How Much Does Content Marketing Cost?

Marketing is important for any business. It’s how you grow! After all, consumers need to you know you exist and what you do before they become a loyal customer. And marketing online, particularly content marketing, is more popular than ever.

If you’re looking to grow your business, “content marketing” may be a buzzword you hear a lot. Investing in social media and digital marketing is almost a no-brainer for today’s companies. But your bottom line still rules the day. How much does content marketing cost? Let’s take a closer look.

Elements of content marketing

Content marketing has many elements. And all of them can play an important role in business. From your initial strategy sessions to your ultimate results, each element has its own costs and benefits.

First, there’s the strategic part of your content marketing strategy. Or, rather, the critical planning aspect of your campaign. Who exactly are you trying to reach, and what end result are you aiming for? During this phase, you’ll need to do the following:

• Do careful research on your buyer personas and target audience
• Check your current digital assets to see if they need a refresh
• Complete a search engine optimization (SEO) analysis to decide what areas to target
• Be clear on your end goals and the key performance indicators that your team will track

Then, there is the actual execution of your marketing plan. In this phase, you’ll define all the steps you need to take to create your content, get it out to the world, promote it, and follow up on the results.

In order to execute on your content marketing, you’ll need a strong team behind you. If you want to scale content marketing and get to the top of the sales funnel, it’s going to take some work.

What is content marketing?

Content marketing is online and digital material that’s created and shared by your business. It can include social media posts, articles or blogs, e-books, videos, and more. The content may not specifically promote your business but is instead meant to generate interest in the products or services you sell.

If you want potential customers to find you online, you need to come up toward the top of online search results. This is the purpose of SEO. To rank highly in SEO, your marketing campaign must prioritize detailed, quality content that promotes your organization and industry.

What factors distinguish great content marketing?

We’ve all heard amazing stories about businesses that have grown exponentially through their content marketing efforts. But what makes content marketing truly great?

The answer may be different for different companies, but a simple way to look at it is the ratio of cost to revenue. If your resulting revenue exceeds the cost of your marketing strategy, you’re doing pretty well.

But what is it that sends your strategy over the top from good to great? Is it simply the number of hits you get on your website? Probably not.

A carefully crafted strategy will not only drive customers to your website but also convert them into buyers. Ideally, they’ll become repeat customers. What keeps them coming back? The answer is often brand loyalty. If you produce great content that your customers can relate to, you’re more likely to draw them in and build a lasting relationship with them.

What effect can content marketing have on a business?

The possibilities of what you can achieve with content marketing are limitless. In short, great content marketing can have many positive effects on your business:

• Driving traffic to your website
• Placing your business high in online search rankings
• Positioning your company as a credible leader in your space
• Educating potential customers
• And (most importantly) increasing sales and revenue

The rewards of a strategic digital marketing plan can be great. But if you’re concerned about the costs involved to create one, never fear. There are plenty of creative ways to fit content marketing into your budget.

Average payroll for content marketing team roles

If you’ve hired a team to handle your content marketing for you, you’ve got to pay them for their work. Each person plays a unique and important role in your content strategy. And each role is compensated differently. Let’s look a little more closely at the average payroll for different content marketing team roles.

Why is paying a fair salary to your content marketing team important?

It goes without saying that if you don’t compensate your marketing team fairly, they are likely to move on and find other opportunities. Digital marketing can be a huge value-add to your company, and your marketing team will expect a fair salary because of that.

A content marketing specialist is a hot commodity these days and there are plenty of opportunities available to them. You need to be prepared to offer a competitive rate!

What is the average salary range for each role on a content marketing team?

The average salary ranges for roles on a content marketing team can vary widely. It may be helpful to check on the current going rates in your region. Generally, Glassdoor US ranks content marketing managers’ salaries very highly, at upward of $80,000 per year.

Other content team roles may include the following:

• Staff writers: $40,000–$70,000 per year
• Freelance writers: $100–$1,000 per article (depending on length and other considerations)
• SEO analysts: $60,000 per year, on average
• Web designers: $60,000–$90,000 per year
• Social media managers: $40,000–$70,000 per year
• Video producers: $50,000–$80,000 per year

What factors can cause the payroll for a content marketing team to rise or fall?

