Improving content marketing strategy. A case study of a digital marketing agency.

Abstract

This thesis explores the impact of content marketing strategies on customer engagement and retention within a B2B digital marketing agency. The main aim is to help provide ‘Company X’ a B2B digital marketing agency, with detailed insights to improve their client relationships by data-driven marketing. The research is carried out by investigating the type of content, distribution channels, and personalization strategies practiced by B2B digital marketing agencies to attain successful client relationships. Beginning the research with the existing literature on the influence of content marketing on B2B customer engagement and retention, followed by a qualitative research analysis which was carried out via semi-structured interviews with representatives of four B2B digital marketing agencies, one of them being the founder of Company X. The interviews provided deep insight into the content marketing strategies practiced by these agencies. Having analyzed the findings it was evident that the agencies followed three main strategies to build strong bonds with their clients. Firstly, they focused on creating informative content as a solution to the exact problem faced by their clients, by ensuring the target audience finds the content relevant. Secondly, they support thought leadership content to demonstrate their expertise concerning each industry, thereby building trust among potential clients. Finally, they distribute content across multiple platforms to a diverse range of audiences, hence creating a bigger impact. Content personalization is a similar practice across all agencies, however, the extent to its implementation varies. The findings also demonstrate a positive influence of informative and thought leadership content on developing deeper client relationships. The findings also highlight the importance of interactive content formats to achieve strong client relationships. However, as data collection was limited to only four agencies, it prevents a conclusive assessment of the relationship between content marketing strategy and client engagement/retention in complex versus simpler agencies. The findings also partially support the hypothesis that personalized content marketing strategies lead to higher engagement and retention rates. The thesis concludes that even though Company X adheres to industry best practices in terms of content marketing there are still areas of improvement, particularly in measuring the content marketing effectiveness and implementation of more sophisticated personalization techniques. Therefore, Company X can develop a data-driven content marketing strategy by implementing the recommendations outlined in this thesis, to achieve stronger client engagement and lasting client retention.