Content Marketing vs Social Media Marketing

Although content marketing and Social Media Marketing have differences, they are closely related. Content Marketing involves creating relevant, creative, and valuable content for your customers, while Social Media Marketing is a channel for communicating that content to customers.

While they both share common goals, their approaches and execution differ. Let’s find out the main differences in our detailed article on Content Marketing vs Social Media Marketing.

What is Content Marketing?

Content Marketing is the Marketing sector focused on creating relevant, valuable, informative, and consistent content to stimulate interest in a product.

You come across hundreds of Content Marketing Strategies of brands on a daily basis without even realizing it. Content Marketing is everywhere.

An average person spends up to 5-6 hours of screen time daily. Estimates suggest that 30-40% of the content they come across is marketing-related. This type of marketing can come in various forms, such as

• Blog Posts: Articles you read to gain information about a particular product or when looking for a solution for a specific problem.  
• E-books and Whitepapers: In-depth pieces that offer a comprehensive look at specific topics.
• Infographics: Visual content that presents information or data in an engaging format.
• Videos: Even when you are casually watching TikTok or reels, you might come across videos that subtly engage you in a particular product. Videos, as a form of content Marketing, are dynamic content that works both as advertisements and as entertainment for customers.  
• Podcasts: Audio content that allows audiences to consume information on the go.

This type of marketing aims to gain profitable customer actions by providing information that solves problems, educates, or entertains its audience.

In summary, Content Marketing focuses on creating content for potential customers, while Social Media marketing is a channel to reach those potential customers. Social Media Marketing is interrelated to Content Marketing.

What is Social Media Marketing?

Social Media Marketing is a form of digital marketing that leverages social media platforms such as Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, Twitter, etc., to promote brand visibility.

The contents that you create as a way of content marketing are communicated to your audience through social media platforms.

The number of social media users is over 5.17 billion worldwide. So, social media stands out as one of the biggest marketing platforms for promoting your products. That is why 91% of brands use social media. Social Media Marketing includes:

• Creating content, such as unique posts, short videos, images, and articles.
• Social media platform optimization: such as managing profiles on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and LinkedIn.
• Paid Advertising: Using targeted ad campaigns to reach new audiences.

In summary, Social Media Marketing is the process of communicating the content you’ve created through Social media platforms to gain more customers.

Basic differences: Content Marketing vs Social Media Marketing

Social media marketing is interrelated with content marketing , but it is fundamentally different. Content Marketing is when you create content to engage with your customers in the form of blogs, images, videos, etc. On the other hand, social media marketing is the channel through which you communicate this content to your customers.

Before we examine the differences, let’s look at what content and social media marketers do.

What is the role of Content Marketers?

Content Marketers create contents that resonates with the target audience. They perform analysis on what their target audience might be looking for and create content based on that analysis.

Their main responsibility is creating, perfecting, and managing content that aligns with the brand’s goals.

Content marketers consistently delivers quality contents aligned with customers interests which helps in building brand authority in the long run.

If you are a content marketer, the following are the things you might need to perform

• Content Strategy: As a content marketer, your first role is to understand the brand’s objectives, identify the target audience, and develop the strategy for your content accordingly.
• Search Engine Optimization (SEO): SEO specialists analyze different metrics such as keyword volume, traffic potential, and competitor’s traffic to gain insights into their audience. SEO is a necessary component of content marketing that focuses on enhancing visibility and ranking in search engine results.
• Content Creation: Here comes the core responsibility of a content marketer. You have to create engaging pieces of content after doing market research. Whether writing articles after keyword research, analyzing social media trends, or creating original posts. The main objective is to create relevant and engaging content.
• Analyze Performance: This involves analyzing metrics like CTR, purchase rate, engagement rates etc. to see your performance. This helps you understand what content works best for your brand.
• Content Distribution Channels: This involves identifying the right channel to reach your target audience effectively. You can use social media platforms such as Facebook, TikTok, and Pinterest to promote your product. You can also post articles to provide information about your products. Deciding the right channel depends on your target audience preferences.
• Analytics: As a content marketer, you have to use analytics tools to get informations about your target audience and competitors and stay relevant.

What is the Role of Social Media Marketers?

Social media marketers’ responsibilities are centered around building brand awareness and communicating with their communities.

For instance, you might come across comments from brands on videos on social platforms more often than before.

