It is easy to get your company on board with content marketing. The challenge is getting stakeholders (managers, CMOs, and CEOs) to invest time, money, and resources in content marketing. Sure, you can track likes, shares, comments, increases in traffic, and click-through rates, but what about the number of dollars your content marketing campaigns make? Proof like that would go a long way and make your life easier.
In this blog, we will understand the concept of return on investment (ROI) in content marketing and look at how you can measure the ROI of your content marketing efforts.
Let’s begin.
What is content marketing ROI
In a creative field like content marketing, it takes a lot of work to show a direct link between actions and results. ROI in content marketing is the amount of revenue generated directly or indirectly against the time, money, resources, and effort put into campaigns. That was the easy part. The hard part of measuring the ROI of your content marketing campaigns is tracking and measuring your success. To track the ROI of your content marketing campaigns, you need to have the right analytics in place.Adding Google Analytics to your website will help you determine how content, leads, and sales are linked. To do so, create a Google Analytics account and connect it to your website. In addition to analytics, knowing the industry standards will also help you compare your campaigns to those of your competitors. Let’s take a look at some industry benchmarks for content marketing ROI.
Content marketing ROI for various industries
Every industry is different. For example, an eCommerce website can track the ROI of content marketing directly with sales on the website, whereas a B2B company will have to track leads through its journey of becoming paying customers.
Let’s take a look at how each industry performs when it comes to content marketing.
- Internet of Things (IoT)
IoT companies produce digital transformation and automation technologies such as sensors, wireless networks, M2M, and robotics. For such companies, content marketing is focused on creating thought leadership in their target industries and generating leads that can be converted with the help of the sales team. Companies in the Internet of Things (IoT) sector create case studies, white papers, blogs, and landing pages through their content marketing efforts. They track the leads from these content pieces by placing forms, trackable links, and Google Analytics goals. On average, the content marketing ROI for IoT companies is a whopping 2000% over three years. Landing pages, in particular, offer a conversion rate of more than 2%.
- Real Estate
Every real estate business's goal in using content marketing is to bring in leads through high-quality content. These businesses target a specific area in their city or state of operations. The idea is to establish themselves as thought leaders and become the first choice for people looking to buy residential or commercial property. The three-year average ROI of content marketing campaigns for real estate companies is more than 2100%. Businesses in the real estate industry can build topical authority and get leads if they host live webinars and publish high-quality, informative content. Landing pages in particular have a conversion rate of over 2.8%.
- Medical Technology
The field of MedTech is always changing, and cutting-edge technology is used to research and make new medical devices. The goal of these companies' content marketing campaigns is to show off their expertise in the field and attract doctors, hospitals, and people in the medical services supply chain.Over a three-year period, the ROI of medical technology companies' content marketing campaigns is over 1900%. More than 3% of the people who visit landing pages for companies that make medical technology end up becoming leads.
- Manufacturing
The manufacturing industry includes companies that work as supply chain contributors to end-consumer companies. These companies look to attract decision-makers from customer-facing companies. As part of their content marketing campaigns, they send out press releases, blog posts, white papers, research, case studies, and host webinars. If a manufacturing company invests in content marketing for at least a period of three years, it can see an exceptional ROI of 1300%. The landing pages of such companies offer a modest conversion rate of over 1%.
- Education
The education industry does a good job of establishing itself as an expert in its field by publishing informative content. Their target audience is working professionals and students looking to upgrade their knowledge. The ROI of content marketing campaigns in the education industry is 100% over a period of three years. Landing pages are expected to produce a conversion rate of over 1.4%.
- Commercial Insurance
Commercial insurance companies target decision-makers through their content marketing campaigns. They want marketers to help them attract, engage, convert, and retain managers, CEOs, and CFOs. To do this, content marketing campaigns often include blogs, ebooks, and virtual events that are full of useful information. The ROI of content marketing campaigns when done over a period of three years is more than 1300%. The landing pages for this industry have a conversion rate of over 1.7%.
- Biotech and Life Sciences
Similar to the medical technology industry, biotech and life sciences folks are looking to attract doctors, hospitals, and other medical professionals. The ROI for content marketing campaigns in the biotech and life sciences industries is 800% (which isn't bad), where properly optimized landing pages offer a conversion rate of over 1.3%.
- Solar Energy
Solar energy companies invest in content marketing to increase their brand awareness and establish themselves as industry leaders. Solar energy companies use different kinds of content in their content marketing campaigns, such as white papers, blogs, ebooks, and interactive webinars. The ROI of content marketing campaigns in the solar energy industry is more than 1500% over a period of three years. The landing pages for solar energy have a conversion rate of over 1.8%.No matter what industry you're in or what kind of content you use for marketing your products and services, it's safe to say that content marketing has a high ROI over a long period (like three years).
How to measure content marketing ROI?
Now that you have a fair understanding of industry benchmarks, let’s understand how you can calculate the ROI of your content marketing campaigns. For example, if you spend $500 worth of your own time, hire someone to create content for $500, and spend another $500 on paid advertising to generate leads that result in $3000 in sales. The ROI of your content marketing campaign is 100%
Content marketing ROI formula
The content marketing ROI formula is as follows:
ROI = (Gains made from Content Marketing - Cost of Content Marketing) / Content Marketing Cost * 100
ROI of Example = ($3000 - $1500) / $1500 * 100 = 100%
There are two main aspects to calculating the ROI of content marketing campaigns: the cost and the revenue generated from your efforts.
How to calculate cost of content marketing
To calculate the cost of content marketing, record of every expenditure and add them up. These may include the cost of your time, the cost of writers, editors, and graphic designers, and the subscriptions that you buy to optimize and track the performance of your campaigns.
Cost of Content Marketing Campaigns= Cost of Your Time + Cost of the time of Team Members + Subscriptions + Outsourcing Costs
How to calculate gain from content marketing
To calculate the gain from your content marketing efforts, you must set up the right analytics on your website. From your blogs to landing pages, everything must be tracked.
Gain from Content Marketing Campaigns = Customer Purchase Value from Content Marketing Campaigns
For example, if you generated 100 leads from an ebook and the sales team was able to convert 10 customers who went on to purchase products or services worth $1000,
The gain from your content marketing ebook is $1000.
As a marketing manager, you must keep track of all the leads generated from CTAs, forms, and other sources. Once you have a list of leads, talk to your sales team to find out what customers and their purchases are really worth.
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