Let’s face it—B2B content marketing trends are evolving faster than Usain Bolt’s sprint to the finish line.
Not keeping up with the changes in the digital marketing landscape can leave marketers lying flat on their faces with nothing but a wasted marketing budget and an empty marketing funnel to show for it.
We know there’s so much noise out there. It feels like you blink and a new marketing trend has come and gone.
With the constantly evolving technologies and trends, B2B marketers have to switch gears and refine their content marketing strategies constantly. It’s a never-ending battle to stay on top of the various platforms, channels, and tactics to reach and engage your audience.
So, we’ve decided to save you some hassle by summarizing the top B2B content marketing trends you simply can’t afford to ignore.
What’s New in Content Marketing
Here’s our take on what’s new and notable in the world of B2B content marketing.
1. AI-Powered Content Creation Gives Bad Content Writers A Run For Their Money
There’s no escaping it! AI-powered content creation has gained a ton of traction recently.
It’s the shiny new toy in the marketing toy box that marketers and businesses everywhere are all grappling with.
There’s no doubt that it’s a whole lot easier, faster, and cheaper to open up ChatGPT and type in “Write me a social post about X” than to pay for a content marketer to do the same thing.
But does that mean that’s what businesses should do?
Well, that’s where things get debatable.
For local B2C companies in industries where competitors put literally zero effort into marketing their businesses online (ie. the family-owned tailoring business down your street), there may very well be advantages to using AI for content creation. Because when it comes to content marketing for these business types, decent (albeit generic) content is better than nothing at all.
But, if you came to this blog post looking for B2B marketing trends, that’s not going to resonate with you.
B2B businesses often need to produce content about highly technical subject matter, demonstrate an advanced level of cutting-edge subject matter expertise, keep users engaged and interested in their brand throughout a long sales funnel, and/or make their brand stand out amongst fierce competitors.
With all that being said, AI content creation can have quite a few drawbacks for B2B businesses:
- AI content creation tools are only as creative as the prompts you give them.
- They lack the capacity for original thought and content will always be a regurgitated amalgamation of things that have been said before.
- They can’t keep up with fast-changing industries where new innovations are constant, opening the door for old, inaccurate information.
So, while AI-driven content may be a productivity powerhouse, churning out marketing magic like a well-oiled machine, when it comes to concocting original content, especially on complex or novel subjects, even the most advanced algorithms might find themselves hitting the creativity snooze button—or worse, spitting out content that could harm your brand’s reputation.
Additionally, as more people use AI content creation tools like ChatGPT, there will be a flood of uninspiring and practically identical content on SERPs, making content originality and expertise more important than ever. In order to try to cut through all the noise, it’s highly likely that originality may emerge as a ranking factor for search engines.
But all this doesn’t mean that AI content creation tools provide no value to B2B businesses. Don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater!
B2B content marketers that leverage AI for content ideation rather than content creation and instead of rejecting AI altogether will be able to leverage all the good stuff that AI provides while still benefitting from the expertise and ingenuity that is still a uniquely human quality—at least for now!
2. Dynamic Content Marketing Creates a More Personalized Experience
Content marketing has evolved into an exceptionally personalized experience due to the intricate workings of algorithms, AI, and real-time tracking.
Gone are the days of casting a wide net with generic brand content. Modern businesses have a secret arsenal of tools to woo specific buyers, leaving old-school spray-and-pray marketing in the dust.
To be fair, dynamic content isn’t brand new. But, tools are constantly evolving to make implementing dynamic content in your content marketing strategy easier than ever before.
With dynamic content marketing, the gist is that you can serve different content to different users based on data, user behaviour, and preferences.
Dynamic content marketing means B2B marketers can really strike the pain points for every stakeholder involved in the purchase decision to help guide them toward conversion.
Rather than providing a single version of a piece of content that leaves many users scratching their heads wondering how it relates to their wants and needs (or worse—causes them to click ‘unsubscribe’ or ‘unfollow’ or bounce from your website immediately), dynamic content makes it immediately apparent that the content is for them.
So, where are the top B2B content marketers leveraging dynamic content marketing, exactly?
Email marketing is one of the most prominent examples.
Tools like HubSpot or MailChimp make it easy to implement dynamic content blocks in your email campaigns to tailor each email to particular audience segments.
3. Outsourcing for Content Marketing Success
Outsourcing content creation to a third party has become an increasingly popular and convenient option to improve your team’s content marketing efforts.
B2B businesses increasingly realize the benefits of outsourcing by saving time and offloading the intensive work of crafting valuable, SEO-driven, personalized content.
Depending on the needs of your B2B business, outsourcing may be vastly cheaper than hiring an individual to do a job or insourcing. And who doesn’t love to save money?
Unfortunately, outsourcing may be difficult for some B2B businesses in the same way that AI can’t serve them. For niche or specialized industries, highly technical content is not as easy to farm out because content writers may struggle to understand a product’s technical aspects in order to create relevant, detailed content that demonstrates the expertise of the brand.
That doesn’t mean it’s impossible to outsource content writing.
Specialty B2B marketing teams should seek out firms that employ a “content engineering” approach, like us (wink, wink, nudge, nudge).
