RUNNING HEAD: Gaining attention

Gaining attention in a crowded space:

How a content based marketing strategy can overcome

the din of digital advertising

Rob Glover

Queens University of Charlotte

gloverr@queens.edu

Submitted April 19, 2017

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Abstract

Modern marketers are applying an ever-increasing budget to the task of communicating

with audiences online. Ever since the first banner ad appeared approximately 20 years ago,

digital marketers have tried to find the most effective way to do their jobs. Adding to the

complexity of their assignment, digital marketers are faced with ad blockers an1d a generation

that has learned to mistrust and avoid traditional tactics. Over the last several years, however, one

strategy has shown promise in cutting through the digital clutter. With an audience-first mentality

and a focus on great storytelling rather than product details, content marketing has emerged as a

potential way for brands to have an authentic communication with their customers. This paper

will look at the potential of persuasion by the content marketing strategy through the lens of the

Elaboration Likelihood Model.

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Introduction

The face of marketing changed forever with the advent of the internet. Audiences gained

more control over which ads they viewed and how they viewed them. In order to connect with an

audience in this new paradigm, marketers have been forced to consider not just new

technologies, but new methodologies as well.

Content marketing is an audience-focused technique with roots that extent more than 100

years. More recently, digital marketers have increasingly turned to the practice of producing and

distributing helpful content as a way to connect with an audience online. What exactly is content

marketing and can it reach an audience in a crowded space such at the internet? This paper

reviews recent research of the practices, effectiveness, and historical context of content

marketing. Using the Elaboration Likelihood Model, this paper reviews research on how digital

advertising is connected to the decision making process.

Literature Review

The internet has created new possibilities and new challenges for modern marketers. To

understand the possibilities that content marketing may provide, it is important first to undertand

the context in which it will be applied in this digital space.

The growth of digital marketing

Some 20 years ago, the first ever banner ads appeared on internet users computer

screens. The website was Wired Magazines digital property Hotwired (Greenfield, 2014s). Since

those earliest days of advertising online, digital marketing budgets have exploded with some
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estimates predicting total spending to surpass the dollars spent on television ads (eMarketer,

2016) in 2017.

So too has the study of the digital marketing trend grown. In a review studying 20 years

worth of articles dedicated to the topic of internet marketing, researchers found that the quantity

of articles and breadth of topics have expanded greatly in the last two decades. In fact, more than

60% of the total articles from the publications studied were published in the last 8 years

(Schibrowsky, Peltier & Nill, 2013).

The growing investment in digital marketing is not confined just a small percentage of

brands and firms. Roughly 80% of marketers have stated that they intent to expand their digital

marketing spend in the next year (Baltes). This trend is understood, as millennials have proven to

be growing economic force for change and a generation that looks to digital assets to make

buying decisions (Taken Smith, 2012)

The effect of digital marketing

Digital marking refers to the practice of communicating with an audience of prospective

and current customers through the internet. This wide reaching term may include search engine

marketing, pay-per-click advertising,, affiliate marketing, email marketing, and content

marketing strategies. (Web Strategies, 2016)

Like traditional marketing, the practice of digital marketing has the goal of reaching

current and potential clients in order to offer goods and services for sale. It differs from more

traditional marketing methods such as television and magazine ads in several important ways

(Brasov).
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Unlike television ads, which are displayed at set times throughout a programing day,

internet based marketing communications can be viewed anytime and anywhere there is a digital

device and a connection to the internet available. Digital marketing is also more interactive, with

the audience often having an opportunity to provide instantaneous feedback to the marketer

(Baltes, 2001).

This change in the way marketers engage their audience has created a dramatic shift in

those audiences. In his study Towards integrated e-marketing value creation process, S. Umit

Kucak states What we are seeing today is a major marketing thought transformation with

increasingly active market involvement by consumers and, hence, a fundamental impact

(Kucak, 2011, p. 345).

The internet has both empowered and fragmented the audience that a modern market

needs to communicate with (Kucak, 2011). They are empowered with the ability to quickly

compare product features and pricing with a few mouse clicks, greatly reducing the time and cost

of making a buying decision (Yannopolous, 2011). And they are fragmented by marketers who

themselves are armed with massive amounts of data about them (Jackson & Ahuja, 2016).

So pervasive is the use of the internet in marketing goods and services, it would be

difficult for a business to thrive without adjusting their strategy to its use (Yannopolous, 2011).

Brasov further explains, Regarding digitalization, it has allowed a dynamic transformation of

the business communication. In a future dominated by the high-technology, without active

communication in the online environments, the communication strategy of an organization is

doomed to failure. (Baltes, 2001, p. 42).

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This phenomenon isnt relegated to business to consumer (B2C) communications. The

internet has proven to be an increasingly important source of information for business to business

(B2B) transactions (Holliman & Rowley, 2014).

