Over 100 B2B Content Marketing Statistics for 2014

Thanks to Content Marketing Institute and MarketingProfs, each year there’s a new report covering the latest trends in B2B content marketing.

From insourcing vs. outsourcing to the most effective tactics, there is plenty of insight in this report to help guide B2B marketers in the right direction.

As a blogger, public speaker and strategist, I know how convenient it can be for statistics in a report like this to be broken out. I did this once before with 100+ B2B Content Marketing Statistics for 2013 and it was well received. So here is the list updated according to the 2014 report.

93% of B2B marketers are using content marketing (2013 91%)

Content Marketing Effectiveness: 42% of B2B marketers say they are effective at content marketing (2013 36%)

• 9% 5 (very effective)
• 33% 4
• 41% 3
• 14% 2
• 1% 1 (not at all effective)

What the Most and Least Effective Content Marketers Do

66% of the most effective marketers has a documented content strategy
11% of the least effective marketers has a documented content strategy

86% of the most effective marketers has someone who oversees content marketing strategy
46% of the least effective marketers has someone who oversees content marketing strategy

15 – Average number of content marketing tactics used by the most effective content marketers
10 – Average number of content marketing tactics used by the least effective content marketers

7 – Average number of social media platforms used by the most effective B2B marketers
4 – Average number of social media platforms used by the least effective B2B marketers

39% – The percentage of marketing budget spent on content marketing by the most effective B2B marketers
16% – The percentage of marketing budget spent on content marketing by the least effective B2B marketers

35% of the most effective content marketers are challenged with producing engaging content
61% of the least effective content marketers are challenged with producing engaging content

B2B Content Marketing Strategy

• 44% of B2B marketers have a documented content strategy
• 48% of smaller B2B companies (10-99 employees) have a documented content strategy
• 41% of large B2B companies (1,000 employees) have a documented content strategy
• 73% of B2B organizations have someone in place to oversee content marketing strategy
• 78% of small companies have someone who oversees content marketing strategy
• 58% of large companies have someone who oversees content marketing strategy
• 73% of B2B content marketers are producing more content than they did one year ago
• 80% of B2B marketers who have a documented content strategy are creating more content than a year ago
• 66% of B2B marketers without a documented content strategy are creating more content than a year ago

Content Marketing Tactics

B2B marketers use an average of 13 content marketing tactics

• 87% Social Media (other than blogs)
• 81% Articles on your website
• 80% eNewsletters
• 76% Blogs
• 76% In-person events
• 73% Case studies
• 73% Videos
• 68% Articles on other websites
• 64% Whitepapers
• 63% Online presentations
• 62% Webinars
• 51% Infographics
• 44% Research reports
• 40% Microsites
• 38% Branded content tools
• 38% Mobile content
• 35% Print magazines
• 34% eBooks
• 30% Books
• 28% Mobile apps
• 27% Digital magazines
• 26% Podcasts
• 25% Syndicated content
• 25% Virtual conferences
• 24% Annual reports
• 22% Print newsletters
• 10% Games

Content Marketing Tactics Effectiveness

• 70% of B2B marketers rate in-person events as effective
• 65% of B2B marketers rate case studies as effective
• 63% of B2B marketers rate videos as effective
• 63$ of B2B marketers rate webinars as effective
• 62% of B2B marketers rate blogs as effective
• 60% of B2B marketers rate eNewsletters as effective
• 59% of B2B marketers rate research reports as effective
• 59% of B2B marketers rate white papers as effective
• 58% of B2B marketers rate articles on your website as effective
• 57% of B2B marketers rate eBooks as effective

B2B Content Marketing and Social Media Tactics

B2B content marketers use an average of 6 social media platforms

• 91% of B2B marketers use LinkedIn to distribute content
• 85% of B2B marketers use Twitter to distribute content
• 81% of B2B marketers use Facebook to distribute content
• 73% of B2B marketers use YouTube to distribute content
• 55% of B2B marketers use Google+ to distribute content
• 40% of B2B marketers use SlideShare to distribute content
• 34% of B2B marketers use Pinterest to distribute content
• 22% of B2B marketers use Instagram to distribute content
• 22% of B2B marketers use Vimeo to distribute content
• 16% of B2B marketers use Flickr to distribute content
• 15% of B2B marketers use StumbleUpon to distribute content
• 14% of B2B marketers use Foursquare to distribute content
• 14% of B2B marketers use Tumblr to distribute content
• 14% of B2B marketers use Vine to distribute content

Goals and Measuring B2B Content Marketing Performance

Top Organizational Goals for B2B Content Marketing

• 82% Brand Awareness
• 74% Lead Generation
• 71% Customer Acquisition
• 68% Thought Leadership
• 64% Engagement
• 57% Customer Retention
• 57% Website Traffic
• 47% Lead Management/Nurturing
• 45% Sales

Metrics for B2B Content Marketing Success

• 63% Web traffic
• 54% Sales lead quality
• 50% Social media sharing
• 48% Sales lead quantity
• 44% SEO ranking
• 40% Time spent on site
• 39% Direct sales
• 39% Qualitative feedback from customers
• 34% Inbound links
• 32% Subscriber growth
• 29% Benchmark lift of company awareness
• 24% Benchmark lift of product / service awareness
• 21% Increased customer loyalty
• 14% Cross-selling
• 6% Cost savings

Content Marketing Budgets

• 58% of B2B marketers plan to increase their content marketing budget
• 32 will keep the same budget
• 8% are unsure
• 1% will decrease their budget
• On average, 30% of B2B marketing budgets are allocated to content marketing

B2B Content Marketing Insourcing & Outsourcing

• 56% of B2B companies create content in-house only
• 1% of B2B companies only outsource content creation
• 43% of B2B companies use both in-house and outsourced content creation resources

Which content marketing tactics are outsourced?

• 64% of B2B marketers outsource writing
• 54% of B2B marketers outsource design
• 30% of B2B marketers outsource content distribution
• 22% of B2B marketers outsource editing
• 13% of B2B marketers outsource measurement & analytics
• 8% of B2B marketers outsource content planning & strategy
• 5% of B2B marketers outsource buyer persona creation

How B2B Companies Customize Content

• 65% Industry trends
• 59% Profile of individual decision makers
• 55% Company characteristics
• 43% Stages in the buying cycle
• 21% Personalized content preferences
• 11% Competitor’s content
• 4% None

Top Challenges B2B Content Marketers Face

• 69% Lack of time
• 55% Producing enough content
• 47% Producing the kind of content that engages
• 39% Lack of budget
• 38% Producing a variety of content
• 33% Inability to measure content effectiveness
• 26% Lack of integration across marketing
• 25% Inability to collect information from SMEs
• 25% Lack of knowledge and training
• 23% Lack of buy-in / vision
• 15% Lack of integration across HR
• 10% Finding trained content marketing professionals

 Check out the full CMI and MarketingProfs report here:

What overall trends are you seeing in the B2B content marketing space? If you’ll be at the B2B Content2Conversion Conference this week, I hope to discuss with you in person! I am presenting Tuesday, May 6th at 2:45pm on working with B2B Influencers to create content that’s socialized and optimized.

Photo: Shuterstock