Content marketing is a significant demand generation driver. It should be a budget priority too.
While many companies have used content marketing as a driver of demand generation, the COVID-19 pandemic spurred even more of them to expand their content marketing strategy. With in-person meetings and events on hold, they had no choice but to enhance their digital footprint and accelerate content marketing in a big way. In fact, 66% of marketers expected their content marketing budget to increase in 2022 (Content Marketing Institute). And in a recent survey from Demand Gen Report, content marketing topped the list of 2022 marketing budget priorities.
Fourth quarter is the time when many companies do budget planning for the upcoming year. Some departments are under pressure to spend their remaining annual budget, or face losing a portion of it for the following year. That’s why now is the perfect time to start planning your demand generation activities for 2023. When January rolls around, you’ll be ready to hit the ground running!
Start by looking in the rearview mirror
As the year begins to wind down, it’s a great time to look back at your current demand generation efforts. This is your opportunity to evaluate what worked – and what didn’t – and prepare to make incremental improvements moving forward. Here are the key areas you should assess:
- Campaign performance. Which campaigns garnered the best results?
- Channel mix. What channels were most effective?
- Content performance. Which content types and topics received the most engagement?
- Target audience. What types of potential buyers engaged with your company the most?
This is an ideal way to identify key insights and learnings to help inform your demand generation strategy for the coming year.
Establish your demand generation KPIs
The first step in planning your future demand generation activities is to define what success looks like. Your specific goals and KPIs will vary based on your business objectives. But we think that measuring these five key metrics is critical for successful demand generation.
- Content Performance. Evaluation of user behavior and engagement with your content, as well as overall traffic and SEO performance
- Inbound Leads. Prospect information that comes in through inbound channels, like the website
- Sales Qualified Leads (SQL). Leads that are ready to move into your sales process
- Close Rate. The number of leads that convert to customers
- Cost Per Acquisition (CPA). The total cost to acquire one paying customer on a campaign or channel level
Refocus on your target audience by defining your ideal customer profile
On average, companies spend about 29 percent of their marketing budgets on account-based marketing (ABM) activities (ITSMA). As you head into another budget planning season, ABM is likely on your list of demand generation activities too (and if it’s not, ABM is certainly something to consider).
An effective ABM strategy requires a deep understanding of your target accounts and audiences. First, you’ll need to identify the right accounts. Then you’ll develop a strategy for hyper-personalized engagement and support. This process is much faster and easier when you leverage an ideal customer profile (ICP) as a tool. If you haven’t yet developed an ideal customer profile, now is the perfect time to do so.
Ideal customer profiles include several data points that describe the type of company that’s the best fit for your services. They also outline what the major steps are in the ideal company’s buying journey. Ideal customer profiles typically include the following types of data:
- Demographics: company industry, size, revenue and location
- Psychographics: company values, challenges and purchase drivers
- Technologies: primary systems and technologies used by the company
- Lifecycle: business development stage and maturity of the company
- Buying Triggers: intent factors that indicate readiness to buy
A robust ideal customer profile makes it easier to identify your target accounts for ABM – and to develop highly focused content that will resonate specifically with them.
Note: This is just a taste of the ideal customer profile. Watch for upcoming articles where we dig deeper into how to create an ideal customer profile that zeros in on who your best-fit prospects are.
Plan content for each stage of the buyer’s journey
Today, 55% of buyers say they now rely more on content to make purchasing decisions than they did a year ago (Demand Gen Report). This data makes a strong case for why mapping your demand generation content to the buyer’s journey is so important.
Content mapping helps to ensure that your content connects with buyers at critical points throughout their purchase decision process. If you’re offering advice at each step along the way, buyers are more likely to turn to you as a trusted partner. For more information about the art of content mapping, check out our blog article, B2B Content Mapping: Build Content for Each Stage of the Buyer Journey.
Why start planning demand generation activities now?
As you head into the budget planning season, now is the time to start identifying your demand generation activities for the coming year.
- What worked this year and what didn’t…and how can you apply those learnings for 2023?
- How will you decide which accounts to target as part of your 2023 ABM strategy?
- How will you ensure that your content resonates with buyers at each stage of their journey?
- What KPIs will you use to measure future success?
Learn more about building a demand generation engine to drive high growth.
Here at GrowthMode Marketing, we can help you answer these questions – and plan a budget to support your 2023 growth goals. We’re experts at helping our clients drive growth through high impact demand generation strategies. Contact us today to learn more.
