Highlights of 30 Content Marketing Statistics You Should Know

January 6, 2023

By Jeff Riddall

Content Marketing is key to your Marketing Strategy in 2023. You must be in the broadcasting and publishing business in this tightening year to compete!

Content will help you establish you as an expert, an authority, and as a trustworthy source in your industry.
And it will improve your traffic, engagement, leads, and sales.
– R. Michael brown

Content continues to rule most marketing strategies, and there is evidence to support my assertion.

Simply put, content marketing is a crucial aspect of any digital marketing strategy, whether you’re running a small local business or a large multinational corporation.

After all, content is indisputably the very lifeblood upon which the web and social media are based.

Modern SEO, for all intents and purposes, has effectively become optimized content marketing as Google demands and rewards businesses that create content demonstrating Expertise, Authority, and Trustworthiness to the benefit of their customers.

Content marketing involves creating and sharing valuable, relevant, entertaining, and consistent content in various text-based, video, and audio formats.

The primary focus should be on attracting and retaining a clearly defined audience, with the ultimate goal of driving profitable customer action.

But with so much content being produced and shared every day, it’s important to stay updated on the latest trends and best practices in content marketing to keep pace.

Highlights from the Article

Content Marketing Usage

According to the Content Marketing Institute, 73% of B2B marketers and 70% of B2C marketers use content marketing as part of their overall marketing strategy.
91% of marketing pros surveyed by Semrush achieved success with their content marketing in 2021.
A B2B Content Marketing Study conducted by CMI found 40% of B2B marketers have a documented content marketing strategy; 33% have a strategy, but it’s not documented, and 27% have no strategy whatsoever.
Half of all marketers say they outsource some content marketing.

Content Marketing Strategy

83% of marketers believe it’s more effective to create higher quality content less often.
In a 2022 Statista Research Study of marketers worldwide, 62% of respondents said they believed it was important to be “always on” for their customers, whereas 23% thought content-led communications were most effective for personalized targeting purposes.

Types Of Content

The top three types of content being created by marketing teams in 2022 included videos, blogs, and images.
Short articles/posts (83%) and videos (61%) are the top two content types that B2C marketers used in the last 12 months. Their use of long-form articles increased to 42% from 22% last year.
Short-form video content like TikToks and Instagram Reels is the most effective type of social media content.
40.8% of marketers said original graphics (infographics, illustrations) helped them reach their marketing goals in 2020 (Source: Venngage)
72% of B2C marketers expected their organization to invest in video marketing in 2022. (Source: CMI)
Short content (300-900 words) attracts 21% less traffic and 75% fewer backlinks than articles of average length (900–1200 words.) (Source: Semrush State of Content Marketing 2022)

Content Distribution

Facebook was the top distribution channel for B2C marketers in the past 12 months and the channel that drove the best results. (Source: CMI)
B2B marketers reported to CMI that LinkedIn was the most common and top-performing organic social media distribution channel.
80% of B2B marketers who use paid distribution use paid social media advertising (Source: CMI)

Content Consumption

A 2021 DemandGen study revealed 62% of those making B2B purchase decisions said they relied more on practical content like case studies and visual content, such as webinars, to guide their buying decisions and citing a higher emphasis on the trustworthiness of the source.
Buyers are willing to spend no more than 5 minutes reviewing most content formats. (Source: DemandGen Content Preferences Survey)

Content Marketing Performance

B2C marketers reported to CMI the top three goals content marketing helps them to achieve are creating brand awareness, building trust, and educating their target audience.
Content marketing generates three times as many leads as traditional outbound marketing but costs 62% less (Source: CMI).
56% of marketers who leverage blogging say it’s an effective tactic, and 10% say it generates the greatest ROI (return on investment). (Source: Hubspot blog research)
Over 60% of marketers measure the success of their content marketing strategy through sales. (Source: Hubspot State of Marketing Report, 2021)

See More including Content Marketing Budgets and Challenges [Search Engine Journal]