Download Content marketing: A review of academic literature and future

Content marketing: A review of academic literature and future research directions
Paper presented at emma conference 2015, May 27-29 of 2015 at the Business School of the
University of Hamburg, Germany
Keywords: content marketing, digital content marketing, digital content, credibility
Songming Feng ([email protected]) and Mart Ots ([email protected])
Media Management & Transformation Center (MMTC), Jönköping International Business School
Address: JIBS AB, MMTC, Box 1026, Gjuterigatan 5, SE-551 11 Jönköping, Sweden
Abstract
In a world where traditional advertising gets a decreasing share of marketing budgets, companies
seek new ways to engage their target audiences. In the intersection between paid, owned and
earned media, content marketing has quickly become an industry buzzword. However, as a rising
phenomenon, content marketing is a relatively unexplored area for academic research and the term
itself lacks proper definition. This paper conducts a review of academic publications related to this
topic, identifying key research streams, their core assumptions, and their theoretical underpinnings.
There are gaps of knowledge and blind alleys, but the theoretical frameworks, research designs,
and methodologies in previous studies are helpful references for stimulating ideas for future
research about content marketing. A number of potential sub-fields or research topics are identified
and discussed for future academic research.
1. Introduction
Whereas the economic decline of traditional media has attracted substantial academic attention,
there are paralleling, largely neglected, processes of constructing tomorrow’s content industries.
One example is the silent rise of corporate-funded media as demonstrated by the phenomenon
called “content marketing”. Funded by companies or brands, content marketing been generating
increasing amount of content online, some of which is on par quality-wise with that of traditional
media.
A once partner and sponsor of media outlets, the corporate world, is reducing spending on
traditional media and instead start to take over the latter’s job. Content marketing has become a
buzzword for corporate marketers as more and more companies or brands are planning to be the
publisher of their own content, delivered through a variety of new media channels such as
Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube. Companies like Red Bull, American Express and Burger King are
considering turning themselves into a “media company” by setting up content creation operations inhouse.
Instead of advertising, the shift is towards publishing. Companies of all types and sizes flood the
market with articles, white papers, videos, podcasts, Facebook posts, and tweets. Reshaped to look
like digital newsrooms, corporate communications teams begin to prioritize and produce high-quality
brand content at scale to power owned media sites, social media, and real-time communications
efforts. Speaking at the 2012 Global PR Summit organized by the Holmes Report, Silicon Valley
Content marketing: A review of academic literature and future research directions
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veteran Tom Foremski wondered if a company might one day win the Pulitzer Prize (Shah &
Sudhaman, 2013). According to a 2014 survey conducted by the Content Council and AdAge,
content marketing accounts for 23.3% of overall budgets and is projected to grab a third of budgets
within two years (“Content marketing budgets set to rise”, n.d.). In a world of shrinking editorial
resources for traditional media, content marketing is of high relevance for media management
scholars seeking to understand the new economic structures and interrelationships between
stakeholders that are developing in the so called media industry.
Content marketing is not by any means a new phenomenon. In 1895, Deere & Company, an
agriculture equipment company located in the Midwestern United States, launched The Furrow
magazine, which provided education information for farmers while helping with the sales of products
of the company, and this magazine is often given credit for being the first content marketing initiative
in modern times (Lieb, 2011). The recent revival of content marketing is due to multiple reasons.
First, technology—the Internet and other digital channels, particularly social media, has lowered the
entry barrier and costs for publishing. Second, consumers accept content from corporate sources
more than ever as they would like to search and find information themselves in various channels.
Third, shrinking budgets in traditional media yield a space for companies to fill gaps. Finally, content
expertise becomes more widespread as more and more journalists shift to work for the corporate
world (Lieb, 2011).
Definitions of content marketing
Despite the buzz, confusion still abounds - from how to define content marketing to how it can fit
into marketing. The definitions of content marketing are mostly provided by industry consultants and
experts. Pulizzi (2013) defines content marketing as “the marketing and business process for
creating and distributing valuable and compelling content to attract, acquire, and engage a clearly
defined and understood target audience with the objective of driving profitable customer action” (p.
