Do you know how your content marketing team stacks up? It's incredibly useful to have an idea of what other content marketers are up to and how they're doing. Not only will it give you a feel for the performance level other content teams are achieving, but it'll also help you find and fix gaps in your own team's processes and performance.
In the ever-evolving world of content marketing, staying on top of statistics, benchmarks, and trends is especially important. We hear from marketers across the globe who are constantly asking themselves questions like, "Are we doing everything we can to stay on top of the latest trends?"
To help out fellow European marketers, our Dublin team dove into some hard data on the state of content marketing in Europe. Alongside Smart Insights, we surveyed over 700 European marketers to see where they've been focusing their efforts most, where they've been struggling, and what their plans are for the remainder of 2015.
For a taste of what we found, flip through this SlideShare and check out the tweetable statistics below. These will give you an introduction to the data we uncovered in our survey.
To learn about these findings in more detail, download the full benchmark report here.
29 Revealing Statistics About Content Marketing in Europe
The hype and success stories have caused more organisations to buy into content marketing.
1 |
37% of respondents felt that they had good capabilities with support from management.  Tweet this stat |
|
2 |
20% of respondents said they have advanced content marketing adoption. Tweet this stat |
|
3 |
12% of respondents said they have an optimised content strategy. Tweet this stat |
|
4 |
Only 11% of our survey respondents said they make little use of content marketing. Tweet this stat |
Businesses are increasing investment in content marketing.
5 |
97% of European marketers believe in the power of content marketing. Tweet this stat |
|
6 |
71% of businesses are creating more content in 2015 compared to 2014. Tweet this stat |
|
7 |
Over 25% of companies are increasing internal headcount for content marketing in 2015. Tweet this stat |
|
8 |
28% of companies are increasing investment in agency resources in 2015. Tweet this stat |
The key issues in managing content marketing are the creation of quality content and measuring ROI.
9 |
Over 66% of businesses see significant room for improvement, rating their content marketing as basic or inconsistent. Tweet this stat |
|
10 |
55% of respondents found quality to be a challenge with content marketing. Tweet this stat |
|
11 |
58% of respondents cite content frequency as a specific concern. Tweet this stat |
|
12 |
Measurement of ROI and content effectiveness is a challenge for 51% of businesses. Tweet this stat |
European marketers are finding success with blogging and strategic planning.
13 |
79% of marketers find that strategy and planning are most effective for distributing content. Tweet this stat |
|
14 |
67% of marketers have success with blog posts and articles. Tweet this stat |
|
15 |
45% of marketers rate e-newsletters or online magazines as effective forms of content marketing. Tweet this stat |
|
16 |
41% of marketers find infographics to be an effective content format. Tweet this stat |
European marketers rate SEO tactics more highly than social media for organic content distribution.
17 |
62% of marketers rate Google organic traffic as a successful tactic for content distribution. Tweet this stat |
|
18 |
47% of marketers believe Twitter is the best social network for distributing content successfully. Tweet this stat |
|
19 |
46% of marketers rated Facebook as a successful channel for organic content distribution. Tweet this stat |
|
20 |
43% of marketers found LinkedIn to be a successful channel for organic content distribution. Tweet this stat |
|
21 |
Only 15% of marketers found that Google+ is an effective channel for distributing content. Tweet this stat |
Despite the competition within organic content distribution, many European marketers are not taking advantage of the targeting techniques of paid media ads.
22 |
50% of marketers are not using using Twitter ads. Tweet this stat |
|
23 |
48% of marketers are not using LinkedIn ads. Tweet this stat |
|
24 |
38% of marketers are not using Facebook ads. Tweet this stat |
|
25 |
49% of marketers are not using Google Remarketing. Tweet this stat |
|
26 |
Out of the people who are using paid content distribution, Google AdWords is used the most, with 53% having paid for their ads to show up in search results. Tweet this stat |
European marketers are still struggling to measure ROI from content marketing.
27 |
The most commonly used metric to measure content marketing effectiveness was website visits at 74%. Tweet this stat |
|
28 |
The second most commonly used metric to measure content marketing effectiveness was social sharing of content at 66%. Tweet this stat |
|
29 |
Only 39% of marketers claimed they were able to measure return on investment from their content marketing. Tweet this stat |
Want to see more data on the state of content marketing in Europe?
Check out the full benchmark report, Driving Content Marketing Success 2015, European Edition.
Editor's Note: This post was originally published in January 2014 and has been updated for freshness, accuracy, and comprehensiveness.
![21 Mind-Blowing Black Friday Statistics for 2020 [New Data]](https://53.fs1.hubspotusercontent-na1.net/hubfs/53/black%20friday%20deals.jpg)
![Here's the 2017 State of Digital Marketing [Infographic]](https://53.fs1.hubspotusercontent-na1.net/hubfs/53/2017-State-of-Digital-Marketing-compressor.jpg)
![3 Must-Read Stats on the State of Inbound Marketing in 2015 [New Research]](http://53.fs1.hubspotusercontent-na1.net/hubfs/53/00-Blog_Thinkstock_Images/Marketing_Stats_State_of_Inbound_copy.jpg)
![15 Stats Every Digital Publisher Needs to Know [SlideShare]](http://53.fs1.hubspotusercontent-na1.net/hubfs/53/Media/charts.jpg)