There are many factors that may cause your content marketing payrolls to go up or to go down. The first is the size of your team. The more people that are involved, the more their salaries will cost you. Additionally, you’ll have to factor in the costs of licenses for their software, computer systems, overhead, and so forth.

If you outsource your marketing strategy instead, you may wish to keep a content agency on retainer. These monthly fees will also affect your total costs. If you hire consultants to assist your marketing team, this will also increase your budget.

Here are some other optional elements of your content strategy that may factor into your overall costs:

• Website maintenance and updates
• Fees for a graphic designer
• Video editing equipment and video producers
• Podcast production
• Designing and publishing e-books
• Ad placement fees
• Influencer marketing

Ultimately, your content marketing plan can be as robust as you want. If one of these elements is not appealing to you or won’t get you high returns on investment, don’t sweat it! Focus on the strategies that are the most important to you and your business.

Digital fees associated with content marketing

Any time you engage in a content marketing initiative, there are going to be costs associated with it. And digital fees associated with content marketing can be a big part of that. You definitely need to factor digital fees into your overall cost.

What are digital fees?

Digital fees are the costs you must pay for your software, subscriptions, and various marketing placements. Depending on what’s involved in your digital marketing strategy, different fees will be involved.

If you’ve hired a content marketing agency, the agency may cover some fees for you or factor them into your rates. But some other fees may include

• subscription fees for software or online services,
• social media marketing fees,
• access to SEMrush or other marketing analytics software, and/or
• payments for other competitive analysis tools.

Make sure you know what each program costs before signing up for it!

Why are there digital fees associated with content marketing?

Other businesses are out to make a buck too. If you want your content marketing to be visible online, these businesses are going to charge digital fees for the use of their services. You’ll naturally have to pay for ad placement on third-party sites, as well as subscription fees for any products or tools you use.

What do you need to keep in mind when considering what digital fees you can accrue for your content marketing efforts?

When you decide what digital marketing course to take, you always need to keep in mind what digital fees you’ll accrue. Make sure that every fee and every subscription is listed as a line item on your budget.

If you are tracking return on investment data, you’ll easily be able to see which investments had the highest payoff for your business. When it’s time to refresh your content marketing budget, it will be clear where to spend more money and what to cut back on.

Cost of outsourcing content marketing

If creating a content marketing strategy seems overwhelming to you, you’re not alone. So don’t panic—there are lots of resources out there to assist you if you choose to outsource your content marketing.

Of course, you’ll need to make sure that your chosen marketing strategy fits your budget. But let’s look at some of the costs involved in outsourcing content marketing.

Why would someone need to outsource their content marketing?

Often, businesses choose to outsource their content marketing if they don’t have the time or resources to do the work internally.

Maybe you don’t have a team of employees with the proper experience. Or maybe you do, but your team doesn’t have the capacity to ramp up their efforts to the scale you need.

Rather than risk eating up all your internal resources on content marketing, outsourcing your marketing efforts to a content marketing agency may be a better option. It enables you to keep a tight rein on costs while you leave the work to content marketing professionals.

What factors can affect costs associated with outsourced content marketing?

There are many factors that can affect the cost of outsourced content marketing. The biggest factors are what you choose to include in your marketing plan and what you choose to omit. You may opt for any of these:

• A website revamp
• Content writing services
• SEO analysis
• A social media strategy
• Targeted email or ad campaigns
• A dedicated marketing manager

The larger your marketing team, and the more strategies you employ, the more your outsourced content marketing will cost.

What do you need to keep in mind when considering the costs of outsourcing content marketing?

When deciding whether to outsource your content marketing, the costs may seem very steep. But it’s definitely something to consider carefully.

If you plan to allot between 10 and 20 percent of your overall revenue to marketing, content marketing should definitely be a big chunk of that. A onetime strategy can cost anywhere from $1,000 to over $10,000. If you hire a content marketing agency on a monthly retainer fee, you’ll need to make sure that monthly fee is factored into your budget.

It’s worth noting, though, that the costs may be worth it if you are more likely to get high-quality content and more customer conversions.

Make your content marketing strategy Elite.

If content marketing is an important investment for your company, you need to make sure it’s done right. That’s where a valued content partner comes in. Elite Editing offers a wide variety of content writing, editing, and social media marketing services to suit the needs of your content marketing budget.

Getting a quote is free and easy. Reach out today!