5). Pulizzi (2013) also gives a less formal definition: “Content marketing is owning media as
opposed to renting it. It is a marketing process to attract and retain customers by consistently
creating and curating content in order to change or enhance a consumer’s behavior” (p. 5).
Lieb (2011) states that content marketing “is not push marketing” and it is a pull strategy where
content is there when consumers need it and seek it out “with relevant, educational, helpful,
compelling, engaging, and sometime entertaining information” (p. 1). Content marketing focuses on
communicating with customers and prospects rather than selling.
The U.S.-headquartered Content Marketing Institute defines content marketing as “the art of
communicating with your customers and prospects without selling” (“What is content marketing?” n.
Content marketing: A review of academic literature and future research directions
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d.). The Content Council defines content marketing as “the discipline of creating content, on behalf
of a brand, designed with the specific strategy of influencing consumer behavior in order to drive
quantifiable profitable results” (“The content council definition of content marketing,” n.d.).
Holliman and Rowley (2014) define digital content marketing as “the activity associated with
creating, communicating, distributing, and exchanging digital content that has value for customers,
clients, partners, and the firm and its brands” (p. 287).
The above definitions of content marketing imply that content is used in marketing exchanges by
organizations as part of marketing. There is another context for using the term “digital content
marketing” where it refers to the marketing of digital content as a commodity or goods (Rowley,
2008). Therefore, the term “digital content marketing” has two different kinds of meaning, one
referring to a marketing program where content is provided by brands for free without any
expectation of revenue, and the other referring to content marketed as a tradable commodity
charging fees with some business models behind it. The latter scenario is not what this article would
address.
The current knowledge base is dominated by advice from practitioners and consultants, and
available information is mostly from the industry, existing in expert blogs, trade publications and
business press articles. This fact prompted the need to conduct a systematic review of extant
academic literature, analyzing the status of academic research and figuring out future research
directions.
2. Method
The review was limited to scholarly publications written in English, specifically peer-reviewed journal
articles. Consistent with commonly practiced database search efforts, a “key word” approach was
used. The database Scopus was selected as the database as it is the largest abstract and citation
database of peer-reviewed literature, covering comprehensive overview of the world's research
output covering multiple fields, including social sciences.
The search did not set any time frame because: first, there were not many results for each search
performed; second, even though content marketing is very related to digital media and the Internet,
future research might need to apply some old theories or methodologies adopted prior to the digital
era. So, to set a timing frame would block or miss valuable results.
Search terms: The database was queried for keywords in the title, abstract and the key word list. A
set of key words or combinations of key words were developed as shown below. These search
Content marketing: A review of academic literature and future research directions
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terms were distilled and deducted from previous reading of academic and trade publications
(Haeusermann, 2013; Lieb, 2011; Pulizzi, 2012 & 2013), and they reflect the core meaning,
connotations or components of content marketing. Content marketing is closely related to or
partially overlaps with a variety of periphery terms, such as brand journalism, inbound marketing,
storytelling, native advertising, branded content, custom publishing, corporate journalism, and social
media marketing. Below are the search keywords:

Content marketing: content marketing, marketing AND content

Brand-related: brand journalism, branded storytelling, branded media, branded social
content, branded social media, branded social campaign

Content: content strategy, paid content, sponsored content, branded content, editorialized
content, editorial AND marketing, digital content, social content, message strategy, digital
AND content, customer relationship AND content, content AND brand, content AND
corporate

Custom publishing: custom publishing, custom media, customer media, customer publishing,
member media, private media, contract publishing, customer engagement agency

Corporate media or journalism: corporate media, corporate publishing, corporate journalism,
owned media, company press, corporate newsroom, sponsored media, corporate AND
media, commercialization AND news, commercialization AND journalism

Storytelling: storytelling, storytelling AND marketing, digital AND storytelling, story AND
brand, story AND corporate, company AND story

Other: native advertising, inbound marketing, hybrid message, masked-news, publisher AND
corporate, publisher AND company, publishing AND corporate, publishing AND company,
publishing AND business, social publishing, sponsored stories
Screening process: After the database submitted a list of results for each search, a manual
screening and evaluation procedure was performed. We evaluated the title, abstract and key words
of each article, selected those which matched the need, and discarded those which were not related
at all. Each selected article is either directly or adjacently related to the topic of content marketing.
