Australian marketers are focused on better understanding their audience and are willing to try different content marketing tactics to engage with them.

That is just one of the many insights from research report Content Marketing in Australia 2015: Benchmarks, Budgets, and Trends, produced by Content Marketing Institute and the Association for Data-driven Marketing and Advertising (ADMA) and sponsored by Brightcove.

This is the third year for the survey studying content marketing in Australia. It is based on responses from 251 for-profit marketers from both business-to-business (B2B) and business-to-consumer (B2C) organisations. This year, the research shows that a high percentage are focused on audience-centered initiatives, such as developing a better understanding of what content is effective, creating more engaging content, and gaining a better understanding of their audience.

“It’s encouraging to see Australian marketers are focused on their audiences so they can provide valuable, relevant content that speaks to them,” says Joe Pulizzi, founder of Content Marketing Institute and author of Epic Content Marketing. “They’re experimenting with how they use specific tactics to reach those audiences. In particular, we saw a decrease in blog usage this year, and increases with infographics, in-person events, and microsites.”

“Australian marketers clearly understand the value of content marketing and 73% of those who have a documented content marketing strategy are planning to increase their investment in this area during the next 12 months,” says Jodie Sangster, chief executive officer, ADMA. “It’s encouraging to see content marketing is now being used more for engagement rather than brand awareness. However, greater steps will need to be taken by marketers to both truly understand the role of content within a marketing strategy and to measure results.”

There are more interesting findings in the full report.