break through the digital noisecommunications.on24.com/rs/848-ahn-047/images/on24... · break...

BREAK through the digital NoiseDrive Engagement, Action, Conversion and Loyalty

BREAK THROUGH THE DIGITAL NOISE: DRIVE ENGAGEMENT, ACTION, CONVERSION AND LOYALTY 1

TABLE OF CONTENTS 2

INTRODUCTION 3

METHODOLOGY 4

KEY FINDINGS 5First, the bad news 5

But there’s good news too 6

WHAT DO THESE FINDINGS MEAN? 7

DIVING INTO THE DETAILS 8Content marketing strategy effectiveness 8

Confidence in delivering relevant content 9

The gap in importance and execution 10

Content strategy segmentation 11

Content most often provided to sales organizations 12

Measuring impact 13

Most important content engagement metric 14

Confidence that content is driving revenue results 15

MINDSETS THAT DON’T CUT IT 16Growth hacking 16

Guesswork 16

More isn’t better 16

Follow the leader 17

WHAT IS WORKING? 18Attributes that drive engagement 18

The context of engagement 19

A framework for engagement success 20

Best practices in personalization 22

A content engagement framework template 23

This is not limited to acquisition 24

CONCLUSION 25

contents

Introduction

So much of what constitutes content marketing today is noise, and while that may keep buyers busy sifting between what’s important and what’s not, noise doesn’t do much to tip the marketing scales in your favor. If anything, poor content marketing does the complete opposite—hurting your results, your cause, and your brand in the process.

If there’s one truth in marketing, it’s that noise doesn’t stand out. It doesn’t get noticed. It doesn’t drive interest, engagement, urgency, or, most importantly, action.

Marketing for the sake of marketing is marketing without intent. It replaces the thoughtfulness and strategy in the assets you create with quick hits, click bait, and disjointed efforts that do little more than insert your brand into an email inbox ready to be deleted or displaying an ad on a webpage immediately ignored whilst scrolling.

Successful content marketing initiatives, especially in today’s increasingly digital, highly-curated world, rely on more than broad strokes and the

traditional whitepapers to generate demand—to generate revenue. And at the center of it all lies a marketer’s most valuable tool, and also their most challenging obstacle: relevance.

How do we become relevant? How do we communicate authenticity? How do we maintain a personalized approach with our audience whilst being nimble, thoughtful, and scalable? How do we break through the digital noise and deliver content that resonates with our audience?

That’s what we’re here to find out.

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Methodology

To understand the state of content marketing, its wins, and its misses, Heinz Marketing and ON24 conducted a hybrid qualitative and quantitative research study in January 2019 with over 150 B2B marketing professionals across various roles, industries, and organization sizes.

To attain the quantitative data, we surveyed B2B marketers and asked them to rate the various elements of their content marketing strategy, execution, and effectiveness.

To find out, more qualitatively, the aspects that make effective content marketing programs successful, we spoke to B2B marketers who were identified as the highest achievers in our study, as well as those with marketing programs tightly tied to sales and revenue performance.

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Attention Span-Centric

Lifecycle-Centric

Persona-Centric

loyalty

engageattract

retai

n

reward

nurture

grow4

Key findings

First, the bad news

We are getting worse at content, not better.

With a majority of benchmark studies, we see that B2B initiatives improve over time. And that’s to be expected as new initiatives mature, tactics are refined, and lessons are learned over time. And while, long term, that may be where content marketing is headed, short term, we appear to have taken a step backward.

• Content effectiveness is severely lacking.Only 1 in 4 marketing professionals believe their content marketing strategy is actually effective. Instead, a majority 47% rate their content strategy as just somewhat effective and nearly 20% rating their strategy as not effective at all.

• Relevant content is few and far between. Only 1 in 5 respondents are very or extremely confident that they’re creating relevant content for target audiences. On the other side, over 45% of respondents are somewhat confident

or not confident at all that they’re creating relevant content.

• A wealth of marketers lack confidence in measuring the impact of their content marketing efforts. Just 13% of marketing professionals report being extremely or very confident in their ability to measure the impact of their content marketing efforts. Over 70% report being only somewhat or not confident at all in their ability to do the same.