In addition, after reading selected articles, we identified and selected related articles in the
reference lists of some articles. Quite a proportion of finally selected articles do not contain the term
“content marketing” in the text, but they were deemed useful as they have some valence or potential
of being useful reference tools for future research for content marketing.
3. Summary of Results and Analysis
The search and evaluation yielded a total of 64 articles published during 1985 to 2015 as shown in
Table 1. They are distributed in peer-reviewed journals of a variety of disciplines such as
Content marketing: A review of academic literature and future research directions
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communication, marketing, journalism, media, psychology, public affairs, computer information
system/MIS, and management. Holliman and Rowley (2014)’s article is one of the few peerreviewed journal articles directly addressing content marketing, suggesting applicable theoretical
frameworks and concepts such as B2B buying process, branding theory, information quality,
information system, and brand communities. They concluded that “research specifically on content
marketing is virtually non-existent” (p. 271). Seminal and representative of some key research
streams in the past, selected articles of this project were classified into three key topic clusters,
which indicate potential patterns of antecedents and research streams related to content marketing.
Table 1. Summary of 64 selected academic publications
Topic areas
Sub-topics & concepts
No. of
articles
Content
Digital content marketing, B2B
3
marketing
content marketing
Year
Discipline areas of journals
2004,
2008,
2014
19852013
Marketing
Content
Digital content, message
strategy, online content,
branded content, paid content,
message effects, branded
entertainment
22
Brand
Journalism
Credibility and
trust
Brand journalism
1
2013
Credibility, message framing,
judgement of news, hybrid
messages, comparison between
editorial content and advertising,
media credibility, perception of
information credibility, credibility
of online information, credibility
assessment, trust in news
media, source credibility,
persuasion
Storytelling, visual narrative,
consumers and brands talk
Customer magazine
17
1969,
19942015
Marketing, journalism, advertising,
public relations, media research,
information processing and
management, communications,
psychology
7
Public relations, business,
psychology, marketing
Journalism, advertising,
publishing research
Consumer
engagement in branded social
content, brand communities,
audience labor in social
media using Facebook’s
sponsored stories, online
content curation, dissemination
of news content in social
media, online information
search, corporate blogs
Online product user reviews and
word-of-mouth (WOM)
communication, how people
cope with persuasion attempts,
consumer responses to different
7
20062014
2007,
2010,
2013
20102015
1994,
1998,
2009,
2011
Internet commerce, consumer
research, advertising
Storytelling
Custom
publishing
Social media
Consumer
behavior
3
4
Marketing, psychology, public
affairs, Internet commerce,
behavioral science, computer
information systems, media, MIS,
management, policy research,
advertising
Journalism, mass communication
Marketing, psychology, media,
communication, management
Content marketing: A review of academic literature and future research directions
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promotional formats, message
content strategy and its effect
Out of the 64 articles listed above, we classify the majority of them into three key clusters: 1).
typology and characteristics of content; 2). social media marketing and consumer behavior; 3).
credibility and trust (details in Table 2-4 below). There are articles whose subjects are marginal or
the quantities of them are not large enough so that they cannot form a cluster in this article due to
the limit of space.
Cluster 1. The typology and characteristics of content
As a core component, content is central and intrinsic to content marketing. The notion of content
has its root in the publishing world where texts, images, and motion graphics have to be sufficiently
interesting for the target audience to seek out. There has been studies about content in both
traditional media settings and on digital platforms, discussing its definitions, characteristics and
value, and analyzing how people use it. Sometimes, researchers use the term “information” or
“message”, which is interchangeable with “content”. Table 2 shows a list of selected, representative
articles with “content” being a key construct or variable in their research.
Given the digital revolution, content of traditional media are migrating onto social media and digital
platforms, either paid or free. Today, content marketing is mostly conducted online, therefore this
paper would focus more on digital content.
