Is Content Marketing or Native Advertising More Socially Effective?

A digital marketer can’t afford to make mistakes with their marketing budgets because their company’s bottom line is on the line. But with the growing popularity of both content marketing and native advertising, it can be challenging to know which tactic to take. Fractl and Moz recently surveyed more than 30 content marketing firms and analyzed the cost data from more than 600 digital publishers to determine which method is most effective. This research revealed that content marketing is king for its greater effectiveness on social media and higher return on investment. Adweek.com explained why content marketing is currently more in line with a marketer’s goals.

Digital Distinctions
Both content marketing and native advertising have been generating lots of buzz from businesses, but their methods are very different. Discover the distinctions:

The Contents of Content Marketing

• Aims to increase search rankings, conversions, and brand awareness.
• Benefits include raising organic rankings, driving brand awareness, increasing conversions, and achieving a higher return on investment.
• Main metrics are the number of leads generated, quality links, and social shares.
• Challenges consist of establishing publishing partnerships and the need for long-term investment.

The Nuances of Native Advertising

• Aims to boost brand awareness and social awareness.
• Benefits include increasing brand engagement and brand awareness.
• Main metrics are campaign impressions, website traffic, and social engagement.
• Challenges consist of lack of SEO benefits, sponsored tags viewed as ads instead of authentic content, lower editorial syndication, and costly to scale.

The Experts’ View on Value
Digital marketing experts based their choice of content marketing being more effective, on much more than mere metrics. Instead, they looked at a variety of factors, from benefits to challenges, which revealed more of native advertising’s weaknesses and fewer of its strengths.

For instance, native advertising needs to be branded, which is often poorly perceived by social media users as less personally valuable. This results in a lack of both engagement and sharing. Also, native advertising’s basis in paid partnerships results in more limited reach than the unlimited placement options offered by content marketing.

While native advertising does have the benefits of scale and predictability, it simply can’t compare to content marketing, which has more of an impact on performance and a higher return on investment.

When selecting the most effective option for social media marketing, more digital marketers clearly choose to use content marketing.

Learn the latest social media marketing tactics. Contact MDG.

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