Is content marketing worth it? Can your company achieve a positive ROI by investing in blogging, social media, and marketing automation?
For the folks that speak “ROI”, this guide from Eloqua will likely be very helpful (warning: opt-in required to download it) as it goes into plenty of detail on all the metrics that the C-Suite could ever want to see.
Below are a few snippets from two reports; one from Eloqua and one from Hubspot.
Eloqua’s Findings
According to Eloqua’s findings, a mid-sized organization should expect to spend approximately $12,000 a month and a larger-sized company could expect about $33,000 a month. These costs would be inclusive of the Managing Editor, Chief Content Officer (for larger organizations), the freelancers to actually write the 2 blog posts per week (estimate to cost $150 per post), and $2,500 (mid-sized) or $3,500 (larger-sized) per month for a piece of premium content; which is typically a special report or video, etc…They also included a charge of $1,500 for mid-sized and $2,500 for larger-sized companies for software and hosting.
As the principle objective of content marketing is to generate leads, let’s look at Eloqua’s findings.
As you can see, regardless of the size of your company, your cost per lead will drop substantially within the first 5 months. This is because content marketing requires some time to build momentum (traffic) and once that starts to happen, returning visitors, combined with sharing across social media platforms, both start to pay off.
When compared to the ongoing cost of paid advertising, content marketing shows a clear and substantial benefit; especially when longer time frames are taken into account.
They key thing to remember about content vs advertising is this: content is an asset that will provide an ROI for a long period of time after it is created, whereas advertising stops sending traffic as soon as you stop paying the bill.
Hubspot’s Findings
Anything worth doing takes effort, and content marketing is no different. Is it actually worth it?
In a word, yes. The chart below shows that inbound marketing (specifically blogging, social media, email, and SEO) do require a larger time commitment than outbound channels; however, inbound channels are very likely to significantly reduce your cost per lead.
To put a firm number on just how inexpensive inbound leads are, we can turn to our friends at Search Engine Journal, who report that inbound leads cost 61% less than outbound leads.
Are Other Companies Even Doing Content Marketing?
More companies are embracing content marketing every day. At this point nearly 60% of marketers report that they have adopted content marketing strategies.
Even more interesting is that nearly half of CEOs report that their companies have completely integrated content marketing strategies with their marketing strategies at large.
What About Blogging? Will It Really Help My Company?
Speaking from first hand experience, I can assure it does. However, don’t take my word for it. Let’s look at the numbers.
For starters, companies that blog generate 126% more leads than those who don’t.
Not only does blogging generate leads; it brings in new customers. As you can see below, 43% of marketers report that they have generated customers from their blog.
But here’s where things get really interesting: of marketers who publish posts on a daily basis, 82% report that they’ve generated customers from their blog. 82%!
Isn’t SEO Dead? Why Should We Allocate Resources to It?
There is no questions that SEO is changing, however, to say it’s dead is completely inaccurate. In fact, when it comes to lead generation, traffic from SEO is leading the pack.
According to Search Engine Journal, leads from SEO have a substantially higher close rate than outbound leads.
I Keep Hearing About “Marketing Automation”. What Is It All About?
When properly implemented, marketing automation can have a very positive impact on your business. According to Gartner Research, companies that use automation experience a 10%+ increase in their revenue within just 6 – 9 months.
If you’re wondering where you can find the absolute best marketing automation software available, we’ve got you covered. In a recent report from VentureBeat, HubSpot was named the “best all-around marketing automation system.”
In fact, we like Hubspot so much, it’s what we use here at Groove.
Here’s a breakdown of how all the companies in the report fared when it came to content optimization and content targeting.
Conclusion
While there is no question that there is effort required to properly execute a well planned content marketing strategy, there is also no question that the benefits are substantial – and the best part is that, unlike with paid advertising, the benefits increase over time, even if your expenditures do not.
What Do You Think?
What are some of the concerns you’re facing with moving to a content strategy? Did this article resonate with you? If so, please share it on your social networks and leave your comments down below.