The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) defines digital content (as a
growth industry) as “a medium that increases user participation and interaction through the
digitization of text, data, sound, and video” (as cited in Kim, Oh, & Shin, 2010, p. 79). Kim, Oh &
Shin (2010) define digital content as information and experiences that provide value for users. This
content can be understood as a combination of original design and scenario (narrative content)
associated with such structural elements as text, sound, music, images, and videos, which can be
accessed by consumers through both wired and wireless digital media. Digital content can be used
for both marketing and as a specific end product. Koiso-Kanttila (2004) conceptualizes digital
content as “bit-based objects distributed through electronic channels” (p.46) and argues that it is
essential that both the distribution process and the actual entity acquired are digital.
Examples of digital content include online news, electronic journals, e-books, virtual pets, online
healthcare advice, databases, online dictionaries, mobile micro movies, games, music downloads,
and software package updates. Ashley and Tuten (2015) point out the three major sources of
content on social media: media/journalist sources, brands, and consumers/users.
Content marketing: A review of academic literature and future research directions
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Koiso-Kanttila (2004) analyzes characteristics of digital content, and identifies five key
characteristics: information recombination, accessibility, navigation interaction, speed, and
essentially zero marginal cost. These five characteristics can form the essence of content
digitization. She argues that digital content entails both conventional service and product features,
and it is a product that behaves in a service-like manner.
Rowley (2008) proposes nine characteristics of digital content: 1. value is contextual; 2.
reproducibility and multiplicability; 3. interactivity; 4. repackageability; 5. delivery and technology; 6.
perishability; 7. homogeneity; 8. inseparability; 9. tangibility. These characteristics derive from its
essential nature as information, and the fluid and contextual nature of its value.
As for the classification of content, Tuten and Solomon (2013) state that, in social media, content
can take so many forms that it is sometimes difficult to categorize. Holliman and Rowley (2014)
suggest that content includes the static content forming web sites, as well as dynamic rich media
content, such as videos, podcasts, user-generated content and interactive product selectors. Kim,
Spiller and Hettche (2015) classify social media content into three categories - task, interaction and
self-orientation. Task-oriented content can be advertising and a new product or service
announcement, interaction-oriented content can be a picture, image or video not directly related to
the brand, and self-oriented content can be news, information or story about the company or its
products.
Table 2. Cluster 1 – The typology and characteristics of content
(Content marketing is abbreviated as “CM”)
Authors
Concepts
Major questions
Relevant theories
Kim, Spiller, &
Hettche (2015)
Media type: text, photo
and video
Article title:
Analyzing media
types and content
orientations in
Facebook for
global brands.
Content orientation:
task, interaction, and
self-oriented
Peng, Fan, & Hsu
(2004)
Dimensions of content
attributes:
informativeness,
entertainment,
organization,
interactivity, and
vividness
Article title:
Proposing the
content
perception theory
for the online
content industry –
a structural
Analyzed media
types, and
categorized the
content orientation
of corporate
Facebook pages
Theories in
interpersonal
communication,
specifically
salesmanship
literature
How the content
perception
dimensions molded
by content
providers will
influence web
users’
psychological
responses and
behavior.
Content
perception theory,
telepresence
theory
Content marketing: A review of academic literature and future research directions
Relevance to
content marketing
The content on
social media is also
the content
distributed by digital
content marketers;
analysis of
consumers’
response to content
on social media is
also the concern for
content marketers.
Classification of
content; the
consumer behavior
(how content
perception
perspectives can
influence web
users’ attitude and
then behavior) is
applicable in CM
context
Page 7 of 17
equation
modeling.
Kim, Oh, & Shin
(2010)
Article title: An
empirical
investigation of
digital content
characteristics,
value and flow.
Graber (1989)
Article title:
Content and
meaning what’s it
all about.
OestreicherSinger &
Zalmanson (2013)
Article title:
Content or
community? A
digital business
strategy for
content providers
in the social age.
Content can be divided
into 3 categories: design
characteristics (visual
appeal and musicality),
scenario characteristics
(creativity and
entertainment value),
and structure (unity and
conciseness)
Evaluated
characteristics of
digital content and
examined how
different
components of
content are related
to its value, flow
and use
intensiveness
Flow theory (the
users’
interpretation of
the current
experience as the
most positive one
from a series of
possible
experiences)
The understanding
of digital content;
how consumers
respond to different
aspects of digital
content
Discussed various
aspects surrounding
content: symbols,
connotations, meaning
construction, how to
analyze content and
meaning, content
choice, content-making
behavior, and
usefulness of news.
