With thousands of publicly traded companies vying for Wall Street's attention, there's a multitude of strategies that can make long-term investors richer. But few strategies have been more successful in generating outsized returns over the long run than buying dividend stocks.

Companies that pay a regular dividend to their shareholders are usually profitable on a recurring basis and time-tested. These are businesses that have demonstrated their ability to navigate challenging economic climates and come out stronger on the other side. In short, they're the type of businesses we'd expect to increase in value over time -- and that's exactly what the data shows.

According to a 2013 report from the wealth management division of JPMorgan Chase, companies that initiated and grew their payouts between 1972 and 2012 averaged a hearty 9.5% annualized return over this four-decade stretch. Meanwhile, non-payers crawled to an annualized return of 1.6% over the same span.

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Source Fool.com