20 Statistics That Will Drive 2014 Marketing Strategies

By Pam Dyer

Next year’s trends highlight the importance of social media marketing.

As 2013 draws to a close, marketers are looking ahead to next year when social media marketing will begin to take center stage. No longer a luxury, it will become a must-have in 2014 marketing strategies. Digital asset management firm WebDAM found that marketing on the social Web will move toward critical mass over the next few years as more budget is allocated by brands, and custom content will become increasingly import as companies fight to develop awareness and win customer mind share in the marketplace.

In 2014, marketers will use dynamic content to deliver targeted, highly-personalized experiences to the right audience at the right time.

What to expect

• 78% of CMOs think that custom content is the future of marketing.
• Marketing teams will spend $135 billion on digital marketing collateral.
• Internet advertising will account for 25% of the entire ad market by 2015.

Trends in the marketing mix

• Social media: Social media marketing budgets will double over the next 5 years.
• Content: Nearly 50% of companies now have content marketing strategies.
• Email: Social sharing buttons in mail increase click-through rates by 158%.
• Events: 67% of B2B content marketers consider event marketing the most effective strategy.
• PR: 73% of reporters think press releases should include images.
• PPC: 72% of PPC marketers (those who use pay-per-click advertising) plan to increase their PPC budget in 2014.
• SEO: SEO (search engine optimization) is vital — 33% of traffic from Google organic search results go the first item listed.

What to consider for your digital audience

• Inbound marketing delivers 54% more leads than traditional outbound marketing.
• 52% of marketers have found a customer via Facebook in this year.
• 43% of marketers have found a customer via LinkedIn in 2013.
• B2B companies that blog generate 67% more leads than those that don’t.
• 55% of marketers increased their digital marketing budget this year.
• Visual content is processed by the brain 60,000 times faster than text.
• Videos on landing pages increase conversion by 86%.
• 65% of people are visual learners, so there will be an industry-wide shift toward to employing visual content in marketing initiatives.