With 400 million monthly active users and more than 80 million posts per day, Instagram has established itself as an obvious platform for brands looking to expand their reach and engage with their audience.

Figuring out how to launch a successful Instagram contest, however, is much less obvious. Sure, it sounds like an effective strategy for stirring up conversation — it capitalizes on user generated content (UGC) and typically requires very little commitment for participants. But where do you start? And how can you be sure that you’re covering all the bases?

To help give you some direction, we put together a detailed list of steps to run through when planning an engaging Instagram contest. From setting goals to monitoring submissions, we’ve covered all of the basics below — and we’ve included some inspirational examples along the way. Check it out …

Disclaimer: This blog post includes some information on legal issues surrounding internet marketing, but legal information is not the same as legal advice — applying the law to a specific circumstance. We’ve conducted research to better ensure that our information is accurate and useful, but we insist that you talk to a lawyer if you want professional assurance that our information, and your interpretation of it, is accurate. In a nutshell, you may not rely on this information as legal advice, nor as a recommendation or endorsement of any particular legal understanding, and you should instead see this post’s info as for entertainment purposes only.

How to Run an Engaging Instagram Contest

1) Plan objectives and goals.

Before you dive into a contest, it’s important to plan it out first. The key to running a successful contest is to have a purpose — one that aligns with the interests and behaviors of your target audience.

Whether you’re looking to grow your brand presence on Instagram or build out your list of followers, it’s important that you set a specific goal so that you’re not left wondering whether or not you were successful in the end.

To help narrow your focus, think about the audience you’re trying to reach: What kinds of posts do they like seeing on your account? What kinds of posts do they enjoy posting on their own feeds? How do they behave on the platform? If you’re looking to drum up a lot of engagement, you should aim to center your goals and purpose around content that your audience actually wants to post and engage with.

Don’t forget to establish a time frame and budget for your contest, as determining these logistical details upfront will help you design a more effective contest.

2) Create an entry method.

Although the most effective and engaging Instagram contests are those that actually prompt your audience to post their own photos, there are number of different ways brands can create contests on Instagram. Because of this, it’s important to establish and emphasize what it takes for your audience to actually enter the contest.

Here are some ideas for how your audience might enter your contest:

• Have your audience post a photo or a video to Instagram with a specific hashtag and a specific theme.
• Have your audience solely follow you or do so in addition to creating a post.
• Have your audience tag your brand in their post.
• Have your audience Like or comment on one of your posts.

Make sure you establish what the guidelines are for entering the contest, and make that clear on your promotional materials. Maybe your contest is centered around a hashtag that doesn’t include your brand name. If you still want your brand to be tagged to gain recognition, you have to make that clear in your rules.

3) Find the perfect hashtag.

A good hashtag is a key to any engaging Instagram contest. Without it, there’s no link between the contest and the content being generated. In other words, hashtags help create brand and/or contest recognition by serving as a mechanism for sharing and driving participation.

Trouble is, creating the perfect hashtag can be tricky. If your contest is going to have a timeframe (and it should), you want to create a hashtag that you’re not going to want to use over and over again. Not to mention, there are tons of hashtags being created each day, making it difficult to land on something unique and catchy.

To help you come up with the best fit, consider these contest hashtag guidelines:

• Short: Create a hashtag that sticks in people’s minds. The more readable and identifiable your hashtag is, the better it is for your contest.
• Relevant: Make sure you’re creating a hashtag that is very clearly related back to your brand name, product, or services. If you settle on a generic, crowded hashtag such as #ThrowbackThursday, it’s likely that you’ll have a hard time figuring out who your participants actually are.
• Memorable: Users are likely to see promotions for your contest prior to actually posting the content. This means your hashtag needs to be memorable enough for users to think about it once and remember to act sometime later. Try to make your hashtag catchy, easy to search, and easy to write. Avoid weird spellings and confusing word choices.
• Universal: Think about your audience. Does everyone speak the same language or use similar words? If you have an international audience, make sure you’re careful about using slang words or region-specific terms that might confuse people.
• Rare: Do a search before you choose a hashtag. Are there lots of users using your ideal hashtag for some other purposes? If so, you may want to head back to the drawing board.

An example of an effective, engaging hashtag:

Earlier this year, Mint.com, an online personal budgeting and financial management company, hosted their #MyMintMoment contest.

