Creating impactful marketing content that sellers actually use is one of the biggest challenges marketers face. It happens all the time: marketing teams invest hours researching, writing, and designing thoughtful materials, only for those resources to sit untouched. It’s frustrating — but it’s the reality for too many marketing teams.
The stats back up these experiences. Up to 65% of marketing content goes unused, often because it’s hard to find, misaligned with seller needs, or created without the insights needed to make it relevant.
And it’s not just a waste of effort — it’s a missed opportunity. It slows deals down, leaves gaps in buyer conversations, and ultimately holds us back from hitting bigger revenue goals.
So, how do you fix it? It’s about rethinking how you approach content. Marketing teams must bring together the art of marketing — compelling storytelling, sleek design, fresh ideas — with the science of AI to create something truly impactful.
Why marketing content misses the mark
Marketers are making content decisions in the dark.
One of the biggest missteps is when marketers often operate without clear insights into what will resonate with their prospects and customers. Only 25% of marketers use data to inform every strategic decision they make. That’s a staggering minority. Without those insights, you’re guessing — and guesswork rarely delivers results.
If you don’t know which content is landing with buyers, how can you feel confident in what you’re creating?
Marketing content is hard to find — and even harder to use.
Then even when marketers do create content that should hit the mark, it doesn’t always get used. Sellers often can’t find what they need when they need it, or the materials don’t align with the specific buyer conversations they’re having.
And when sellers are left to search for the right materials, they waste valuable time — time that could be spent actually selling and closing more deals.
Using AI to create marketing content that gets used
AI takes the guesswork out of marketing content creation and helps you make smarter, data-backed decisions. With tools like Analytics and Insights from Showpad, marketing teams can finally see what’s driving real engagement and adjust on the fly: topics, audience focus, formats.
This means you can identify which materials are performing well, spot gaps, and quickly adapt strategies to meet the needs of both sellers and buyers.
When sellers have access to relevant, tailored materials, they use them with confidence — leading to stronger buyer engagement and more closed deals. That’s what makes AI such a powerful tool. It ensures the effort you put into creating content actually delivers results.
Greater usage and more time saved with AI content management
But AI isn’t just about making better marketing content — it’s about giving teams the time to focus on what really matters. Another major challenge for marketing teams is how much time gets wasted answering seller requests to re-share assets or tweaking materials to meet seller needs. Those hours add up fast.
With Showpad, that time-suck goes away. AI-powered content management and search functionality simplifies sharing and enhances discoverability. It ensures marketing materials are found and used by sellers, exactly when they need it. And when content is easy to discover for sellers in Showpad, it’s used three times more often, ensuring the effort our teams put into creation is worthwhile.
Even better, smarter content management saves marketing teams over 400 hours a year. That’s busywork time that can be reinvested in big-picture strategic planning and creative ideation — the work that actually moves the needle.
increase in content usage when content is easy to discover
marketing hours saved per year with Showpad, on average
Aligning art and science for measurable wins
At its core, marketing is about storytelling. But storytelling alone isn’t enough if it doesn’t reach the right audience at the right time.
With AI-powered analytics and content management, your team can ensure they’re not just creating more content but creating the right content — timely, critical, focused— that sellers can use to engage buyers and move deals forward.
That’s the power of uniting the art of marketing with the science of AI.
Frequently asked questions
AI takes the guesswork out of content creation by giving marketing teams clear, data-backed insights into what’s actually working. Instead of relying on gut instinct, you can see which content is driving engagement, which formats resonate with specific buyer personas, and where gaps exist. Tools like Showpad’s Analytics and Insights let you ask questions in plain language — like “What content drove the most engagement with enterprise buyers last quarter?” — and get instant, actionable answers.
There are a few common reasons. Content often gets buried in shared drives or scattered across multiple platforms, making it hard for sellers to find what they need in the moments they need. Other times, the materials don’t align with the specific conversations sellers are having with buyers — they might be too generic, outdated, or created without input from the field. AI-support content management solves this by improving discoverability and surfacing the most relevant assets at the right time. When content is easy to find in Showpad, it’s used three times more often.
On average, marketing teams save over 400 hours per year with Showpad. That time is typically spent fielding ad hoc requests from sellers, re-sharing assets, and manually tweaking materials. With AI-powered search and smart content organization, sellers can self-serve — finding the right content exactly when they need it. Those reclaimed hours can be reinvested in higher-value work like strategic planning, creative campaigns, and data-driven content optimization.
Not at all. Showpad is built for marketers, not data scientists. The natural language interface lets you ask questions the way you’d talk to a colleague — no complex queries or technical skills required. You’ll get clear visualizations and narrative explanations that make it easy to understand performance data and act on it quickly.
