TLDR: Companies need to integrate their performance measurement to get ready to launch. That's one finding of the Content Marketing Readiness Study, which .companion is unveiling this week. Here's the latest Horizon interview on the topic.
Content marketing "With digital advertising, we've been living in the matrix for a long time"
When it comes to content marketing, German marketers still have a lot to learn
How well do Germany's companies really master content marketing? Mediocre at best - that is the result of a study by the Companion consulting firm. The "Content One Survey" will be presented in detail at the HORIZONT Content Marketing Congress on Thursday of next week.
Companion's consultants conducted interviews with 57 heads of marketing, communications and digital - all from DAX and MDAX companies. A maturity level (Content Marketing Maturity) was then determined for six "success-critical fields of action": Content Creation, Content Distribution, Media Buying, Media Control, Content Measurement and Share of Voice Measurement.
With 56 out of 100 points, the companies are best at the discipline of content creation. The greatest need for action is in media control, i.e., the establishment of uniform performance indicators and efficiency reports. Here, the maturity level is just 31 percent.
Companion man Michael Heine nevertheless draws a conciliatory conclusion: "The problems and challenges are very much recognized - and they are being addressed. The question is no longer whether a new form of organization is needed in communications, but how best to tackle this daunting task."
What Heine has to say about Google and Facebook is very remarkable. The stars from Silicon Valley are all too happy to promise companies that, thanks to their gigantic collection of data, they can provide marketing people with all the information they want about their customers. The Companion man: "There are just these Silicon Valley discussions about whether we are already 'in the matrix', in an illusory reality made of data, like in the movie of the same name. With digital advertising, you can be relatively sure that we're already in it."
But there is also a positive development, says Heine: "Fortunately, the era of digital hypes is clearly over. Companies no longer have to chase the next hot thing, they finally have time to take a more serious and deeper look at the lasting things."
Michael Heine: "Your own web space is where it all happens. Agencies won't get you very far there.
Companion Manager Michael Heine
Mr. Heine, according to your study, companies are reaching a maturity level of 44 percent in content marketing. That doesn't sound great. In fact, the road to readiness is still long; only very few companies are ready to go and can easily grow beyond their budgets. But the good thing is that practically all companies have the right understanding of the internal tasks. The problems and challenges are therefore very well recognized - and they are being addressed. The question is no longer whether a new form of organization is needed in communications, but how best to approach this enormous task.
How do you see the future of content marketing? I think the era of digital hypes is clearly over, thankfully. Companies no longer have to chase the next "hot thing"; they finally have time to get more serious and deeper into the things that matter. Content marketing ensures that specialist topics such as social media and the performance of one's own website have to be brought together for the first time. Our Content.One evaluation system provides answers that are also understood at board level. The overarching theme is called Digital Transformation. And it offers a great opportunity to really put into practice what was called integrated communication 20 years ago.
Who is the natural mind behind content marketing? The CMO, the head of communications, the digital strategist? The crucial question is: Who has access to the technology budgets? It's about what technologies need to be built to communicate in digital media, and what to do with the data trails that are created in digital media. This gives the topic of communication a completely different momentum in companies.
Media agencies are responsible for measuring the efficiency of communication. They can continue to play an important role. The only problem is that media agencies can't make any valid statements about a very central medium: the company websites. However, unless you are an FMCG, these are where by far the largest investments are made, and I am convinced that they are becoming increasingly important. The company's own web space is the place where the decisive things happen, where conversions take place, where marketing contacts become real customer contacts, where business happens. The entire measurement landscape has to dock onto this place! Agencies won't get you very far. With media agencies and players like Facebook or Google, you're basically dealing with black boxes and companies that pursue their own interests. In my view, measuring and evaluating data on your own is therefore a very central issue for companies.
Integrated communications also means an end to silos within companies - marketing, PR and sales are growing together. Absolutely, there's no way around it. It won't work without a central integration platform for the different disciplines. Measurement methods and analytics have to be set up in such a way that I can actually evaluate across channels and objectively compare individual measures. It's all about collaboration. For this, you need simple KPIs at most. Only specialists can be interested in special silo KPIs, such as visits, retweets, and so on. In reality, there is still no currency for communication in companies beyond the advertising departments. But uniform KPIs are crucial; they help different communications departments to speak a common language in the future and to prove themselves as an important part of the digital transformation.
And what about traditional advertising? Is it becoming dramatically less important in this digital data world? Not at all. The right message in the right place at the right time: "Digital naive" confuse marketing with direct marketing. Targeting only helps in special situations. But there are also completely different demands on marketing, especially in the area of fast moving consumer goods. Just look at the sales development of television, a medium that is supposedly doomed to die. Personally, I find all this talk about the rise and fall of individual media genres completely boring. And as far as digital propaganda is concerned: There are these Silicon Valley discussions right now about whether we are already "in the matrix," in an illusory reality made of data, like in the movie of the same name. With digital advertising, you can be relatively sure that we're already in it.