Concept of “social
content website”;
content consumption as
a social experience;
levels of participation:
content consumption,
content organization,
community involvement,
and community
leadership
N/A
Human
information
processing,
democratic
theories, the
etiology of content
The perspectives
about content and
related concepts
are helpful for CM.
Consumers’
willingness to pay
for content is
strongly linked to
community
participation than to
the volume of
content
consumption.
Community
behavior patterns
(Lave & Wenger,
1991)
Consumers’
consumption of
content and
community
participation
patterns in social
media are related
elements of digital
CM.
Commitmentbased approach
Cluster 2. Social media marketing and consumer behavior
Social media have become important outlets for news, information and content. For content
marketing programs running online, they have a lot to do with social media. The core logic of
content marketing is to leverage content online, which customers would search for and find
valuable, to engage and dialogue with them. The research domains corresponding to these two
terms of “content marketing” and “social media marketing” overlap in such areas as online
information searching and sharing, content curation, content/news reception, dissemination and
consumption, consumers’ reaction to content/information, brand community, among others.
Social media marketing is a wide-ranging concept or research domain, and it could be elusive to
capture or delineate it. Table 3 shows a list of selected, representative articles in the field of social
marketing with consumer behavior elements. Research about social media marketing entails
consumer behavior, and these two concepts are highly related to each other. Peltier and Nill
(2013)’s review of Internet marketing research during the past 20 years (1993-2012) find out that
consumer behavior is the number one area of research in terms of quantity of articles, accounting
Content marketing: A review of academic literature and future research directions
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for 26% of the total of 2,859 journal articles about Internet marketing. Many scholars are trying to
apply consumer behavior theories to Internet marketing. That’s why this article groups social media
marketing and consumer behavior together into one cluster.
As shown by Table 3, selected articles in the cluster of “social media marketing and consumer
behavior” do not necessarily contain the keyword “content marketing”, but what is being studied is
actually part of the process or result of content marketing. Future research for content marketing
can focus on certain antecedents in social media marketing, borrowing theoretical frameworks,
methodologies, and research designs.
Table 3. Cluster 2 - Social media marketing and consumer behavior
(Content marketing is abbreviated as “CM”)
Authors
Concepts &
Major questions
Theories
antecedents
Botha & Reyneke Viral marketing
Users’ emotional
Emotions in
(2013)
reaction to the videos
consumer behavior
Content sharing
and relevance of the
(“affect”, Job Affect
Article title: To
behavior by users
content played key
Scale, Positive
share or not to
roles in their decisions
Affect Negative
share: The role of
to forward and share
Affect Scale, twocontent and
factor model of
emotion in viral
emotion)
marketing.
Theories related to
the spread of
epidemics.
Gregory (2006)
Two approaches
The study examined
N/A
of message
readers’ reactions to
Article title: Using strategy:
different message
message strategy information/argum strategies used in eight
to capture
ent and
publications (brochures
audience
emotion/entertain
and postcards) about
attention:
ment
healthcare issues, to
Readers’
find out how to use
reactions to
message strategy as a
health education
technique to capture
publication.
audience attention.
Ashley & Tuten
(2015)
Article title:
Creative
strategies in
social media
marketing: An
exploratory study
of branded social
content and
consumer
engagement.
Fotopoulou &
Couldry (2014)
Brand social
content (or
campaigns), social
media content,
social content, and
branded social
content
Uses and
gratification theory;
elaboration
likelihood model;
identity theory, selfexpansion theory
Social media
marketing
The study explored
how the channel and
creative strategies
used by companies
related to consumer
engagement in
branded social media.
Three message
appeals related to
performance on
Facebook: image
appeal, exclusivity
appeal, and incentives.
Content curation
(reuse and
Through a case study
communication media
N/A
Creative message
strategy
Content marketing: A review of academic literature and future research directions
Relevance to
content marketing
The videos in
study are largely
created and driven
by brands as
content marketers.
Content sharing
behavior
Consumers’
reaction to
different types of
content.
