Earlier this month, the Content Marketing Association unveiled findings from its Measuring Effectiveness Report, conducted with senior-level marketers from 40-plus recognizable brands.

When it comes to recognizing the need for measuring the effectiveness of content marketing, there’s no question about it: 100 percent of respondents said measurement is either very important or important to their content marketing strategy. Over the next year, 45 percent plan to increase spending on content measurement, while another 44 percent may increase spending.

You’re leaving key customer insights on the table if you aren’t measuring and analyzing your content’s impact — then taking action accordingly.

What could your content metrics tell you? Here are a few ideas of optimizations you might make as a result of data:

• By tracking the top shared content on your site, you can see what topics or content types are more likely to be shared. Let’s say your data tells you infographics are shared three times as often as text-only articles. So you dedicate a greater percentage of your efforts to infographics to get exponentially more eyes on your content.
• By tracking play duration trends for your videos, you can see how your customers are engaged — or not engaged. You might find the average play duration is around 1minute, but your average video is over 5. As a result, you start developing shorter, snappier videos to get messages across.
• By looking at your content pages with the highest exit rates (the percentage of visitors that leave your site from a specific page), you can dig deeper into what’s causing them to leave. Maybe you those pages lack a clear call to action. Maybe those pages have a slow load time. Or maybe your content isn’t delivering what the headline offered. Whatever it is, you optimize accordingly.

What was the last thing you learn from your content metrics?