The result of this trend is a well-connected consumer with vast amounts of information

available with which to make buying decisions. The seismic shift that the modern marketer must

consider is that we have entered an age of consumer-focused marketing (Kucak, 2011).

Gaining a new customer is expensive. Some estimates state that the cost of obtaining a

new customer can be five times that of retaining an existing client (Ekhlassi, 2012). So the

challenges that emerge from digital marketing spending should be considered.

The challenges of digital marketing

The consumers easy access to data and the interactive nature of the internet, especially

social media, can create significant challenges for the modern marketer.

One explicit example is downward pricing pressure. As consumers can quickly find and compare

competitive prices for the goods they purchase online, sellers are often placed in a position of

competing solely on cost. While research results do not offer this as an absolute correlation, there

is some evidence that the shift towards online shopping may result in lower prices in many

sectors (Kung, Monroe, Cox, 2002).

Additionally, the interactivity of social media has eliminated the barriers of customer

communications. It is now possible for negative publicity to be placed online and shared quickly.

It has become important for modern marketers to monitor their organizations reputation online

(Huotari, Ulkuniemi, Saraniemi, & Malaska, 2015).

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In his review of marketing in the digital age, Jackson (2016) notes that the availability of

online content can actually create a challenge for marketers who use interruptive techniques.

Ekhlassi (2012) confirms this idea and suggests that some digital marketing tactics can be seen

as intrusive by potential customers.

To help overcome these challenges, digital marketers have engaged in a different strategy

of communicating with their audiences.

Content Marketing

Content marketing is the idea that all brands, in order to attract and retain customers,

need to think and act like media companies (Poluzzi, 2017, p. 13).

Furthermore, Baltes (2001) posits the underlying theme of a content marketing strategy to

be: instead of pitching your products or services, you are delivering information that makes

your buyer more intelligent (Baltes, pg 216).

Content marketing differs from direct advertising tactics in that it isnt product focused

(Baltes). Rather, content marketing is an inbound marketing technique that seeks to build

audience and brand trust by publishing helpful and entertaining content (Poluzzi, 2017).

The shift to content marketing is the shift away from an interruptive technique to one that

hopes to engage with an audience that will actively seek out a brand because it provides them

with relevant, engaging content (Holliman & Rowley, 2014).

In one of the first studies of its kind, Holliman and Rowley (year) completed a

qualitative, interview-based study to understand how marketers across several markets viewed
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the practice of business to business (B2B) content marketing (Holliman & Rowley, 2014). While

the study did not provide quantitative results, their thematic review of the responses revealed a

few notes of interest. First, the importance of content in the B2B purchasing process in

increasing. Second, due to the availability of information online, customers were completing

much of their buying process before speaking with a salesperson. Thirdly, content needed to

focus on the audience, not the product. And finally, sellers are now in the publishing business

(Holliman & Rowley, 2014).

Houtori et al. (2015) notes several platforms that can be considered when engaging a

prospect online. Webinars, podcasts, copy, photography, and video can all be used and distributed

via Slideshare, Facebook, Email, blogs, and Twitter (Houtari, Ulkuniemi, Saraniemi, & Malaska,

2015)

While like everything digital, modern content marketing doesnt have a long history, the

analog routes of the practice date back to the earliest days of selling.

In the late 1800s, John Deere launched their printed publication, The Furrow, to provide

helpful information to farmers. A couple decades later, Jell-O published a cookbook, and Sears

produced a radio show in the 1920s (Pulizzi, 2017). Modern use of the term content marketing

dates back to 1996 (Baltes, 2001).

Modern marketers are applying the technique to their digital strategies at an increasing

rate, with the majority of those marketers planning to increase their spending on content

marketing in future budgets (Baltes, 2001). Some 90% of marketers say they are employing

some form of content marketing strategy (Pulizzi, 2017).

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Fueling this growth is research that indicates consumers are engaging in more content online

(Pulizzi, 2017) and that content is becoming more important to their buying decisions (Baltes,

2001).

The three steps of content marketing

Most scholars on the topic seems to agree that a great content marketing strategy begins

with great content (Baltes, 2001), (Pulizzi, 2017), (Holliman & Rowley, 2014). Both the

audience and company values should be taken into consideration when choosing content topics

and types (Baltes, 2001). Houtari et al. notes that the tone of the content should be that of an

authentic human voice (Huotari, Ulkuniemi, Saraniemi, & Malaska, 2015). The most engaging

and trustworthy content is not brand focused but rather tells a story or educates an audience

(Pulizzi, 2017).

While internally created content such as blog posts, emails, and podcasts should be

considered (Pullizi, 2017), Huotari et al. suggest that content created externally is important as

well. He states that UGC (user generated content), as it is known, can influence the value of a

brand in ways that other content cannot (Huotari, Ulkuniemi, Saraniemi, & Malaska, 2015).

