How Should You Budget for 2014
The analyst-research company with the best finger on the pulse of B-to-B marketing is clearly Marketing Sherpa. They routinely publish the most relevant and accurate data about trends and directions for our industry that help B-to-B marketers make the right calls in where to invest time and dollars for improving ROI.
MS recently published the first of what we’re sure will be several studies giving advice on how to allocate dollars for next year. This is the season for working with clients to determine budget priorities, so we thought we’d share some of their insight. Everyone asks the question a bit differently, with different categories, but this is a good start:
– Budget increases for 2014 (MarketingSherpa)
- 64% Content Marketing
- 60% Landing Page Optimization
- 60% Website Upgrades
- 54% Social Media
- 52% SEO
- 45% PPC
- 39% Email
- 26% Direct Mail
- 24% Contextual Ads
- 22% Trade Shows
- 19% Telemarketing
- 15% Print Advertising
- 14% Broadcast
Two items missing from this list: webcasts and marketing automation. We’re seeing clients increase spending in those two areas, particularly dramatically for marketing automation. That certainly
would have changed the above results, but as we said, everyone asks this same
question differently.
