​A new study shows that business-facing brands still struggle to allocate appropriate resources toward content creation efforts.

Content marketing has reached widespread adoption in the United States, but the standardized practice doesn’t come without a few challenges. Brafton reported on a recent study from the Association of National Advertisers, which found that marketing accountability and ROI measurement remain major obstacles for most organizations.

In the B2B world, specific hardships consistently reign supreme. Curata published an infographic that highlights industry-relevant trends in the business-to-business landscape, outlining goals, adoption rates and obstacles.

At first glance, it seems content marketing efforts thrive. The data shows that 87 percent of B2B brands used content marketing in 2012 – up 5 percent from 2011. More, brands optimized their web content for greater reach last year. Sixty-eight percent of B2Bs created SEO content in 2012, an increase of 3 percent year-over-year.

While more businesses used content marketing to reach audiences, they faced pressing challenges. Twenty-seven percent of B2Bs had limited budgets, and 25 percent had limited staff members. These obstacles prevented marketing departments from reaching their three major objectives: 82 percent wanted to drive sales and leads through custom content, 42 percent expected to establish thought leadership via content writing and 40 percent planned to boost brand awareness via web media.

B2B brands realize they need content to achieve all of their goals online, but they can’t allocate enough time and resource toward perfecting their campaigns. As the practice becomes even more paramount to success on the ‘net, companies must restructure their marketing departments, and give their employees the tools they need to develop winning blog content strategies.

Ted Karczewski is an Executive Communications Associate at Brafton. He works to develop his own voice and apply his passions to the evolving world of SEO and content marketing, but he doesn't shy away from writing for fun. After graduating from Suffolk University, Ted used his Communications degree to test out Sports Journalism before Marketing at Brafton.