• A majority of today’s content isn’t driving results. Just 13% of respondents report being extremely or very confident that their content is driving their desired revenue results, while over 65% of marketing professionals claim to be just somewhat confident or not confident at all.

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But there’s good news too

While there’s obviously some sobering results around content marketing effectiveness and measurement as a whole, there’s a bright side too. Because while a majority of B2B marketers are executing content marketing approaches that deliver less-than-ideal results, there’s a minority of practitioners who are highly confident in their work, productive in their efforts, and able to achieve their goals.

What are they doing that others aren’t? What’s different about their content programs, strategy, tactics, and integrations that makes them so successful?

The following are some high-level findings from our qualitative research that reveal the stark similarities of those with high-performing content programs.

• Prioritize engagement. The published content formats and channels utilized of those with high-performing content programs clearly have a focus on driving two-way, interactive engagement with their audience. While this can take a number of formats, by prioritizing two-way engagement between the buyer and seller, you can increase the amount of time your audience spends with your content, facilitating their comprehension of your message and values.

• Focus on personalization. Those with the most successful content programs focus intensely on personalizing the experience. In fact, many of them focus more on the experience as a higher priority than scale and efficiency, especially for their most important target accounts. Successful practitioners know that personalized attention and experience can lead directly to greater engagement as it results in greater relevance to the prospect’s needs, wants, and challenges.

• Tell the buyer’s story, instead of their own. Content that drives the most sales and revenue performance waits the longest to tell the company’s own story. These programs have a higher percentage of content that focuses on the prospect’s story over their own. This reinforces best practices from SiriusDecisions and others in putting the prospect’s commitment to change first, which requires a deep look at their own issues, loosening their status quo before even remotely going into any kind of product or solution conversations.

• Align and integrate marketing, sales, and customer channels. There’s an accelerating impact of multichannel campaigns that truly integrate a consistent message and theme across channels. This integration includes not just marketing channels, but also incorporates sales and other customer-facing channels as well. In this way, successful programs can utilize content, end to end, from the moment a prospect enters the funnel to well beyond the point of sale to drive retention and loyalty.

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What do these findings mean?

At the core of marketing is empathy—the ability to see the world from the eyes of your buyer. Successful content marketing relies on your ability to deliver to your prospects content that does more than add noise to their already noisy world. Instead, it delivers content that resonates— content that’s meaningful to your buyer’s journey, situation, needs, and challenges.

It’s true, a majority of B2B marketers today are missing the mark with their content. But there’s a minority of marketers out there who are finding success. They’re taking the time to ensure their content is relevant, impactful, insightful, and in doing so, are able to utilize that content to drive revenue across their organization.

What is the current state of B2B content marketing? Let’s dive into the details.

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Diving into the detailsContent marketing strategy effectiveness

When asked to rate the effectiveness of their organization’s content marketing strategy, marketers showed a significant decline in confidence from 2017. Where two years ago, 30% of marketers thought their content marketing strategy was effective, in 2018, less than 10% felt the same.

Today, a majority of B2B marketers feel far less certain about the effectiveness of their content marketing strategy, leaning far more towards being somewhat effective (47%) or not very effective at all (16%).

1. How would you rate your organization’s content marketing strategy?

3.4%5.4%

27.7%

47.3%

16.2%12%

18%

25%

19%

26%

Extremely effective Very effective Effective Somewhat effective Not very effective

Total(147) Same question in August 2017

4.7%

15.5%

33.1%35.8%

10.8%9%

18%

31%

11%

28%

Extremely confident Very confident Confident Somewhat confident Not confident


2.7%

10.3%

20.5%

47.9%

18.5%


3.4%

9.5%

17.0%

49.7%

20.4%

14% 14%

20%

14%

35%



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Confidence in delivering relevant content

Relevance, as we saw earlier, plays a key role in content effectiveness, but when asked about targeting to specific audiences effectively, marketers reported a similar dip in confidence from last year.

While we saw a relatively small difference in those expressing higher confidence levels, the number of respondents who are just somewhat confident (36%) increased by more than three times from 2017 (11%).