Even though the
framework of
message strategy
is in print format, it
can be applied to
research about
CM
Brand social
content is a result
of CM driven by
companies, and
the consumer
behavior aspect is
what marketers
are concerned
about in terms of
result.
Content curation
overlaps and is
Page 9 of 17
Article title:
Telling the story
of the stories:
Online content
curation and
digital
engagement.
Weeks & Holbert
(2013)
Article title:
Predicting
dissemination of
news content in
social media: A
focus on
reception,
friending, and
partisanship.
Chauhan & Pillai
(2013)
Article title: Role
of content
strategy in social
media brand
communities: A
case of higher
education
institutes in India.
circulation of
content) on digital
media
Community
tagging (a usergenerated tagging
system to bring
together the
practice of curating
content)
Social media as
important outlets
for the
dissemination and
distribution of
news and
information
Information
sharing
journalists, the study
explored how they
implemented certain
digital technologies and
the ways in which
imaginaries and
material limitations
coexisted in the
shaping of a digital
infrastructure.
part of content
marketing, which
generates original
content and
curates third-party
content.
How people engaged
news content in social
media - social media
news reception and
friending a
journalist/news
organization were
predictors of social
media news
dissemination.
N/A
In addition to
traditional news
organizations,
companies are an
important source
distributing their
own news and info
in SNS, to be
shared by users.
How content strategy
of higher education
institutions initiated and
enhanced customer
engagement in brand
communities of those
institutions in SNS.
N/A
Brand community
(BC) in SNS
overlaps with CM,
and the research
methods are
highly useful for
the study of
consumers’
activities of
consuming
content online.
Friending in SNS
4 scenarios of
news
dissemination
Content strategy
Brand community
(BC) in SNS
Customer
engagement
Cluster 3. Credibility and trust
Marketers are increasingly embracing editorial-style storytelling to supplement or replace traditional
advertising to enhance the appearance of neutrality and message credibility. Editorial credibility,
once the sole province of traditional media, is now being bought and paid for by the brands
themselves. As the lines blur between news and marketing messages a brand, not all consumers
will be able to distinguish a news organization’s story about a brand from the brand’s own stories
about itself. The Facebook stream and the Twitter feed have brought the numbing sameness to all
content on the Internet.
An increasing amount of today’s information and content on the Internet is a result of and the output
from content marketing. Given content marketing’s practice of hiring ex-journalists to create content,
Content marketing: A review of academic literature and future research directions
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which tends to be news-like or editorial-like to be trusted by consumers, and controversies
surrounding corporate-funded journalism, it is necessary to look at the issue of credibility and trust
tied to content marketing.
The assessment of media or information credibility requires appropriate ways of operationalizing
credibility with multi-layered, complex constructs. Prior to the digital age, there was research
comparing audiences’ perceptions of the credibility and trustworthiness of different forms of
traditional communications such news, advertising, publicity, advertorial, and product placement,
aiming to know how to effectively persuade audience.
Since the late 1990s when the Internet became a new environment for providing information and
content for people, the concept of credibility or trust has received considerable attention.
Researchers from diverse fields such as information science, marketing, communication, humancomputer interaction, and psychology have examined the assessment of credibility or trust from a
variety of perspectives, uncovering the dimensions, antecedents and predictors of credibility
(Balasubramanian, 1994; Cole II & Greer, 2013; Flanagin & Metzger, 2000; Hilligoss & Rieh, 2008;
Kohring & Matthes, 2007).
These previous studies can serve as valuable references for the research about content marketing
in terms of research design, theoretical frameworks, and techniques (see Table 4). For example,
Hilligoss and Rieh (2008) conducted studies to identify a framework with common aspects of
credibility assessment regardless of media, type of information, and environment of information use.
Their theoretical frameworks and research methods for testing trust or credibility of traditional media
or non-media settings, could be extended to examine content marketing. Table 4 shows a list of
selected, representative articles in this topic cluster.
Table 4. Cluster 3 - Credibility and trust
(Content marketing is abbreviated as “CM”)
Authors
Concepts
Key questions
Cole II & Greer
(2013)
Article title:
Audience
response to
brand journalism:
The effect of
frame, source,
and involvement.