At Konstruct, we take a unique approach to content creation that we like to call, “content engineering.” This approach involves our content writers working closely with your subject matter experts to create high-performing content that demonstrates your technical expertise and utilizes proven content marketing best practices. Content engineering ensures that your content reaches, impresses, AND converts your target audience.
Trends to Watch in the Best B2B Content Marketing Channels
We can’t say enough about the importance of choosing the right channels to market your business.
As a B2B business, you don’t need to be using every marketing channel, you just need to be using the ones that make the most sense for your audience.
Here’s what you need to know about the best B2B content marketing channels.
4. Video Content Marketing Is The Cat’s Pyjamas
If a picture says a thousand words, what does a video say?
Well, it can tell a fantastic story for your brand, and content marketers (even in B2B industries where getting people on camera is like pulling teeth) are increasingly turning to video as part of their content strategy.
In fact, video marketing usage is at an all-time high in 2023, with 91% of businesses using video as a marketing tool, representing a significant increase from previous years (Wyzowl). Additionally, marketers who use video content can generate more leads, and 88% of video marketers have experienced a positive ROI from video content (Wyzowl).
So it’s no surprise that B2B marketers have hopped on the video bandwagon, serving up educational and thought-provoking content with the finesse of a viral maestro. By dicing and splicing their videos into delectable bites, marketers can achieve maximum efficiency, effectiveness, and reach—making every channel sing in sweet harmony.
The challenge, though, is that video marketing can be a significant investment (although it doesn’t always need to be), and getting people in front of the camera is no easy feat.
So when you do get those precious nuggets of video content, it’s important to make the most of them!
For example:
- Perform an interview with an industry expert
- Plug the full-length interview with smaller parts spread across various platforms like Twitter and LinkedIn
- Share snippets of the video via your newsletter, guiding viewers to your website to see the entire piece
And all of a sudden you go from having one great piece of content to many!
5. Email Marketing Still Dominates
Email marketing remains one of the top B2B marketing strategies.
In fact, email marketing revenue is set to reach nearly $14 billion by 2025, which is almost double what it was in 2020 (Influencer Marketing Hub).
And, did you know that email marketing has an ROI of $36 for every dollar spent? (HubSpot)
With such an impressive return on investment, how can you afford to ignore this content marketing trend?
Need some more convincing? According to SERP Watch, 72% of consumers prefer their marketing communication to be via email over other channels (SERP Watch).
It’s worth noting that content marketers have found that segmented emails have conversion rates 208% higher than batch-and-blast (SERP Watch). While it might seem like a lot of work, with templates and segmented email lists, it’s quite efficient and effective. Plus, you can automate many tasks to save even more time.
6. Podcast and Audio Content Marketing is on the Rise
Did you know 45% of global internet users between 25-34 listen to podcasts regularly? (BuzzSprout)
Currently, millennials are the dominant generation when it comes to podcast listening.
But, since millennials have more buying power in B2B industries than ever before, this actually works in favour of B2B podcasting!
According to LinkedIn, podcast listening is a pretty common hobby amongst department heads, VPs, owners, and C-suites, with 44% of the people aware of podcasts in this demographic listening to podcasts. (To be fair, this number is a bit outdated since it was published in 2016, but we expect this number to be even higher today.)
The great thing about podcasts is their repurposeability. Even if your podcast itself doesn’t result in a huge following base, you can easily repurpose podcast content for things like short social media clips or blog posts by leveraging the podcast transcript.
Or vice versa! If you’ve got great blog content, you can consider leveraging your blog posts for podcast topics.
Maximizing marketing ROI is all about making the most of the assets you create.
7. LinkedIn & Blog Content Remain Tried-and-True
You know what they say—if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!
LinkedIn and your company blog continue to be the best organic platforms to build brand awareness for your B2B business and drive more qualified potential customers into your sales funnel.
In social media marketing especially, there are constantly new and intriguing updates that can sway marketers off the beaten path.
Remember when TikTok was blowing up, and marketers everywhere were asked, “Should our business be on TikTok?” *Eye roll*
The key to B2B content marketing is to produce content in the spaces where your audience will be most receptive to your marketing and in a way that doesn’t make them feel like they are being sold something.
According to a Demand Gen 2022 B2B Buyer Behaviour Survey, 63% of respondents said that their top criterion for evaluating a vendor was having easy access to relevant content that spoke directly to their company.
So, stick to the platforms that business professionals go to when they want to level up their careers and focus on providing real value based on the specific pain points that they experience in their jobs, and you’ll be golden.
Take the Next Steps to Building a Stellar B2B Content Marketing Strategy
Now that you’re up to date on all the latest content marketing trends, it’s time to take a hard look at your existing strategies.
To develop your own foolproof B2B content marketing strategy, you need to determine what’s working and what isn’t.
It may seem intimidating initially, but if you keep everything covered in this article in mind, you’ll find that producing high-value digital content and gaining traction in your marketing efforts is possible.
If you’re tired of spinning your wheels with content marketing strategy, don’t know where you’re going wrong, or don’t have time to pile more on your plate, it’s time to contact a professional team for help. Cue the incredible content marketing team at Konstruct Digital!
If you need help building a winning content marketing strategy, request a proposal today!