2. How confident are you that you are creating relevant content for your target audience?

3.4%5.4%

27.7%

47.3%

16.2%12%

18%

25%

19%

26%



4.7%

15.5%

33.1%35.8%

10.8%9%

18%

31%

11%

28%



2.7%

10.3%

20.5%

47.9%

18.5%


3.4%

9.5%

17.0%

49.7%

20.4%

14% 14%

20%

14%

35%



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The gap in importance and execution

Digging deeper into the data, we can see the difference between how marketers rate the importance of various levels of content marketing and their self-reported performance.

In the table below, we see three key content marketing elements, and are able to identify that though marketers may rank an element as being important, there’s a disconnect in how they actually employ that element effectively.

While 77% of marketers say that content must be engaging to succeed, nearly 50% of marketers are lacking in this area, leaving a performance gap of -23%.

There are also sizeable gaps between importance and performance in the other two content categories, leaving a lot of room for improvement when it comes to creating successful content.

Key Content Marketing Elements

Importance Score Performance Score Performance Gap

Content is engaging 76.5 54.0 -22.5

Content drives action 59.8 46.4 -13.4

Content is customized 48.3 34.5 -13.8

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Content strategy segmentation

Because of the poor self-reported performance by content marketers when it comes to segmentation, we also wanted to know how they were segmenting content in the first place.

The vast majority of marketers reported segmenting content by target personas, but far fewer were tying content to sales stages.

This indicates a relatively low overall effort by content marketers to align their activity with sales. And without coordinating content efforts across all prospect touch points, it’s no surprise that effectiveness ratings have fallen, leaving sales and marketing to operate separately and disjoint the content experience as a prospect moves from one stage to another.

3. Do you have content strategy by the following segments?

Target personas70.9%

Vertical industries59.5%

Sales stages54.1%

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Content most often provided to sales organizations

If content isn’t segmented by sales stage, then where does sales get their content come from? What kind of content gets created?

Our research indicates that sales content is spread across a wide variety of formats, led by case studies and product collateral—formats that typically work best in middle to late stages of the sales process.

4. What type of content do you most frequently provide to your sales organization?

Case studies

Videos

30.6%

9.5%

Product/service collateral

Commericial insights

23.1%

8.8%

Webinars

Primary research

11.6%

6.1%

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Measuring impact

Measuring content marketing’s direct impact has always been a challenge, even for the best content marketers, and these metrics further emphasize a declining confidence in current solutions or reporting implementations.

The number of respondents indicating high confidence (13%) dropped approximately fourfold from 2017, while those indicating “somewhat confidence” rose more than threefold (50%).

We believe this is tied to the increasing expectation from leadership that content should be measured and evaluated similar to other marketing functions, such as demand generation. Where two years ago, activity-based metrics were more likely perceived as adequate, today, those same metrics aren’t valued to nearly the same degree.

While activity-based vanity metrics help identify engagement from a high level, they do little to showcase the ROI and revenue impact of a specific asset or content experience.

5. How confident are you in your ability to measure the impact of your content marketing efforts?

3.4%5.4%

27.7%

47.3%

16.2%12%

18%

25%

19%

26%



4.7%

15.5%

33.1%35.8%

10.8%9%

18%

31%

11%

28%



2.7%

10.3%

20.5%

47.9%

18.5%


3.4%

9.5%

17.0%

49.7%

20.4%

14% 14%

20%

14%

35%



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Most important content engagement metric

With the declining confidence in content marketing metrics, we asked respondents to tell us what exactly they are measuring.

Conversion-based metrics rank highest on the list by a wide margin with sales-related metrics following suit between 6% and 7%.

These metrics reinforce what we continue to hear from content marketers in the field that they prioritize metrics they can directly control and easily see (lead conversion, lead-to-opportunity conversion, even clicks and likes) over more difficult metrics to track such as sales influence (even if those are far more important to the organization).

5. What is the most important content engagement metric for your organization?

Lead conversion

Sales influence

39.5%

6.1%

Sales opportunity conversion

Click

34%

5.4%

Sales contribution

Likes

6.8%

2%

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Confidence that content is driving revenue results

Based on all the metrics we’ve seen thus far, it’s no surprise that content marketers lack confidence that their work is driving revenue results. In the quantitative and qualitative feedback from our research, it’s clear that this isn’t just about direct impact. It’s a combination of perceived measured impact that is causing problems for content marketers.

For example, many content marketers measure traffic, impressions and clicks. But do those metrics really lead to revenue results? Does volume equal quality?