The contest was well-designed for a number of reasons, one of which is its hashtag. The hashtag — #MyMintMoment — is simple, short, memorable, and easy to understand. It stayed on-brand and had a clear theme.

The goal of the contest was to get users to post about the things they were saving for. Participants posted pictures of tattoos, vacations, weddings, children, cars — you name it.

This is a great example of an effective hashtag, but it’s also a great example of how UGC can be used to drive marketing decisions. Think about it: Mint asked participants to share posts about things they were saving for. Sounds like an easy way to gain insight surrounding the unique motives and interests that fuel the usage of their service, doesn’t it?

4) Clearly define a theme.

Because most Instagram contests are UGC-based, it’s important to pick a theme so your users know what kinds of pictures and videos to post.

Ideally, you want to a pick a theme that aligns with your market, product, or services. But you can also take advantage of holidays, seasons, and events that align with your product or brand.

An example of an effective theme:

Last summer, D Magazine, a city and lifestyle magazine based in Dallas, used the Texas summer heat to create an effective #StayCoolDallas contest. The contest encouraged participants to submit photos of ways to stay cool in the Dallas heat. Submissions included everything from cold drinks at favorite bars and restaurants to fun summer activities.

This contest and hashtag worked particularly well because of the double meaning of the word “cool” — which ultimately left room for participants to get creative with their interpretations. This is a great example of how to make engagement super easy.

While the hashtag wasn’t totally brand-specific, the theme was very much in line with their brand and passion for all things Dallas. And as a result of the contest, they were left with a ton of new material to get ideas for their next issue.

5) Decide how winners will be chosen.

Part of a well-designed contest is informing your participants of how the winner will be chosen. Most contests are determined based on one of two ways: a vote or a jury. Let’s explore how each option works …

Voting:

A great way to boost the virality of your contest is to have participants compete for the most Likes. If the prize is valuable enough, your participants will likely share their posts with their friends across channels in order to get as many Likes as possible.

This strategy helps maximize your audience’s reach. At the same time, it can be detrimental to your contest, as you run into issues with folks using “Like bots” to gain artificial Likes. To avoid any complications here, you’ll want to put forth very specific rules that address the use of these types of workarounds.

Jury:

For the sake of quality and overall fairness, the jury method is the clear winner. With the jury method, you select a group of experts to decide upon a winner, rather than relying on a voting system.

There are pros and cons to votes or juries, but no matter the way you choose, make sure to clearly state your method so your users know what they’re vying for. Many brands choose to have a mixed-method approach and use a combination of voting and jury to determine the winner.

6) Choose an appropriate award.

When determining what the award for you contest should be, you need to consider your target audience, your budgetary constraints, and how aggressive your goals are.

Remember that by asking your audience to participate in the contest, you’re asking them to take action on something. As with any effort like this, you’ll need the value of the prize to outweigh the cost and energy required to enter the contest. While people might gloss over an opportunity to win a free t-shirt, it’s likely that they’d be willing to jump through a few hoops for something like a free trip.

While your prize should match the entry action, it should also align with the interests of your target audience. Ask yourself: What might my target audience like to have? Your list of answers for this — budget not considered — might be huge. Sure, everyone wants that free trip we mentioned earlier, but that’s not the point. The goal is to find a prize that’s both valuable and relevant to your brand.

Gift cards, free services, coupons, giveaways, and product goodie bags are all common prizes that brands use for contests, but we’re always in favor of getting creative, too.

Example of a creative contest prize:

One of our favorite examples of contest prizes was Sperry’s Photo Real Design Contest. Sperry encouraged users to post “epic photos” that represented an “odyssey.”

Participants then submitted photos of all kinds of things — nature shots, colorful art, real people, etc. — to be judged based on creativity and the number of Likes it received.

The winner that was chosen received a unique pair of Sperry shoes featuring their photo. Talk about a creative prize, right? Not to mention, it served as a great example of how brands can use contests to inspire real product ideas.

7) Create terms & conditions.

Don’t forget that when you create a competition with a prize, you must follow legal guidelines. The laws that will apply to you depend on where you’re based and who you allow to enter your contest, so you should consult your lawyer for help drafting your terms and conditions. Creating a terms & conditions page is a must.

