The strategy behind content marketing KPIs is a critical aspect of any business. The more strategically and efficiently you use content marketing, the more your business can experience measurable success. However, there isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution, so individualized analysis is necessary.
Content marketing offers the advantage of being both cost-effective and efficient, but even the smallest budget can be a burden depending on the size of the company. Therefore, it’s essential to consider ROI when engaging in content marketing.
Marketers must measure and optimize the performance of their content marketing to improve engagement, which in turn allows for more effective ROI measurement.
So, what are the strategies, tactics, and recent trends in content marketing performance measurement?
The Challenge of Content Marketing KPIs
Accurately measuring marketing effectiveness is extremely challenging. Surveys reveal that two-thirds (66%) of marketers find it difficult to measure content marketing performance, while only one-third (34%) consider it somewhat easy or straightforward.
To properly measure content marketing performance, a significant amount of data must be collected. Beyond this, marketers often have differing opinions when discussing marketing effectiveness. For clarity, let’s examine the three types of marketing effects:
Channel-Specific Effects
Consider a scenario where you’ve spent a substantial amount on paid search advertising. You’d naturally wonder how many of those conversions from paid search might have occurred organically. This is known as the channel-specific effect.
To understand channel-specific effects, you can either track the direct increase in conversions from the ads or analyze and measure the impact of ads across different channels. Another approach is conducting a randomized controlled experiment, not at a geographical level but at the user level.
For example, by dividing target users into two groups—one exposed to ads and the other not—marketers can compare the behavior of those exposed to advertising with those who weren’t. Some argue that such tests don’t fully capture the true channel-specific effect, but it’s still a strategic option for measuring content marketing performance.
Cross-Media Effects
Advertising platforms often provide various options for placing ads, which prompts marketers to consider the effectiveness of resources across different marketing channels. This is referred to as the cross-media effect.
Not all ad spend results in conversions, which is why measuring cross-media effects is complex and challenging. Most advertising platforms cannot measure cross-media effects. However, market comparison tests can analyze specific user behaviors to assess cross-media effects. If you have a generous budget, advanced modeling techniques like conversion modeling can also be employed.
Leveraging cross-media effects can help optimize the budget allocated for content marketing performance measurement.
Marketing Portfolio Effects
Marketers are concerned with measuring the effectiveness of all marketing activities that have been budgeted. This is known as the marketing portfolio effect.
In other words, how effective is the marketing spend across platforms A, B, and C? The return on investment relative to the expenditure is a crucial metric for measuring performance. Accurately measuring marketing effectiveness can have a significant impact on marketing decisions.
However, precise measurement is difficult, and conflicting results are common. Like cross-media effects, marketing portfolio effects can be measured through market comparison tests.
Content Marketing KPIs and the Necessity of Martech Tools
As mentioned earlier, content marketing typically utilizes multiple channels.
Surveys show that one in five marketers uses more than six tools to track content marketing KPIs. Moreover, over half of respondents use at least three to five tools.
As technology advances and market trends evolve, the field of marketing technology is becoming increasingly sophisticated.
With the growth of AI and automation, the Martech stack has expanded rapidly, enhancing related capabilities. Additionally, the acceleration of digital and e-commerce has led to the rise of flexible, cloud-based technologies.
The Need for Robust Marketing Measurement Tools
Martech is on the rise to more effectively prove marketing impact. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, companies have chosen to review costs and reduce budgets across all areas. This has necessitated that content marketers demonstrate the value and effectiveness of their roles more clearly and accurately.
Although the pandemic has subsided, content marketers will continue to feel pressure to report on marketing success and automation. As a result, experts suggest that finding tools that effectively measure marketing impact will become the norm. Going forward, marketers will focus on targeting potential customers, tracking and optimizing capabilities, and improving sales cycles through automation and machine learning.
These will become meaningful metrics for business improvement. While perfect measurement is challenging, marketers will increasingly be able to extract more meaningful data. Content marketers will adapt to environments where they can more effectively measure and continuously improve ROMI.
Content Marketing KPIs: Conversion Rates and Traffic
Regardless of budget size, marketers need to have a solid understanding of the concept of ‘marketing effectiveness.’ To measure performance effectively, it’s crucial not only to use the right tools but also to clearly define metrics.
Half of the marketers agree that conversion rates (50%) and website traffic (46%) are among the most important metrics to consider when assessing the overall performance of content marketing strategies. Additionally, 39% of respondents ranked engagement on social media channels high on their list of key metrics.
Traffic and conversion rates are vital metrics, providing marketers with clear and straightforward evidence. However, not all visitors generate revenue or become customers. If the percentage of visitors converting to leads decreases, the number of visitors becomes less relevant.
Instead, marketers will focus on targeting more suitable potential customers rather than simply attracting more visitors. In this way, conversion rates and traffic can complement each other.
Marketers want visitors who have the potential to become leads. Therefore, they will target specific niche markets, excluding numerous visitors who are unlikely to convert. This allows marketers to use their time more efficiently.
Marketers should strive to build an ideal customer persona and form optimized, customer-tailored metrics. Once marketers establish metrics for a specific customer group, setting up and measuring these metrics becomes much simpler. Instead of wasting energy on filtering out irrelevant traffic, marketers can spend time nurturing traffic with a higher likelihood of conversion.
Conclusion and Next Steps
Creating great content is crucial, but it’s just one element of the bigger picture in marketing. Content marketers must consider the most significant challenges and then develop a strategic plan to overcome them. At Growth Marketing Agency, we believe that establishing content marketing KPIs that everyone agrees on and reviewing the marketing technology stack are essential parts of the marketing strategy. We are committed to realizing data-driven content marketing.
Still find content marketing challenging? Start by checking out Growth Marketing Agency’s content marketing case study and SEO marketing case study to see the analyzed results.
