Cybersecurity buyers hear more marketing noise than ever. How can you send them a strong signal that resonates? By using real buyer behavior data to guide tactics, sharpen messaging, and find value propositions that truly resonate with the target audience.
Using a precision strategy to amplify your message makes all the difference.
CyberTheory, a full-service cybersecurity marketing agency, partnered with Cyentia Institute to analyze millions of engagement signals from across the ISMG media network, showing what’s really important to cybersecurity buyers. We’ve distilled these critical insights for marketers in our 2025 CISO Engagement and Decision Drivers Study. Read on to learn about these top highlights and more from our in-depth analysis:
- Artificial intelligence (AI): AI-related topics see the highest engagement by far, but there’s more competition for mindshare than ever.
- Operational technology (OT): Editorial coverage has risen, but sponsored OT content hasn’t kept pace with audience interest.
- Small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs): Smaller organizations prioritize practical security solutions and actionable guidance for current cyber risks.
AI Dominates Topic Engagement
AI-related topics have risen rapidly in user engagement to become today’s foundational security discussion across every industry and company size. From AI-driven security operations to AI-powered cloud next-generation firewalls and beyond, security professionals and decision-makers crave AI content to help assess new AI-driven risks, as well as new AI-infused solutions to help combat them.
In fact, the number of AI-related content assets increased by 520% from 2022 to 2024, and over half of all users (56%) engaged with AI and machine learning (ML) content between Q4 2024 and Q1 2025 — more than 20 percentage points above the second-highest topic (cloud data security and resilience).
Effective AI messaging also requires sector-specific context rather than generic descriptions.
For example, healthcare organizations evaluate AI solutions through much different criteria than those in financial services or manufacturing. Knowing how to position AI tools and solutions within the operational framework and regulatory environment of the target buyer’s industry is a great technique to capture more buyer attention.
Vendors should also include real examples of implementation and customer use cases to show practical outcomes. Supporting those assertions with original data and proprietary research can further buyer interest.
OT Offers Untapped Opportunities for Marketers
Cybersecurity leaders, as well as government regulatory agencies across the globe, consistently identify the need to prioritize OT cybersecurity. In the study, that trend was reflected in a marked increase in editorial coverage of OT cyber incidents.
However, a content performance analysis shows that vendor OT content hasn’t kept pace with more user engagement on the subject. While OT editorial content increased 51% in 2024 compared to the previous year, sponsored OT content actually declined by 53% in the second half of 2024 compared to the first half.
This gap in sponsored OT content comes at a time of heightened demand and heightened risk, which represents a powerful strategic opportunity for organizations offering impactful OT solutions.
Rather than approaching OT through conventional cybersecurity frameworks, marketers can hook target buyers with content focused on regulatory compliance considerations (e.g., NIS2, SOCI, OTCC, etc.), business continuity and resiliency best practices, and industry-specific threat scenarios. Vendors that consistently deliver authoritative, information, and actionable OT content can capture mindshare and a competitive advantage.
SMBs Need Approachable Solutions for Operational Risks
Small and medium-sized enterprises have unique challenges and needs. Those users tend to show higher engagement with content that provides actionable guidance about common cyber risks, especially because some threat actors may view smaller entities with fewer resources as low-hanging fruit.
As with other cohorts, SMBs showed the highest engagement on AI-related topics. However, compared to other users, SMBs showed higher engagement with cyberwarfare and ransomware topics, which took second and third place during Q4 2024 through Q1 2025.
That indicates SMB security leaders focus on operational risks and frontline resilience against the persistent challenges of sophisticated cyberattacks. They seek practical solutions to current threats and cost-effective ways to raise resilience, such as through cloud security and enterprise browser security.
The Intent Data Difference: Contact-Level Insight Reveals Real Buyer Behaviors
Many organizations use intent data providers. But the majority of B2B buyer intent data consists of account-level analysis, which can only provide broad indicators of interest somewhere in a vast organization.
By contrast, contact-level intent data uncovers a treasure trove of buyer intelligence. It can reveal specific engagement patterns, topic preferences, and behavioral shifts that enable precise campaign customization. The ability to adapt marketing tactics based on real behavior signals can lead to more impactful results and greater ROI.
One example analyzed in our report shows how a vendor targeting users for a specific topic saw strong user engagement on their sponsored assets. However, that engagement amounted to just 27% of overall activity on that topic across the ISMG network. Contact-level B2B intent data revealed the other 73% of buyer signals — an amazing resource for informing enhanced messaging, content formats, channel selection, and more at a granular level.
Access to the content engagement patterns of cybersecurity target buyers is one of many advantages of a content strategy agency such as CyberTheory. Other advantages include easier content auditing, CISO message testing and validation, and expertise in interactive asset formats designed to better qualify and persuade prospects.
Format Follows Function: Aligning Content to Audience Preference
To maximize engagement, marketers should ensure their content formats align with those their target personas prefer. As our study reveals, different roles — and regions — have clear preferences for certain formats.
For example, we tracked the greater popularity of webinars and whitepapers with CISOs, indicating that executives seek out those in-depth insights. Senior-level professionals also show strong interest in article formats, which often spotlight current challenges and potential solutions to pain points.
Additionally, we see that event attendance by at least one person from an organization correlates with a significant engagement increase of nearly 1400% across that organization. Offering a range of complementary content assets can reinforce key messaging pillars, boost engagement across different title levels, and nurture prospects throughout the buyer journey.
And while original research, such as proprietary survey data, can require more time and planning than other content types, it also earns outsized attention. It has the potential to give marketers improved messaging, potential press coverage, and an array of unique campaign assets with lasting value.
Cybersecurity Marketing and Engagement Strategy for 2025 and Beyond
By crafting a marketing and engagement strategy based on actual buyer behavior, you can meet your buyers where they are. Content that contains timely and accurate messaging, which is produced in your buyers’ preferred content formats, and that’s easily found in channels your buyers favor most, helps win trust and increase ROI.
Rise above the noise and amplify your cybersecurity content marketing with these strategic insights and many others. Get your copy of our 2025 CISO Engagement and Decision Drivers Study here. Then contact CyberTheory for a free consultation about how our content strategy agency services can help refine your content for better results.