Here are some common terms people include:

• The name and contact details of the promoting brand
• The dates of the contest
• The rules of who can enter (such as age and employee restrictions)
• The guidelines for how people enter
• The guidelines for how a winner is chosen
• The date and way winners will be announced
• The date and way the winner will be informed
• The time period the winner has to respond and claim their prize
• The specific of the prize (including number of prizes, description of prizes, and any caveats)
• The details of how the prize will be delivered
• Acknowledge that the promotion isn’t sponsored, endorsed or administered by, or associated with Instagram or any other social media used throughout the contest.

Note: Check out Instagram’s Promotion guidelines and make sure to comply with their rules.

8) Promote like crazy.

Now that you’ve got a solid plan in place, it’s time to promote the heck out of your contest.

Where’s the best place to start spreading the word? The possibilities are seemingly endless, but here are a few ideas to inspire your promotion efforts:

• Your blog. Write a post on your site detailing the contest, and use it as a launch point for your contest’s landing page.

• Social media. What better place to launch a social media contest than on social media? Direct your existing followers to the contest by including a shortened link in your bio and referencing that link in your promotional posts.

• Email. Extend the invitation to participate to your email subscribers by sending over a quick and friendly email to announce the offer.

9) Monitor submissions.

Monitoring both your promotional efforts and the level of participation during your contest is essential for meeting your goals and creating a plan to follow up on your contest.

Make sure to determine what metrics you’d like to use and how you’ll keep track of them. Here are some metrics to consider using:

• Number of submissions – Total number of posts submitted in compliance with your terms and conditions.
• Likes per submission – Helps you keep track of potential winners if your contest is decided by vote.
• Number of participants – If users can submit more than one submission, how many unique participants contributed to your contest?
• Top participants – Who shared the most content during your campaign? Keeping track of this helps you better engage with your biggest fans.
• Total Likes – Measures the total number of Likes on all submissions in your contest.
• Total reach – Captures the number of followers of your participants at the time of submission. Meant to show you the potential reach of your campaign.
• Follower growth during contest – Measure how much your following increased during the contest’s time period.

If your current audience is relatively small, and you don’t expect more than 30 submissions to your contest, you may decide to monitor your contest manually. To do this, assign someone the task of keeping track of submissions each day. At the end of the contest, someone will have to go through each submission and measure and write down the results from each submission.

If you’re monitoring your contest manually, try using a tool like Tagboard or Google Alerts to keep track of when your hashtag is being mentioned online, making it easier to track submissions. (HubSpot customers: You can set up a custom Stream in your Social Monitoring tool to keep tabs on a specific hashtag. Learn more here.)

If you’re expecting well over 30 submissions, however, you can imagine how difficult monitoring your submissions might be. If that’s the case, you may want to explore an Instagram-specific tool such as Iconosquare.

10) Follow up accordingly.

Once the contest is over, you can’t forget to follow up on the rules you set in the first place. Keep your terms and conditions in mind when reviewing the submissions to ensure that you’re being 100% fair in your evaluation.

Again, this is why establishing your terms and conditions early on is so important, as it will provide you with an documented plan for selecting, contacting, and awarding the winner.

Once you’ve selected and notified the winner, don’t forget to make the announcement publicly. Here’s an example of how to do so from D Magazine‘s #StayCoolDallas contest:

Ready to Run a Contest?

Now that you know everything it takes to run a successful, engaging Instagram contest, go put your knowledge to work for your brand.

Not only will you end up engaging and expanding your audience, but you’ll also end up with great new content you can use to inspire future content and contests.

What tips do you have for running a successful Instagram contest? Share them in the comments below.

As marketers find more innovative ways to grab people’s attention, video has become a meaningful part of the strategic marketing conversation.

Video is no longer an “up-and-coming” marketing tactic — it’s here, and it’s a powerful way to communicate your brand story, explain your value proposition, and build relationships with your customers and prospects. 

And the statistics show it’s working quite well. Did you know, for example, that including video on a landing page can increase conversion rates by 80%? Or that 92% of mobile video consumers share videos with others?

Download our free guide here to learn how to create high-quality videos for social media.

To learn more about how video marketing can help convert customers and increase interaction with your brand, check out the infographic below from Hyperfine Media. It breaks down 31 compelling video marketing statistics into five categories: conversion rates, video users, user interaction, spending, and content.

Editor’s Note: This post was originally published in August 2015 and has been updated for accuracy and comprehensiveness.

