Professional Documents
Culture Documents
State of Marketing Strategy 2018
State of Marketing Strategy 2018
Summary .................................................................................................................................................... 4
2: Do you set marketing goals? Are you successful in achieving them? ...................... 15
8: How much time do you collectively spend creating a piece of content? ............... 29
Limitations ................................................................................................................................................. 37
03
SUMMARY
Testing Assumptions
Like most marketers, we’ve made assumptions about what works in
marketing strategy. We’ve operated with some common truisms.
But what if these bits of standard marketing wisdom are actually
myths?
Because we believe everything is anecdotal until the data backs it 16% 17%
up, we tested our hypotheses against the numbers.
In this report, you’ll find each question along with its results and our 6%
contextualized conclusions. Our conclusions are fueled by
3%
measuring responses against one another and crunching the
numbers on correlation strength. 1 2-5 6-10 11-25 26+
04
We asked them questions to determine: Report Data
How successful they are; All report data is from a blind survey over a two-week period in
Whether or not they document strategies and August 2017. We received 1,597 responses from professional
processes; marketers. Every continent (besides Antartica) is represented in our
Whether or not they set goals and achieve them; study; with 85 countries in total.
Their key performance indicators;
Their content quality, publishing frequency, primary Because of rounding, not all percentages equal 100%. Lastly, all
content type, and time investment in creating calculations are based upon total numbers, or a relevant sample
individual pieces of content;
from total numbers. Sample size is indicated as an “n = X” value.
And how often they conduct audience research.
05
KEY INSIGHTS
06
THE
Questions
QUESTION #1
S TRON G LY D I SAG R EE
There is some positive correlation between content
quality and marketing success. But, nothing earth
shattering.
(R = 0.29; N = 907; P-VALUE; P-VALUE < 0.0001)
N EU TR A L
First, these stats don’t definitively prove quality content has been
dethroned as a significant part of marketing success.
9
IS YOUR MARKETING SUCCESSFUL?
Data are good, but they don’t always tell the whole story.
Instead, it’s, “Are you creating the right kind of epic, high-quality
content?”
You can spend 30 hours or more on a single piece. But if it’s not
laser-focused on the right audience… Or converting traffic into
customers…
10
“
W E A S K E D J AY S O N D E M E R S T O W E I G H
IN ON THESE FINDINGS:
To me, this study shows that defining what "success" looks like,
and breaking it down into quantifiable, calculable components, is
essential for perceiving success in a campaign.
— J AY S O N D E M E R S , C E O O F A U D I E N C E B L O O M
QUESTION #2
...but 81% of the “marketing goals” crowd also reported success. In Goal setting is great. But…
fact, successful marketers are 4.3X more likely to set goals.
...do these marketers actually hit their goals?
Our research shows marketers who set goals are 429% more likely
to report success. And there is a reasonable correlation between Our respondents answered:
these data, as well. 58% often achieve them,
(R = 0.37; N = 907; P-VALUE < 0.0001) 21% seldom achieve them,
9% don’t know,
6% always achieve them,
And 6% rarely achieve them.
13
are you 6% ALWAYS
N = 1,101
DO YOU SET MARKETING GOALS?
Our research shows marketers who both set goals and report
marketing success accomplish 82% of those goals. There is a strong
correlation between these data, as well.
(R = 0.5; N = 889; P-VALUE < 0.0001)
A N D T H E T R I F E C TA : 5 9 % O F M A R K E T E R S W H O
REPORT SUCCESS BOTH SET GOALS AND HAVE
A D O C U M E N T E D S T R A T E G Y.
Conclusions
To set your team up for success, set goals. And do so understanding
that maintaining the status quo is risky, too.
Achieving new goals will require new actions and skills. But old
habits are tough to break and new ones hard to form.
15
QUESTION #3
Conclusions
While we found weak correlation between specific KPIs and
I DO N’T H AVE ON E
success.
SO CIAL
E MAIL
Because our finding that marketers who set goals were 429% more
likely to report success than those who don't, we conclude that
30% 19% 18% 10% 8% 7% 7% your specific goal-driven KPI isn’t the most important thing.
17
QUESTION #4
And this finding is where things got really interesting. There is a definite correlation between these data, as well.
(R = 0.48; N = 889; P-VALUE < 0.0001)
48%
13% STRONGLY AGREE
22% NEUTRAL
HAVE A DOCUMENTED
STRATEGY 18% SOMEWHAT DISAGREE
19
D O YO U H AV E A D O C U M E N T E D S T R AT E G Y ?
Conclusions
84% of our survey participants work on marketing teams.
And when you consider that 60% of marketers who set goals also
document their strategy, you have a recipe for a team rowing in the
same direction.
20
QUESTION #5
But…
ST RONGLY DI SAGREE
22
DO YOU HAVE A DOCUMENTED PROCESS?
Conclusions
Documenting processes is strongly correlated with success—and 4. Deadline.
even holds a 4.7X greater likelihood of success. When must the work be complete by?
23
QUESTION #6
25
HOW OFTEN DO YOU PUBLISH CONTENT?
After all, the more content you produce, the greater your chances
of hitting a homerun…
But the true benefit would be discovering the patterns that exist
throughout your most successful pieces.
Virtually none.
26
QUESTION #7
Additionally…
SO M EWHAT AG R EE
ST RO N G LY AG R EE
S T RO NG LY D ISAG R EE So, even though three-fourths of marketers say they have better
N EU T R A L
28
QUESTION #8
Did this hold true? There was a slightly positive correlation between content quality and
marketing success. But nothing earth shattering.
There is a pretty weak correlation between a marketer’s time spent (R = .29; N = 1,101; P-VALUE < 0.0001)
30
time spent on a single piece of content
14 % 11%
10-19
28% 7-9 hours
1-3 hours
hours less than
24% 1 hour
4-6
hours
1 , 5 9 7 P EO P L E S U RV E Y E D
QUESTION #9
other content.
P OD C AST S
WE BI N AR S
COU RS E S
EB OOK S
EM AI L S
AD S
33
QUESTION #10
SELD O M
And marketers who do so at least once per year or more are 303%
1- 2 TI M ES P ER Q UA R TER
N EV ER
Additionally, 56% of marketers who “strongly agree” their marketing
is successful conduct audience research once or more per month.
35
DO YOU CONDUCT CUSTOMER RESERACH?
Conclusions
There is definite value in conducting research.
This closely pairs with our findings. And even sheds more light on
surprisingly weak correlation between content quality and success.
36
L I M I TAT I O N S
These data points are guide posts. Keep in mind there are often caveats the
numbers themselves don’t tell us.
Whenever you come across a report like ours, it’s always important to keep a
few things in mind.
37
SURVEY
Demographics
WE S URVEYED 1,597 PROFE SSIONAL MARKE T E RS FROM 8 3 COUNTRIES.
ALBANIA G HAN A P E RU
A LG ER I A G REECE P H I LI P P I NE S
A RG EN T I N A G UATEM AL A P OL A ND
A R M EN I A HON G KO N G P ORTUGA L
B A N G L A DES H IN DO N ES IA SE RBI A
B OT S WA N A ITALY SLOVE NI A
CHILE K EN YA SW E D E N
CO LO M B I A M AL AY S IA TA I WA N
C Y PRUS M AU RITIU S TH A I L A ND
G ER M A N Y PAN AM A
W H O PA R T I C I PAT E D ?
40
R E A D Y T O A D D R O C K E T F U E L T O Y O U R R E S U LT S ?
S TA RT A 14 -DAY FRE E T RI A L