In the world of small business marketers, the use of online content marketing as a high priority advertising method is almost universal. It is, and always has been, one of the more preferred and most used types of marketing on the web. In a report by BusinessBolts.com from January, as it has been reported by eMarketer, 74 percent of small businesses are currently using content marketing. But of course, there is always room for growth, no matter what type of marketing is the subject of it. According to the responses of many respondents, when asked what their plans are for content marketing in the future, the marketing method will indeed be growing even further.
In the same report from BusinessBolts.com, according to eMarketer, nearly three quarters, totaling another 74 percent of respondents stated that they have plans to increase their efforts in content marketing for this year. With that, only 4 percent of the respondents stated that they have no plans for content marketing in 2013.
The study shows that the most popular forms of content marketing came in the form of articles and blog posts. Apparently, 74 percent of small businesses reported that they have used articles to promote themselves on the web. After that 64 percent used blog posts. Social media content was used by under half of the respondents. Finally, only about 40 percent of small businesses used email content. Overall, small businesses allocated 6.9 percent of their yearly budgets to marketing through the use of online content for 2012, as eMarketer reported from November research from Ad-ology Research.
According to this same study, articles will remain the more popular choice among small business marketers for 2013, in the realm of content marketing. Apparently, 55 percent of small business respondents in the Ad-ology study from November stated that they would like to increase their use of article for marketing in 2013. Just below that, 54 percent of small businesses plan to increase their use of social media content. Another 53 percent stated that they have plans to increase their usage of blog posts as content marketing tools. The final option in the top four choices was video content, as another 53 percent of marketers said that they had big plans for video content marketing in the coming year. Email newsletters did not make the top 4, landing a spot at number five with only 39 percent of marketers planning to use it in the coming year.
So, as the digital marketing world continues to grow, improve and innovate, content marketing still interests small businesses greatly. Small businesses cannot reach consumers in the same ways that bigger businesses can, with small ad budgets as well as less resources available to them. Therefore, content proves the best and most effective way for these small businesses to reach the masses. Based on success they saw in 2012, and information about coming trends, small businesses are sticking with articles and blog posts, while the rest of the web seems to be going to mobile, social and video.