 

Personalization is a growing segment of online marketing. If in the past a one-size-fits-all was enough, today’s audience demands more. The idea behind personalization is a straightforward one: personalize your message and you’ll see better results. Think about it like calling someone by their name instead of just shouting, “Hey you”; in which case are you more likely to get a response?

Be Personal, Be Relevant

Publishers are attempting to personalize the entire online experience, with personalized recommendations becoming a central tool for driving anonymous readers into deeper engagement and interaction. These personalized recommendations can come in the form of popups, calls-to-action, email segmentation, etc., and attempt to deliver the most relevant article or offer to each and every reader.

Relevancy is the name of the game. If you recommended the best and most comfortable ski gear, at an amazing price, to a person who never skied, it’s still not going to work. The quality of the recommendation is important but pales in comparison to the importance of being relevant.

How Personalization Works

So how does it actually work? Personalization can either be rule-based or algorithm-based. With rule-based personalization tools, you define visitor lists and decide what is the best and most relevant content for them. You can segment your visitors in any number of ways, depending on the specific tool you are using. In many cases, self-volunteered information from previous on-site conversions can be most effective. 

With personalization algorithms there are two phases: first the system ‘learns’ your site by mapping content such as white papers, case studies and blog posts, using a combination of NLP (natural language processing) textual matching and taxonomy. The result is a content-map of the site, with highlights for unique content. 

As a visitor arrives to the site, the algorithm then analyzes their on-site behavior – what was the starting page, what other pages the visitor viewed and how long he stayed on each. The algorithm then matches the two pieces and serves personalized recommendations to the visitor in real time.   

Why Do Personalized Recommendations Work?

For many publications, first time visitors are a tough crowd to please. Regardless of how they found your site, they are unfamiliar with what else you may have to offer, or where on your site to find it. By bringing these treasures to the reader, rather then making them hunt around for it, you increase time-on-site, positive user-experience, and click-through rates. Personalized recommendations that work smoothly are like answering a visitor question before it is being asked.

Additionally, personal recommendations evoke emotions from the website visitor. Not heavy-handed emotions like happiness or anger, but more a faint sense of credibility and trust. 

As a digital publisher, personalized recommendations are a smart way to bring back your articles or content offers from the abyss. Your entire content arsenal is put into good use, and nothing goes to waste.

What to Consider When Using Personalized Recommendations

To Gate or Not to Gate?

The first thing to decide is whether to gate your content, and how much of it to gate. And finding the right balance of gated vs. open content is delicate work. 

In short, you need to consider the overall website experience . If you are gating too little of your content, you miss opportunities to convert. That said, readers typically need to first consume and enjoy several pieces of ungated content to consider giving up their personal information to business. 

Recommendations or Offers?

The next decision publishers face is whether to use on-site content recommendations or offer recommendations (which can be personalized too). Let’s say a visitor to a magazine’s website checks out the subscription page, but does not convert. You might consider serving them a personalized offer on the next page they visit for a 50% discount on their first month of subscription.

Deciphering when to serve recommendations during natural browsing is like preparing for a meeting with a client. You plan what you are going to say, in what order, what visual aides you are going to present and when. Serving personalized recommendations is quite similar—you need to know your website inside out, and understand how visitors use it. From that you can conclude when questions might arise and how to answer them with  personalized content recommendations. Also, think how to enrich each users’ interactions with added value content and relevant offers.  

Timing is Everything

Personalized recommendations all boil down to a few motivations—to increase engagement and ultimately conversions. Be it leads for advertisers, newsletter subscriptions, or anything else that helps meet your marketing goals. So when do you ask your readers for a commitment beyond reading another article?

You need to evaluate engagement and set the right parameters for when to recommend more substantial offers. Only after the reader’s interest has been established beyond doubt should you attempt to re-define their motives for being on your site. For example, after recommending one or two on-site articles, on which the reader clicks and stays on your site, then you should go ahead and offer a newsletter subscription. 

The Secret is Not in the Sauce, It’s in You

Registering for a newsletter is a sign of trust. Publishers can earn this trust by making recommendations that their readers appreciate, and only asking for larger commitments when the time is right. Instill the notion that your content is beneficial for them, and easy to navigate. This type of trust can happen instantaneously, or take time – but either way it’s worth it in the long run for the health of your database, advertiser revenue, newsletter, publication, and more.

A short, professional bio is one of those things most people don’t think about until, all of a sudden, we’ve been asked to “shoot one over via email” and have approximately one afternoon to come up with it.

