I speak with a lot of people who are frustrated that their content marketing strategy doesn't seem to be working. In fact, in some cases, their entire content strategy seems to be a miserable failure. why is this the phone number list case? If phone number list content marketing is such an important marketing method, proven to be successful, and used by nearly 90% of businesses, then why do so many businesses feel like their strategy is useless and ineffective? There are some common trends that characterize many of these “failed” content marketing strategies. In most cases, the phone number list strategies did not “fail” at all. The "strategy", whatever it was, was not clear enough to guide the company towards its goals. Instead, the phone number list strategy needs a hard reset and reprogramming. This new programming comes in the form of SMART objectives. Why I'm Concerned About 'Strategy' Content marketing is something everyone does, but few people are very confident about it. You may have read CMI's industry survey, which explained that only 9% of B2B marketers think their organization's use of content marketing is "very effective." This leaves the phone number list vast majority of the industry in a situation where they are not completely confident in their efforts. It is a problem. If content marketing is the phone number list miracle technique we think it is, shouldn't we have a little more faith in it? The phone number list heart of the problem seems to be the strategy. The proof is in the data. We are faced with an industry in which “strategy” – whatever it is – does not work or does not exist. Why? Because there is no strategy at all. This is an issue I covered in depth in my Kissmetrics article, 10 Common Reasons Why Content Marketing Isn't Working For You. The phone number list problem to notice here is that there is actually no strategy. The phone number list percentage of B2C marketers who have a documented content marketing strategy is 27%. You might have hope because 50% of marketers have a strategy. (It's not written, that's all.) It's a huge problem. If it's not written, it probably doesn't really exist. Sure, it exists in people's minds, but how clear is it? How can a strategy that exists in people's minds guide an organization's cohesion efforts? Content marketing is a method that forces a team to move forward. If the phone number list individuals in the organization have a nebulous strategy in their minds, it really isn't a strategy at all. These are just a few thoughts on phone number list content marketing. I'm also concerned about this stat: only a third follow their documented strategy "very" closely, and 57% follow it "fairly" closely. Why document your content marketing strategy if it's not valuable enough to track? People confuse business strategy with the phone number list aggregation of tactical plans. Studies show that a big problem with strategic planning processes is that the resulting 'strategy' is a bland compilation of capital budgets which, in turn, are a compilation (not an integration) of initiatives.