Lead Generation the Top Priority Among One Third of B2B Content Marketers

The benefits of an investment in content marketing have been put into full view with the revelation that one third (38%) of B2B campaign managers use the technique mainly to generate leads.

A new survey from content advertising firm OneSpot and digital management consultancy the 614 Group suggests that a fair chunk of marketing professionals use sponsored media to reel in new customers. While lead generation was not as much of a priority for professionals looking to attract a B2C audience, in B2B it was of the utmost importance.

Those looking to capture the attention spans of individual consumers named brand and product engagement (28%) as their top priority. To highlight the difference in approaches, just 9% of B2B audiences claimed this to be of importance.

Distribution v creation

Other readings from the survey revealed how content marketers have been trying to hit targets with their distribution strategies.

Targeting audiences with relevant content is now gaining traction as brands go on the hunt for specific audiences, and it was of little surprise to find that one in five marketers were using some form of targeting when placing their articles.

Unfortunately this adoption was not the same for other key distribution opportunities, such as native advertising – considered a priority by just 24% of campaign managers.

Even lower levels of interest were discovered in content recommendation platforms, used by 18% of marketers, and in-feed native platforms, used by just 7%.

The readings could be attributed to a tendency among marketers to allocate more of their budget towards content creation than distribution. OneSpot and the 614 Group stated that on average, 37% of a content budget will be allocated to the creation of media, but Rob Rasko – CEO and founder of the latter – sees this changing in the not too distant future.

“There is no question that content marketing and native advertising are in the forefront of the minds of marketers. But, clearly there is a huge opportunity for publishers as marketers seek scaled distribution channels for delivery of these executions.”