That’s when we scramble.

And when we scramble, our bio ends up reading like this:

Rodney Erickson is a content marketing professional at HubSpot, an inbound marketing and sales platform that helps companies attract visitors, convert leads, and close customers. Previously, Rodney worked as a marketing manager for a tech software startup. He graduated with honors from Columbia University with a dual degree in Business Administration and Creative Writing.”

… Woof, that was dull. Are you still with me? I swear, not even adding a tidbit about his cats would liven that bio up. 

To be fair, in certain contexts, your professional bio does need to be more formal, like Mr. Erickson’s up there. But in many cases, writing a bio that’s readable — even conversational — is actually a really good thing. That means dropping that traditional format of listing your accomplishments like a robot and cramming as much professional-sounding jargon in there as you can.

Remember: The people reading your bio are suffering from information fatigue. If you don’t hook ’em in the first line, you’ll lose them quickly.

I know what you may be thinking … So what? It’s just a bio.

Why Does Your Professional Bio Matter?

I mean, how many people actually read those things, anyway? 

The answer: A lot of people. More importantly, it’s important to remember that there’s no way to tell exactly who is reading it. You always want to be ready for the right people to come across it. And when they do, you want it to catch their eye — in a good way.

You see, while your resume is only useful for when you’re actively applying for specific positions, your professional bio is much more visible. It can live on your LinkedIn profile, your company’s website, your guest blog posts, your speaker profiles, your Twitter bio, and many other places.

And, most importantly, it’s the tool that you can leverage most when you’re networking.

Bottom line? People will read your professional bio. Whether they remember it, and whether it makes them actually care about you, is a matter of how well you present yourself to your intended audience.

So, what does a top-notch professional bio look like?

Let’s take a look at some great examples. We’ve curated some of the best real professional bio examples we’ve ever seen online. Check ’em out, and use them as inspiration when crafting your own.

6 of the Best Professional Bio Examples We’ve Ever Seen

1) Phil

Phil is a real estate broker for the East Boston neighborhood, and he’s mastered the art of adding a warm personality to the professional bio on his website.

First, check out the header of his bio: “Promoting positive community and economic growth in our neighborhood.”

The header isn’t all about him, nor is it a hard sell about his business. Instead, he’s chosen to start with a value proposition. Why? Because Phil knows that his value proposition is the core of his competitive advantage. In header text that stands out on the page, he clearly articulates why someone would want to hire him instead of a competitor: This guy doesn’t just sell houses to make money; he promotes community and economic growth in the area. 

The rest of his bio includes personal touches that make him more human. He does talk about his business history and accomplishments, but he does so while including personal details that invite readers to relate to him as a person.

For instance, he talks about where he’s from (a relevant detail for a real estate broker), his love of the water, why he started his business, and how he’s committed to the local community. His bio indicates he’s friendly and probably a pleasure to work with, which is important for a real estate broker someone would be working with one-on-one.

2) Ann

If you’re a marketer, you’ve likely heard of Ann Handley. Her list of credentials is lengthy, and if she really wanted to, she could go on and on and on about her accomplishments.

But when people list out all their accomplishments in their bios, they risk sounding a little egotistical. Sure, you might impress a handful of people with all those laurels, but many people who read your bio will end up feeling either intimidated or annoyed. Think about it: Is that how you want the majority of your readers to feel when they read your bio? 

To minimize the egoism that comes with talking about yourself, think about how you can list out your accomplishments without sounding like you’re bragging. Ann does this really well, choosing a tone in her bio that’s more approachable.

It starts with the excerpt in the footer of her personal website. Give it a quick read, paying close attention to the opening and closing lines:

 

“This is Ann Handley’s website, and this is a bit of copy about her … That’s not giving you a lot of detail, is it? So read more here.” This is the kind of simple, friendly language that invites the reader in rather than shutting them out.

Follow the link and you’ll be led to a page dedicated to a fuller bio, which she’s divided into two parts: a “short version” (literally a bulleted list of key facts) and a “long version,” which includes traditional paragraphs. There’s something in there for everyone.

3) Hillary

U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has different versions of her bio all over the internet. As you can imagine, some are more formal than others. But when it comes to her Twitter bio, she has carefully phrased her bio information in a way that helps her connect with her audience — specifically, through the use of humor. 

