Content Marketing: By the Numbers

Today we continue in our discussion about Content Marketing. Yesterday, we learned what content marketing is. Today, we talk about the numbers that support its importance.

Blogs on Company Sites Result in 55% More Visitors
We have learned the importance of content. By adding a blog to your company website, you can expect to see 55% more visitors than websites without blogs. Adding a blog is relatively simple, but the hard part is keeping up your blog and dedicating the time to keeping it current. I recently heard a stat that I can’t support but was interesting if true. During a social media podcast, a very well respected marketer made the statement that 85% of blogs have less than 5 posts. It would be very scary if this is true. It basically means that too many blogs are created and unattended.

Companies with Blogs get 97% More Inbound Links than Others
What does this mean? According to SearchMetrics, the number of inbound links is the 3rd most influential factor in search engine ranking. Simply put, the more inbound links, or links from other places to your website, the higher you will place in search results.

Interesting Content is a Top 3 Reason Why People Follow Brands on Social Media
People follow brands online because they produce interesting content. Furthermore, 6 out of 10 Twitter or Facebook users will recommend a brand they follow. This is the bridge between social media followers and customers.

In fact,

• 67% of Twitter users are more likely to buy from brands they follow
• Blogs are 63% more likely to influence purchase decisions than magazines.
• 3 in 4 marketers cite successful social media campaigns as a factor in closing sales. Successful social media campaigns come from compelling content.

Blogs give websites 434% more Indexed Pages and 97% more Indexed Links.
The more indexed pages and links you have, the more often you will be seen in online search. By increasing these numbers with a blog, your site will be found more often by more people.

Social Media Content Boosts Sales
63% of companies with leading social media sites surveyed said that posting content on social networks has increased their marketing effectiveness.

In fact,

• 61% of companies find customers on LinkedIn
• 67% of companies find customers on Facebook
• 53% of companies find customers on Twitter

The numbers are pretty astonishing but do not lie. When trying to equate sales to online marketing efforts, the best results come from sites that produce effective, engaging content.

The source for the aforementioned number is the the following infographic and reference list.