As our capacity for data collection grows, so do the many approaches for monitoring content performance. We’ve discovered that B2B marketers would rather adhere to traditional vanity metrics than reconsider what we’re measuring—and why.
Email statistics are a good example. For years, we’ve been measuring open and click rates, deliverability, and unsubscribe rates. Each of these metrics adds to the tale, yet we usually judge success by seeing them as independent data.
With little results, it’s impossible to inform anyone about your content marketing strategy. Nonetheless, we appear to be eager to keep sending email campaigns with poor returns. That conclusion has been accepted because it is the standard. Even if the response rate remains dismal, we applaud ourselves when we exceed the targets.
Individual clicks do not tell the whole story of a complicated B2B purchasing transaction. To use content performance data to drive our content marketing strategy, we must concentrate on pathways and progression.
Keep Your Content Alive
We have a habit of seeing content as a distinct asset and judging performance in isolation, rewarding assets that perform well and discarding those that do not. But there’s more to consider. We must examine content analytics to determine how well our stuff interacts with other content. To put it another way, how successful it is in directing development by acting as a conductor for engagement and intent.
According to research, B2B IT buyers look at 18 pieces of content, whilst business buyers look at at least 13 content assets before making a purchase decision. Given the volume of content necessary to impact a B2B purchase decision, we must evaluate our content marketing strategy based on more than just views and popularity.
In Order To Create Connected Experiences, You Need To Influence Your Content Marketing Strategy.
A content marketing strategy is a methodical approach to utilizing content to achieve a commercial goal.
When you consider the body of material you’ll create to meet this objective with this specific audience, defining the content metrics that influence your content marketing approach becomes easier.
Once you’ve established a premise or aim, decide what your audience will need to learn to attain that goal. Determine the questions you’ll need to answer at each level of their learning and how you can utilize that material to build meaningful, connected experiences that signify purpose as they approach the purchase stage.
While evaluating the contribution of each content asset to the effectiveness of your content marketing strategy is vital, it is more critical to examine its influence as a component of the whole versus the premise you’ve established.
If one asset is underperforming, it may impede the utilization of other materials that it leads. Perhaps the query answered by this piece of material is invalid. Perhaps a different issue or point of view might be more interesting. Change it out. If the links aren’t working, replace them.
One fundamental goal is to manage growth. This cannot be accomplished with a single content asset, at least not to the amount required to build a lucrative B2B client relationship, which is the ultimate aim of a content marketing plan.