Brand journalism,
custom
publishing, and
custom content
Source credibility,
and message
credibility
Product
involvement
This study examined the
effect of frame (editorial vs.
commercial) and attributed
story source (a peer customer
vs. a corporate source) in a
custom magazine on
audience ratings of content
credibility, attitude towards
the brand, and purchase
intent. Conclusion presenting a custom
magazine as editorial can
positively affect readers’
perception of message
Theories
Framing
theory
Content marketing: A review of academic literature and future research directions
Relevance to
content marketing
The term “brand
journalism” is
used
interchangeably
with CM. This
study’s research
questions and
methods are
applicable to CM
where companies
hire ex-journalists
to create editorialtype of content to
be distributed.
Page 11 of 17
Balasubramanian
(1994)
Article title:
Beyond
advertising and
publicity: Hybrid
messages and
public policy
issues.
Flanagin &
Metzger (2000)
Article title:
Perceptions of
Internet
information
credibility.
Hilligoss & Rieh
(2008)
Article title:
Developing a
unifying
framework of
credibility
assessment:
Construct,
heuristics, and
interaction in
context.
Kohring &
Matthes (2007)
Article title: Trust
in news media:
Hybrid messages
(something
between
advertising and
publicity, such as
product
placement,
program tie-in,
program-length
commercial,
masked news,
masked
spokesperson)
Credibility of
Internet
information
Information
verification
Media literacy
under the Internet
environment
Credibility and
credibility
assessment
Construct level
(truthfulness,
believability,
trustworthiness,
objectivity)
credibility and increase
positive attitude toward a
brand.
A comprehensive analysis of
hybrid messages, a rising
marketing phenomenon in the
1980s.
The marketing effect aspect –
how to assess the persuasive
impact of hybrid messages.
Attribution
theory,
classic
conditioning
principle,
and
modeling
paradigm
This paper studied subjects'
perceptions of the credibility
of different types of
information - news, reference,
entertainment and
commercial - in five different
media channels (Internet,
magazine, newspaper, radio,
and TV). Overall, credibility
did not vary as a function of
medium. Media credibility is
less a result of audience
response to media institutions
and personalities and more a
result of audience responses
to specific content.
The paper developed a
theoretical framework of
credibility assessment,
involving three levels of
judgement: construct,
heuristics, and interactions.
Context emerged as an
important factor that
influences the three levels.
Theories of
persuasion,
social
judgment
theory, the
elaboration
likelihood
model
The paper presents the
development and validation
of a multi-dimensional scale
of trust in news media. The
Sociological
theories of
trust,
hierarchical
factor model
Prominentinterpretation
theory
Elaboration
Likelihood
Model (ELM)
Commonalities–
the deviation from
intrusive, shortformat advertising
that tends to
evoke skepticism,
and the effort of
trying to look like
news or editorial.
CM could be
considered as the
evolved, updated
version of hybrid
messages in
today’s digital
environment.
This paper
provides useful
referential
frameworks to
analyze CM, such
as users’
perception of
credibility in
relation to source,
media forms and
specific
messages.
This study
provides
theoretical
foundation and
methodology for
investigating
credibility under
CM.
Heuristics level
(media, source,
endorsement,
aesthetics)
Interaction level
(content cues,
periphery source
cues, periphery
info object cures)
Trustworthiness or
credibility of news
media
Content marketing: A review of academic literature and future research directions
The content
generated by CM
has certain
characteristics
from that of
Page 12 of 17
Development
and validation of
a
multidimensional
scale.
Source credibility,
the comparative
approach of
media credibility,
factor analytical
approach
Arora & Arora
(2004)
Communicator
(source) credibility
Article title: The
impact of
message framing
and credibility:
Findings for
Nutritional
Guidelines.
Message framing
(positively vs.
negatively)
Credibility in
marketing
model was tested via
confirmatory factor analysis.
Trust in news media can be
considered a hierarchical
factor (of second
order) that consists of four
lower order factors, including
trust in the selectivity of
topics, trust in the selectivity
of facts, trust in the accuracy
of depictions, and trust in
journalistic assessment.