Similarly, when a prospect engages with content for longer, stays engaged with content beyond a superficial few seconds, what does that imply about their self-education, interest velocity and likelihood to learn more, deeper into the buying journey?

6. How confident are you that your content is driving revenue results for your organization?

3.4%5.4%

27.7%

47.3%

16.2%12%

18%

25%

19%

26%



4.7%

15.5%

33.1%35.8%

10.8%9%

18%

31%

11%

28%



2.7%

10.3%

20.5%

47.9%

18.5%


3.4%

9.5%

17.0%

49.7%

20.4%

14% 14%

20%

14%

35%



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Mindsets that don’t cut it

We believe that success and perceived impact of content marketing goes beyond a universal, superficial approach. There are several existing, prevalent approaches to content marketing that we believe contribute to a persistent lack of confidence, impact, and results.

Growth hacking

Growth hacking has become a popular approach to marketing overall, as well as content marketing specifically. The idea that content can be conceived and executed quickly sounds great, but without a foundational strategy let alone an understanding of the buyer personas and buying journey stages, it’s next to impossible to create content that drives impact and results.

Guesswork

Similarly, many content marketing programs are developed based on what’s perceived as relevant

and popular with prospects vs what is rooted in their observed and documented interested, pain points, needs and objectives. An editorial calendar developed entirely in a “whiteboarding session” based on “interesting topics” is little more than guessing, and is less likely to have a true impact on mobilizing prospects forward in a buying or customer journey.

More isn’t better

Other content projects seem to be working in a “more is better” mentality. In reality, more may do little more than inundate and intimidate your buyers and customers. More copy doesn’t mean better value. Longer white papers don’t necessarily deliver more value.

Buyers don’t need more content any more than marketers need to prove their worth with greater reams of blog posts and videos. Instead, by understanding not only what customers what but also the formats and channels that drive the more

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engagement and interest, content marketers can maximize the impact of less content to have a much greater impact.

Follow the leader

While there’s nothing inherently wrong with following the content marketers who appear to be more prominent and successful in their efforts, it’s also important to remember that every business is uniquely different. Your customers, your selling environment, your industry —all lead to unique needs from a content perspective.

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What is working?

With the bad news out of the way, we can finally turn to what is working in content marketing.

Attributes that drive engagement

We found that six specific attributes of engagement seem to be most prevalent amongst successful content programs. They include:

Personalization

As discussed previously, this means customizing the message for each individual audience, even at the expense of campaign “efficiency”.

Interaction

This means driving a two-way conversation as part of the content itself. In some cases, the content is incomplete until the prospect or customer interacts.

Curiosity

Great content programs take advantage of our inherent interest in learning more about topics we care about, some of which are relevant to the

buying journey and others that just plain capture and keep our attention.

Personas

Buildings don’t write checks, and yet many B2B content programs and assets read as if they were written by a machine for a fellow machine to read. Successful, engaging content programs have a personality!

Precision

When some marketers hear that 90 percent of content for sales goes unused, they aim to create less content. But successful content marketers know their job is to increase the precision of content to unique points in the buying journey. Great content doesn’t have to be massive in scope. Sometimes a single slide, quote or infographic can do the job.

Brevity

The crazy busy, attention span-limited buyer doesn’t always have time for your 20-page white paper. Or as Mark Twain once famously said, “If I would have had more time, I would have written a shorter letter.”

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Lifecycle-Centric

Persona-Centric

loyalty

engageattract

retai

n

reward

nurture

grow

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The context of engagement

Attention Span Centric

The earlier in the buying journey you are with a prospect, the less attention span you have. Use that to your advantage.

Lifecycle Centric

Promote the right content at the right stage. Too much product too fast, for example, can be off-putting.

Persona Centric

Know specifically the audience you’re engaging. Even different people at different levels of IT, for example, may have different approaches and needs, and therefore different content strategies to engage them.

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Lifecycle-Centric

Persona-Centric

loyalty

engageattract

retai

n

reward

nurture

grow

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A framework for engagement success

These three focus area categories for content engagement success may seem basic and self-explanatory, but many are missing for unsuccessful programs. For successful, consistent and repeatable content engagement success, the most successful programs focus on the following:

Preparation

• Focus time on strategy—why you’re doing it, what you’re doing, and how it will achieve a stated goal. Too many content programs get right to execution without framing the “why” first.