Why would she choose humor, especially when she’s seeking support for such a, well, serious job? Actually, Hillary’s tactic is totally intentional: It’s just one of the many levers she and her team are pulling to rebrand her with a fresh image, while maintaining her already impressive, well-established identity. 

“In politics, authenticity can be a powerful trait, and it is one that sometimes has escaped Clinton,” wrote Philip Rucker and Anne Gearan for the Washington Post. “In her 2008 presidential campaign, despite some raw displays of emotion, she often came across as overly programmed.”

That’s exactly why Hillary and her team chose to leverage her Twitter bio (among other marketing channels) to help her become more relatable to her fans.  And for her audience, it’s really worked. The New York Times, for example, called Twitter bios “a postmodern art form.”

When crafting your own Twitter bio, consider your audience and the personal brand you’re trying to create for yourself. Use it as an opportunity to be relatable. (And check out this list of amusing Twitter bios for inspiration.)

4) Lena

When it all comes down to it, your professional bio is no different than any other piece of persuasive copy — no matter where it lives. One of the most common mistakes people make is thinking of it as its own beast, separate from other pieces of writing. If you think about it that way, you’re far more likely to write something painfully uninteresting.

When you sit down to write your professional bio and you’re watching that cursor blinking on the screen, think about how you would introduce a blog post. You don’t just dive right into the meat of the thing, now, do you? No. You start with an introduction.

The best bios are often concise (around 200–300 words), so you don’t have a lot of room to play around. But a single sentence that tees your reader up and provides context for the accomplishments that follow could make the rest of your bio that much more persuasive.

Take Lena Axelsson’s bio, for instance. She’s a marriage and family therapist — a job where empathy and compassion are a big part of the job description. That’s why she chooses to open her bio with a great introductory sentence: “When human beings experience trauma or severe life stressors, it is not uncommon for their lives to unravel.”

Then, she goes into why she’s passionate about her job, how she helps her clients, and how she caters her approach to each individual patient. The necessary educational information is left for the end, after the reader has been hooked.

Your bio doesn’t have to be super serious, nor does it have to start with a joke. This bio shows how you can capture your reader’s attention by being empathetic or telling a brief story.

5) Mark

Mark Levy is a small business owner who’s taken a more traditional approach to the professional bio on his website — but in a way that takes care to speak to his intended audience.

What we love about his bio is the way he’s set it up: On his business’ “About” page, he’s listed two biographies, which he’s labeled “Mark Levy’s Biography #1” and “Mark Levy’s Biography #2.”

[Click here to see the full version.]

Like Ann, Mark’s given his readers two different options. The first biography is a “short version,” which includes a combination of bullet points listing his credentials and a few short paragraphs.

The second is the “long version,” which is actually even more interesting than the first one. Why? Because it reads like a story — a compelling one, at that. In fact, it gets really funny at parts.

The second sentence of the bio reads: “He was frightened of public school, loved playing baseball and football, ran home to watch ape films on the 4:30 Movie, listened to The Jam and The Buzzcocks, and read magic trick books.”

Here’s another excerpt from the middle:

Of course, the fantastic copywriting isn’t a surprise, given that this guy wrote several books. But the conversational tone and entertaining copy let his quirky personality (and great writing skills) shine.

6) Corey

Finally, we have Corey Wainwright, who’s the director of content here at HubSpot. She’s written content for HubSpot’s Marketing Blog for years, and her blog author bio has caught my eye since before I ever started working for HubSpot. (Back then, it started with, “Corey just took a cool vacation.”)

What I love most about Corey’s bio is that it’s a great example of how to deliver information about yourself without taking things too seriously. And in this context, that’s totally appropriate. 

Despite having a number of impressive accomplishments under her belt, she simply doesn’t like displaying them publicly. So, she prefers making her author bio a little more “light.” 

Her bio (pictured below) reads, “Corey is a Bruce Springsteen fan who does content marketing, in that order.”

It works in this particular context because, at HubSpot, our blog authors often prefer to make themselves as friendly and approachable as possible — while letting the content speak for itself.

It helps that authors’ social media accounts are located right below our names and above our pictures. For folks who really do want a list of Corey’s credentials, they can click the LinkedIn button to go to her LinkedIn page. (You can read this blog post to learn how to create social media buttons and add them to your website.)

What are your favorite professional bio examples? Share with us in the comments.