While Pulizzi states that content quality should take precedent over quantity (Pulizzi,

2017), Holliman notes that how often you publish shouldnt be over looked. He states that a great

content marketing strategy is the confluence of frequency, quality, and relevance (Holliman).

Once content is created, it can be distributed through many channels such as a blog or

through social media (Baltes, 2001). These platforms offer significant benefits over traditional

platforms such as print or television such as greater accessibility, lower cost, and better
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connection between target and medium.Connecting content with consumer through social media

also allows for additional brand equity as the audience can share your message for you (Baltes,

2001). This allows the audience to become active participants in a marketing communication

strategy (Huotari, Ulkuniemi, Saraniemi, & Malaska, 2015). It presents a two way mode of

communication that connects marketers to their customers (Castronovo & Huang, 2012).

Content marketing benefits from the cadre of statistical analysis available to most digital

marketing techniques. Since most online actions that a consumer takes can be tracked, it is easy

to gather this data (Jackson & Ahuja, 2016).

Baltes argues that not allowing metrics to inform your content decisions to be one of the

biggest mistakes in the strategy of content marketing (Baltes, 2001). He breaks the specific

metrics to be monitored into four categories:

1. Consumption metrics (Google Analytics, Traffic, Open Rates).

2. Sharing metrics (Retweets, Forwards, Likes).
3. Lead metrics (Leads generated).
4. Sales metrics (Deals).
(Baltas, 2001, p. 115)
Much like the greater discipline of digital marketing, researchers note specific challenges in the

practice of content marketing.

The Elaboration Likelihood Model

First introduced by researchers Richard E. Petty and John Caccioppo, the Elaboration

Likelihood Model (ELM) model suggests that persuasion happens through two distinct models.

The first is referred to as the Central Route. This is direct, logical cognition of the information
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acquired by the recipient. The second, called the peripheral Route, relies less on direct cognition

and more on the other cues such as the perceived quality of the message or trustworthiness of the

sender. How and what extent a message will change the recievers attitude depends on several

factors. Motivation and interest of the receiver, whether the message aligns with the recievers

existing attitudes, the recievers ability to comprehend a the message, and repatitiveness all play

a part (Kitchen, Kerr, Schultz, McColl, & Pals, 2014)

Although no now research could be found that directly investigated the content marketing

method with the ELM in mind, some studies about digitial marketing in general are an

interesting correlary. In one such study, researchers tested the effectiveness of personalized offers

via the internet (Yan Tam). Their results indicate a connection between the personalization of

offers made on a website and the elaboration that took place with the viewer (Yan Tam)

Another study also examined the likelihood of elaboration but this time from the

consumers who exhibited various levels of loyalty towards a brand. Their paper found that more

elaboration existed in the study group that has previously been known to shift brands more often

(Woodham, Hamilton & Leak, 2017).

Challenges of Content Marketing

According to Pulizzi (2017), many of the early barriers to content marketing have been

overcome. He lists acceptance of content, access to writing talent, and publishing technology as

hurdles early content marketers needed to overcome that modern marketers no longer need to

worry about.
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Even still, Holliman & Rowley note that less than 40% of marketers have an explicit plan

to execute a content marketing strategy. Holliman continues to explain that a change of mindset

is one issue still slowing the progress. This needed shift, he explains, is from that of a

broadcaster of one-way messages to a strategy of audience creation where consumers look to the

brand for education and entertainment (Holliman & Rowley, 2014 ).

With the barriers to publication greatly reduced, the shear amount of content being

produced has created information overload and can itself hinder the success of a content

marketing program. (Jackson & Ahuja, 2016, p. 184).

Conclusions and further study

Marketing online is a swiftly changing space. Technologies are becoming more complex

and internet users are adapting with them. Just as customers attitudes and abilities change, so to

must the marketers that hope to reach them.

While the practice of producing helpful content to connect with an audience is not new,

there has been a significant increase in investment and interest in conent marketing for digital

marketers in recent years. The specific definitions and scope of what content marketing is

continues to take shape, but most experienced content marketers seem to agree that a good

strategy, audience-focused content, an investment in distribution, and engagement measurement

are all important in its success.

The most glaring void in the reasarch of the effectiveness of content marketing seems to

long term qualitative content marketing studies. Most research currently available is qualitative

and thematic. While useful in understanding short term reactions by an audience or impressions
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of the content marketing discipline by marketers, this type of research does not offer metrics that

might inform the long term benefits of the strategy.

A more granular look at which metrics are the most informative in both B2B and B2C

content marketing would be useful. And research in the potential correlation between content

marketing investment and long term audience and sales growth could help answer many open

questions.

Finally, a study which leverages the Elaboration Likelihood Model could be useful in

understanding how types of content are processed by an online audience.

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