• Separate strategic planning (“why”) from operational planning (“what” and “how”). Take the time up front to build consensus among your internal stakeholders on objectives and focus, which will make execution more efficient and successful.

• Think through what’s required to drive results, beyond merely publishing your new content. Do you need budget to amplify its reach? To pay writers, influencers and others to create and distribute the content?

Execution

• Be specific about implementation of your content—including format, engagement type, and method of conversion.

• Think through the right format, for example, for the audience. Will your C-level target really read through a 25-page white paper?

• The most successful content engagement programs integrate across multiple channels, both at the beginning of the campaign and

through multiple “resends” that reinforce and deepen acceptance of the message among your target audience.

• Conversion need not be a form or a demo; focus on the next specific/tactical step to keep your prospect engaged and interested.

Impact

• If you did the right work up front to define strategic objectives, this is where you follow up and share whether you were successful or not.

• Impact happens both short term and long term. For example, to get a prospect to convert into a new customer, they first need to simply engage with your content. You can therefore separate your reporting into operational and executive scorecards.

• Did your content move the needle immediately? Did it accelerate acceptance and likelihood to continue further down the buying journey?

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Preparation

• Strategic planning

• Budgeting

• Operational planning

Execution

• Format precision

• Channel integration

• Reach/distribution/amplification

• Campaign optimization

• Conversion

Impact

• Measurement and reporting

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Best practices in personalization

When it comes to leveraging personalization in engagement best practices, keep four things in mind:

• Perfect is the enemy of good. Don’t worry about making things perfect. Get it close and get it live.

• A little goes a long way. Precision and brevity, as stated before, can make a big difference. Sometimes three steps are faster than one.

• Personalize in cohorts. Personalization is critical, but can be done effectively in groups as well as individuals.

• Don’t limit yourself to business contexts. Don’t be afraid to have some personality, to engage prospects based on interests and topics outside of the buying journey. In a long sales cycle, bringing in topical or seasonal focus areas can keep things light and engaging.

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A Content Engagement Framework Template

For the rubber to meet the road, we’ve developed the following content engagement template to help you focus, organize and execute better, more successful engagement content moving forward.

This simple framework is intended to clarify and build consensus internally, plus help you think through the required consideration and execution points necessary for successful, repeatable and scalable content engagement programs.

Focus Area Example Answer

Strategic Objective Drive prospect to commitment to change

Audience Chief technology officers at named account orgs

Strategic Measure of Success Net-new sales opportunities created within 30 days of engaging with the content

Tactical Objective CTOs engage with entire content experience

Tactical Measure of Success 70% of CTOs engage with entire piece of content within 7 days

Format Live webinar/video with on-demand access

Distribution Channels Email, social, sales team distribution

Conversion/CTA % and time engaged, % of CTOs who complete the next step

Success Measurement Timing Within 7 days of engaging with live or on-demand webinar

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This is not limited to acquisition

Increasingly, leading B2B marketing organizations are thinking beyond the closed sales and beyond the initial funnel. Much of what we have learned about successful content engagement can be applied throughout the customer journey.

According to Gartner, the single most impactful means of increasing new orders from existing customers is to deliver new insights and engaging content that reinforces your expertise, leadership and vision for not just your own future, but the successful future of your customer.

Each content engagement opportunity you create for your prospects to attract their attention and bring them into your customer family is also an opportunity to nurture, reward and retain your existing customers into deeper relationships and a significantly expanded lifetime value.

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Lifecycle-Centric

Persona-Centric

loyalty

engageattract

retai

n

reward

nurture

grow

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Conclusion

We’ve covered what’s broken with content marketing as well as the distinct opportunity in front of you to differentiate, create value and mobilize both prospects and existing customers into deeper, more mutually profitable relationships.

But what happens next is up to you. No matter how much research we present, no matter how specific the recommendations of engagement framework, your business is unique. Your customers, your culture, your industry, your competitive environment—each of these variables (and more) create a unique opportunity to create and convert with engaging content at your core.

We hope that this research and the ensuing recommendations give you both inspiration and direction to take your content engagement to the next level. We look forward to hearing the results and success that comes with it!

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