What they do is try to engage with the community and reach a vast array of customers by using these marketing tactics. Following are the responsibilities of a social media marketer

• Community Management: Social Media Marketing managers have dedicated time to monitor their social media platforms to communicate and engage with their audience. They reply to comments and posts online according to the preferences of their community.
• Content Planning and Publishing: They schedule and post content optimally to maximize audience reach. This involves creating a content calendar that aligns with the brand’s marketing goals and audience interests.
• Social Listening: Social listening is a way to monitor and analyze conversations around the brand and industry. This allows them to gain insights into audience sentiment and trends, allowing them to tailor content and strategies effectively.
• Performance Analysis: Analyzing metrics such as engagement rates, follower growth, and traffic from social media channels helps social media marketers measure the success of their campaigns.
• Influencer Collaboration: Social Media Marketers leverage the audience of popular influencers by collaborating with them. This is a really effective marketing tactic to boost your brand’s visibility.  
• Paid Advertising Management: One of the most important roles of Social Media Marketers is paid advertising management. They manage social media ad campaigns, optimize the ads according to their target audience, and evaluate the optimal budget for ad campaigns.

Is advertising a part of social media marketing?

Yes, advertising is a key part of social media marketing. Brands leverages the channel of social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, twitter, LinkedIn to target specific audience with their ads. These ads can be in the form of sponsored post, targeted stories, and video ads.  

Is Facebook Ad a Part of Social Media Marketing?

Yes, Facebook ads are part of social media marketing. Facebook is the most used social media platform. Therefore, 89% of Social Media Marketers use Facebook as a platform for social media marketing.

Which One is more expensive: Content Marketing vs. Social Media Marketing

The cost will depend on the scale of execution and strategy that you use. When it comes to content marketing, hiring content writers can be quite expensive. While in Social medial marketing, most of the expenses occurs in ad campaigns. But both are cost effective.

Which One is Better: Content Marketing or Social Media Marketing?

Content Marketing focuses on building brand authority and driving organic traffic. Social media marketing excels at boosting brand visibility. Ideally, a mixture of both will get the best result for your brand.

Why you should choose content Marketing

• You can provide information through blog posts about your product’s quality or why they should choose your product or services. This is a good marketing strategy if you are solving a certain problem of people through what you are selling.
• Email Marketing is also a part of content marketing. There are over 4.258 billion email users around the world. Also, with automated email-sending tools, this is one of the easiest and most effective marketing strategies. If you are an e-commerce store owner, email marketing can be really helpful.
• Podcasts are also a crucial part of content marketing due to their rising popularity.

Why you should choose Social Media Marketing

There are 5.17 billion active social media users around the world. They use social media platforms such as

• Facebook: Around 40% of Facebook’s active users buy products from that platform monthly. 16% of Facebook users log in to Facebook for the sole purpose of purchasing something from the marketplace. That’s why Facebook Marketing tends to be really cost-effective.
• Instagram: You might come across Instagram stories of products while scrolling through Instagram. Did you know that 50% of the viewers who watch those stories visit the website link to make a purchase? This seamlessly integrates Content Marketing and Social Media Marketing. Also, influencer collaboration is an added plus to Instagram marketing.
• Twitter: Twitter has a strong influence on purchasing. Over 50% of people make a purchase through the links posted on Twitter.
• Pinterest: Pinterest is one of the highly influential social media platforms. Due to its simple shopping process, which allows you to easily buy from the shop tab, 85% of Pinterest users have bought something directly from Pinterest.

In summary, it is ideal to use a mixture of both Content Marketing and Social Media marketing for your brand.

How Marketing and Social Media Work Together

Content marketing and social media marketing are not mutually exclusive but rather complementary strategies.

• Increased Visibility: Sharing content on platforms like Facebook and Twitter exposes it to a larger audience, increasing its potential impact.
• Enhanced Engagement: Interactive content like polls, quizzes, and live videos encourages audience participation and feedback.
• Real-Time Feedback: Social media allows brands to receive immediate feedback, which can be used to refine future content strategies.

In the dynamic landscape of digital marketing, content marketing, and social media marketing serve as powerful tools for engaging audiences and driving brand success. While they are distinct in their approach, they work synergistically to extend the reach of content, foster brand engagement, and attract and retain target audiences.