Almost nine out of ten enterprises now have a content marketing team, and more than 40 per cent of them are planning to increase the number of staff creating meaningful content this year, according to a new study by software platform provider Curata.
The study, which canvassed the opinions of 1,030 marketers and executives in March 2016, has now been published as part of a new Content Marketing Staffing & Tactics Study report. The 50-page guide aims to shine a light on the content strategies being used by brands and businesses in the B2B, B2C and hybrid B2B-B2C sectors.
Marketing teams
Just over two-thirds of the enterprises surveyed said that they now have between one and three people working on content marketing. A further 21 per cent have a team of four to six employees, six per cent have seven to ten staff members, and five per cent have more than ten people creating and distributing valuable content across marketing channels.
Content marketing is becoming an increasingly important activity for brands as shown by the fact that 42 per cent of respondents have now appointed a Chief Content Officer or Director of Content, who is responsible for managing content campaigns and their overall strategy. The report found that the most popular title used was Content Marketing Director or Manager, and that more than half of the companies surveyed are expected to appoint a content marketing executive of some kind by next year.
Content creation
When sourcing skills for their content marketing teams, the majority of those surveyed said that content creation was the most important skill set absent from their current setup. Of the respondents, 41.2 per cent admitted that this was a missing skill, which was significantly more than those who chose content marketing lead generation (21.1 per cent) and promotion (8.8 per cent). Just 5.3 per cent said that they most needed technology expertise to boost their content marketing endeavours.
Content marketing is now defined as a strategic marketing approach that is designed to engage a target audience through relevant, consistent and valuable content such as videos, online blogs and social media posts. Its overall aim is to drive profitable customer action and to keep customers engaged with a brand.
