Compared to advertising campaigns, content marketing generates 62% less costs and at the same time provides 3 times more sales leads. According to 83% of marketers, good quality content can help you sell. On the other hand, 81% of them say that they will help to keep the customer and increase his involvement. Which actions and which new trends are most effective in attracting customers using content marketing?

In the era of banner blindness and the growing number of people using adBlocks, content marketing is constantly gaining in importance. As the old saying goes, whoever has the information has the power. Which activities in content marketing are the hottest trends and the most effective in supporting sales according to the experts from Praktycy.com?

Engaging video content

Research shows that 80% of B2C and 76% of B2B marketers plan to prepare more content in 2016. And it's not about the content itself - they pay more and more attention to video content. In the USA it is used by as many as 96% of marketers. According to Demand Metric research, 74% of respondents admitted that video content is more convergent than other forms of content delivery, and that it also gives a better ROI result than other forms of content delivery. Polish statistics also arouse optimism among video enthusiasts. The latest MediaCom Warsaw analysis shows that 93% of Poles aged 16-24 watch video online. Moreover, the popularity of online video content in 2015, for the first time, has reached a higher level than the programs on fixed-line television. According to the experts from Praktycy.com, a good video content must:

- engage emotions and be remembered - play, move, intrigue with form, so that the user wants to share it with others,

- be on a specific topic or tell a story about e.g. a brand,

- be based on a creative idea - even a seemingly boring and hard-to-promote product can be transformed into an Internet hit - just look at Blendtec, the blender manufacturer. Their "Will it blend?" program has been very popular on YouTube for 8 years.

From a computer to a smartphone - mobile copywriting

The importance of optimizing content for mobile websites is growing. Contrary to appearances, creating content for mobile users is not the same as preparing content for the desktop. Experts from Praktycy.com list the most important rules of creating engaging mobile-friendly materials:

- Pictures are more important than text. Eye-tracking research indicates that mobile users look at images and graphics more often than at text. When we have a lot of information to provide, it is worth doing it in the form of an infographics. Visual materials are to attract and encourage users to familiarize themselves with other content, e.g. a valuable guide or blog post.

- It's what's important. In mobile copywriting there is no room for unnecessary words, long, flowery explanations, so called pouring water. Mobile content must be concrete. And it's not just a matter of focusing the user's attention, but the need to adapt to the size of the smartphone's screen. The aim of the copywriter is to present as much information as possible, without requiring the user to move the screen. Concreteness does not mean the creation of short content only. Valuable materials can be long, but at the same time substantial. It is not worth to force yourself to create long material just because the content of the tutorial should be long.

- Make friends with short paragraphs. "Walls of text" for good morning? Nobody's gonna read that. It is better to divide the created content into short paragraphs and check how such content looks on the smartphone screen. Research confirms that dividing the material into paragraphs makes the eyes move in a predictable way and the chance that the reader grows significantly until the end of the text.

Visual content in social media

The fact that content marketing in social media is very effective, both in the case of B2B customers - 93%, and in the case of other B2B customers - the same percentage. - as well as B2C - 90%. - I don't think there's any need to convince anyone. Research shows that 73% of clicks in brand posts on user boards are clicks on visual content, i.e. photos and videos. No wonder the brain processes images much faster than text. Understanding the visual message takes 0.1 seconds, while the average time it takes to read 200-250 words is about 60 seconds. Since the dawn of time, man has learned to process what he sees. In the case of content, however, the process of processing it began on a larger scale only about 560 years ago - Gutenberg's invention, which was printing, became a milestone in the dissemination of writing and reading. Building communication based on photographic inspiration is the basis of visual content, especially based on Pinterest and Instagram. Example? A photograph of a well-decorated interior, which was styled with e.g. paints or furniture of a given brand. And all with an attractive unique description and the power of hashtags.

Content marketing has been gaining in importance for several years now. However, its forms and effectiveness of individual actions are changing. Currently, video, visual content and mobile-friendly content are fighting for the palm of the hand. It should be remembered, however, that valuable, good quality content will never lose its value.