During a survey carried out in 2022 among marketers from across the globe, 80 percent stated they thought their content marketing strategy was very successful; another 73 percent perceived their content marketing strategy was successful, and 52 percent said it was unsuccessful.

As of August 2024, approximately 82 percent of business-to-business (B2B) content marketers surveyed worldwide (but predominantly based in North America) listed understanding the audience among the leading factors contributing to content marketing's success. High-quality content and industry expertise followed, selected by 77 and 70 percent of respondents, respectively. According to the same study, B2B content marketers' leading paid content distribution channels included social media ads and search engine marketing (SEM).

During a 2020 survey carried out among senior level communications and marketing professionals in the United States, 20 percent of respondents strongly agreed that consumers actually read content they had created; another 44 percent moderately agreed.

This graph presents the assessment of various social media platforms among B2C marketers in North America as of July 2022. During the survey, 49 percent of the respondents stated they believed LinkedIn was an effective B2C marketing tactic.

During a survey conducted in 2022, 45 percent of responding marketing professionals stated that their most successfully performing type of content marketing was video. Short-form articles and success stories followed with 31 percent and 28 percent, respectively.

The statistic shows the most effective social media platforms for content marketing according to marketers in Australia in 2014. The source found that 53 percent of the respondents said that Twitter was the most effective social medium in regards to content marketing.

According to a study conducted in 2022, 52 percent of marketers worldwide find interactive emails as the most effective marketing content tool. Another 47 percent of respondents stated that live streaming/interactive videos were the most effective type of content for reaching marketing goals.

During a survey carried out in 2021 among marketers from across the globe, improving the quality of the content was named the most effective content marketing tactic. Around 55 percent of respondents said it helped them the most to make their 2021 content strategy more successful. Collaborating more with industry influencers was mentioned by 14 percent of interviewed marketers.

In 2022, global content marketing industry revenue was estimated at roughly 63 billion U.S. dollars. The source projected that it would increase to 72 billion in 2023 and that it would continue growing over the further years to reach 107 billion in 2026.

Content marketing was believed to be the most effective digital technique based on the responses of global marketers in early 2020. When asked to identify the single activity they thought would make the largest commercial impact on their own or their clients’ businesses, 17 percent pointed to content marketing. Following that was marketing automation, big data, AI, as well as machine learning.
Why could AI be beneficial for marketing?
Across North America, Europe and Asia Pacific artificial intelligence is most commonly used in marketing data analysis. There are some differences between the regions, however, where Asian marketers seem to be more experimental with the use of AI and employ the technology in content creation, whereas North American and European industry professionals tend to utilize AI for automation of marketing processes such as personalization, optimization or programmatic advertising. It falls in line with what marketers really expect from AI – making their tasks easier and improving marketing effectiveness. Among those who have already used artificial intelligence in their marketing efforts, the majority claim that AI helped them with better content recognition, increasing sales and customer relations as well as facilitating new product launches. As a result, the share of marketers using AI for digital marketing worldwide skyrocketed, from 29 percent in 2018 to 84 percent in 2020.

Which factors contributed to Danish companies' growing success with content marketing? During a survey carried out among content marketers from Denmark in 2021, 59 percent of respondents stated that producing content of higher quality was a factor; another 46 percent said that the higher priority of content marketing and more time spent contributed to their company's growing success of content marketing.

This statistic depicts the effectiveness of different types of content for content marketing according to professionals within the marketing industry in Spain in 2018. According to the results of a survey conducted between August and December 2018, approximately 66.7 percent of respondents considered current affairs as the more effective type of content.

A 2023 global survey asked business-to-business (B2B) content marketers at companies employing at least one thousand people to select up to three organic social media platforms delivering the best value for their organizations. Approximately 79 percent chose LinkedIn. Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram rounded up the top four, selected by 30, 27, and 23 percent, respectively. Less than 10 percent of respondents selected Twitter and/or TikTok.

During a survey conducted in September 2021 among content marketers who make use of videos in the United States, 49 percent of respondents said that interviews with influencers or subject matter experts produced the best content marketing results in the previous 12 months. Case studies, customer stories, and explainer videos were said to yield the best results by 48 percent of respondents, while 47 percent cited branded stories.

During a 2022 survey, 55 percent of responding marketers from across the globe stated that they believed Facebook was the most effective social media platform for content distribution. Instagram followed with 54 percent of respondents stating the same about the Meta-owned platform. LinkedIn came fourth, with 36 percent of marketers globally using it for their effective content distribution.

In 2022, about eight out of ten representatives of business companies and advertising agencies in Russia measured content marketing effectiveness by analyzing digital metrics. Furthermore, 77 percent of the survey participants tracked website traffic and identified the source of the content. Nearly 10 percent did not evaluate content marketing efficiency.

During a survey among B2B marketing professional in the United States, conducted in 2019, it was found that according to 55 percent of respondents, articles and blog posts were considered the most valuable content for moving prospects through the sales funnel. Further 43 percent said that reviews and customer testimonials helped them move their prospects through the B2B sales funnel.

During a July 2022 survey among B2B marketers who used social media platforms for paid content promotion worldwide, 78 percent of respondents stated that they made use of LinkedIn over the previous 12 months. Facebook was ranked second with 56 percent of respondents, which was a drop of 13 percentage points, compared to 2021, when 69 percent stated using it.

During a 2024 survey among marketers worldwide, approximately 83 percent selected increased exposure as a benefit of social media marketing. Increased traffic followed, mentioned by 73 percent of the respondents, while 65 percent cited generated leads. The multibillion-dollar social media ad industry Between 2019 – the last year before the pandemic – and 2024, global social media advertising spending skyrocketed by 140 percent, surpassing an estimated 230 billion U.S. dollars in the latter year. That figure was forecast to increase by nearly 50 percent by the end of the decade, exceeding 345 billion dollars in 2029. As of 2024, the social media networks with the most monthly active users were Facebook, with over three billion, and YouTube, with more than 2.5 billion. Pros and cons of GenAI for social media marketing According to another 2024 survey, generative artificial intelligence's (GenAI) leading benefits for social media marketing according to professionals worldwide included increased efficiency and easier idea generation. The third place was a tie between increased content production and enhanced creativity. All those advantages were cited by between 33 and 38 percent of the interviewees. As for GenAI's top challenges for global social media marketing, maintaining authenticity and the value of human creativity ranked first, mentioned by 43 and 40 percent of the respondents, respectively. Another 35 percent deemed ensuring the content resonates as an obstacle.

During a 2024 global survey among marketing and media leaders, approximately 42 percent reported using artificial intelligence (AI) tools a few times per week or daily when writing or generating content. Around 40 percent said they used those solutions for social media content generation. According to the same study, Facebook and Instagram were the social media platforms most used by global marketers for organic content and paid ads.