Using experimental approach
to test the influence of
message framing and
credibility on the attitude and
intention of people toward
following the guidelines for
healthy eating and preventing
cancer. The persuasive
impact will be greater under
high credibility and negative
framing.
media, and the
research
techniques can be
borrowed.
Framing
theory,
attribution
theory,
Elaboration
Likelihood
Model
(sourcecredibility
inferences),
prospect
theory
This research is
about advertising
copy and layout in
the old paradigm
of marketing, but
the concept of
source credibility
and the research
method of
consumer
behavior can be
applied to content
marketing.
In addition to the three topic clusters analyzed above, out of the 64 articles, there are ones
addressing other topics such as storytelling/ digital storytelling, custom publishing/ customer
magazine, and branded content/branded entertainment. In terms of quantity of these articles, they
are not as prominent as those in the three clusters listed above. Due to the limit of space, this paper
does not elaborate on them.
4. Discussion and Conclusion
This article has categorized the fragmented body of academic literature related to content
marketing. The analysis identified a handful of interest areas that have shaped previous research in
different fields. Unfortunately, there is scant academic literature directly addressing content
marketing. The absence exists for good reasons. First, content marketing, especially the digital part,
is a recently proliferating phenomenon, waiting to be treated as a distinctive research area. Second,
it is a matter of defining and delineating concepts and research domains. Content marketing
overlaps with a variety of other concepts such as social media marketing, brand journalism, custom
publishing, storytelling, and business models of online content. Scholars researching about these
other phenomena or antecedents did not necessarily label their research topics as content
marketing. Thirdly, content marketing is at the nexus of communication, marketing, journalism and
consumer behavior, so the research about it would be cross-disciplinary, making it hard to find a
easy home in the current academic community.
Content marketing: A review of academic literature and future research directions
Page 13 of 17
The status of academic research in content marketing does not allow convenient referencing or
borrowing of extant academic knowledge. The review conducted by this paper has identified the
three main topic clusters: 1). the typology and characteristics of content; 2). social media marketing
and consumer behavior; 3). credibility and trust. Within them, we can see some meaningful cues,
theories, research questions, research methodologies, and isolated antecedents, used by previous
research in relevant or periphery fields. These findings can serve as a foundation for future
research, bridging past research and what can be done for content marketing in the future.
Then, we propose a number of sample research streams or topics for the future, based on the
review of academic literature as well as issues raised by practitioners:

New business models: In digital environments, it is as easy to become media as it is to buy
media (Lieb, 2011). Brands are investing in or acquiring media assets and capabilities, and
some new types of media business models or organizational forms emerged, such as Ecommerce interwoven with content, sponsored content, and corporate in-house media units
making money by licensing content. The research can look at new organizational forms,
revenue and profit models, value chain, process, and operation models of these new
organizations under content marketing.

Human resources: More and more former journalists shift to work for companies as the so-called
brand journalists. This role shifting presented some issues such as the changes and
compromises in professional identity, job roles, editorial judgment criteria, and professional
values.

Consumer behavior:
o
Linkage between content consumption and product buying - the direct and lagged effects
on consumers’ purchasing behavior (situations where consumers make or do not make
purchase decisions after consuming content).
o
Consumers’ reaction towards editorial-like content or brand copy, and their responses
about the credibility and trustworthiness of content marketing.
o
Consumers’ exposure to content and its impact on their becoming brand advocates.
o
Brands’ effort of building thought leadership via content marketing and its impact on
consumers, and how consumers engage in this process.
o
Consumers’ motivation and behaviors of search and sharing content and information tied
to content marketing.

The credibility and trust of content marketing: Does knowledge about the true nature of the
content of content marketing affect consumers’ response? If such knowledge becomes
available, would consumers resist them as propaganda? How can companies or media solve
Content marketing: A review of academic literature and future research directions
Page 14 of 17
the dilemma of incorporating commercial content into editorial content, while creating unbiased
information for readers?

Impact on public interest and public policy: Given the ever-increasing, pervasive content
generated by content marketers or corporate-funded journalism, content marketing might lead to
the shrinking of public interest. How would policy makers, the traditional media industry, the
corporate world and consumers address it?
Content marketing: A review of academic literature and future research directions
Page 15 of 17
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