, social has actually decreased.
In their reporting of the study results, eMarketer writes,
It seems that as the newness of social media wears off, so too does marketer enthusiasm for the practice. The report found that 35% of respondents thought social media presented one of the most exciting digital opportunities in 2013, a significant drop from the 54% who said the same in 2012. But excitement levels for social media were still high, and trailed only one other category: mobile optimization, which was named by 43% of respondents.
These numbers do show one very important thing, as is mentioned above. The excitement over the shiny new marketing platform of social media is wearing off, and people are starting to realize perhaps what will actually work best for them. Although, there are still things out there that are newer than social media, with mobile being one of them. For 2013, 43% of respondents stated that mobile optimization was the most exciting digital marketing opportunity for the coming year, while only 38% said so in 2012.
Regardless, I think the numbers here prove that content marketing was hidden for a while, but it did not deteriorate much. Content marketing provides solid performance, and as people have had the chance to try out social for a while, many of them are putting more focus on what has worked for them in the past. However, we will surely continue to see new and exciting offerings from the many social networks on the web, so with those there are bound to be shifts in priorities.