You’ve probably heard people refer to themselves as “left-brained” or “right-brained” as a way to explain their dominating analytical or creative skills.

But where do those terms come from?

In the 1960s, Psychologist Roger Sperry and his colleagues conducted experimental split-brain surgeries on epileptic patients. By cutting the structure that holds the two hemispheres of the brain together, they noticed they could reduce the seizures epileptic patients were experiencing. What’s more, post-surgery cognitive testing revealed that the two sides of the brain were actually capable of functioning independently.

This discovery sparked the theory of lateralization of brain function, leading to research on which parts of the brain control different skills. The outcome? Much of the research suggests that the left side of our brain is responsible for language and logic, while the right side control spatial and visual capabilities.

When it comes to categorizing ourselves as “left-brained” or “right-brained,” it would be naive to suggest that we can reduce the complexities of both our brains and personalities to fit the mold of one hemisphere.

Although, it is true that many people’s personalities take on more dominant strengths in one area or the other — even if they’re capable of both. And understanding the dominant areas of your personality can help you better understand your strengths and weaknesses — allowing you to be more successful at owning certain tasks and trying to improve on others.

That’s why we’ve put together the following flowchart. Simply follow the questions through to determine where you land. But remember: Our brains aren’t as clear-cut as this theory suggests, so don’t sell yourself short based on the results.

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The cultural landscape of the modern world is constantly changing. Internet celebrities are created in as little as six seconds. Viral videos can be viewed in every continent across the world in a matter of hours. There’s a lot going on.

As a result, there are also a lot of opportunities for brands to join the conversation — that is, if they can keep up. With things moving at such a fast pace, trends can disappear before we even have time to craft a meaningful message in response to them.

But what technology takes away in terms of time to prepare, it makes up for in ways to monitor and follow these (sometimes global) conversations. In fact, there are a ton of awesome tools and tricks of the trade out there that are designed to help brands make the most out of popular content and trends.

That’s why we put together the following guide on trending content: to help all of you figure out a plan for not only discovering and planning for trends and events, but also finding ways to connect your brand’s story to them in an interesting and relevant way.

A Simple Guide to Navigating Trending Content

Discovering Trending Content

1) BuzzSumo

Price: Free version available. Paid packages are broken down into three categories: Pro ($99/month), Agency ($299/month), and Enterprise ($999/month).

With the help of BuzzSumo’s “Most Shared” function, users can easily identify what content has worked well in the past. What’s more, the “Trending Now” function can display the most popular content being read across the internet within the last two hours.

The “Most Shared” function is perfect for mining ideas for your next content campaign, while the “Trending Now” function is ideal for tapping into articles and conversations that people have responded to in real time.

2) Content Explorer by Ahrefs

Price: Free trial available. Paid packages are broken down into three categories: Lite ($99/month), Standard ($179/month), and Advanced ($399/month).

This is another great tool for finding the best performing content in a desired niche. Simply input your keyword — for example, let’s use “content marketing” — and filter down the timeframe you’d like to see results from. That’s it.

The tool simply lists the top pieces of content from the past month based on social shares. (Zazzle Media’s very own Simon Penson is actually featured in the number three spot … so it’s obviously a smart tool.)

3) Google Trends

Price: Free.

Google Trends is a great resource for surfacing some of the biggest daily headlines, as well as stories on the rise.

It’s easy to use and, as a Google tool, is informed by more data than you can shake a stick at.

Analysing a portion of Google searches, it examines the number of searches carried out for certain terms, against the total searches done on Google over the same time.

It then ranks the most popular stories trending in order of popularity. From there, simply click on the story to find more information on why it’s trending and where.

4) EpicBeat

Price: Free version available. Paid packages are broken down into two categories: EpicBeat Plus ($39/month // $268/year) and EpicSuite ($249/month).

EpicBeat is a helpful tool designed to simplify trending content research. You can search for content by topic or website, or explore curated topics.

With each search, you’ll gain access to social sharing counts, as well as some insights behind these shares — for example, EpicBeat provides a list of people that have shared a specific piece of content in the last seven days. This information can be used to inform the audience you should be focusing on, while also providing a selection of influencers for you to seed your finished content out to.

5) Reddit

Price: Free.

Commonly referred to as “the front page of the internet,” Reddit should be one of the first destinations you visit to find out exactly what people are buzzing out during the day.

From news and videos, to funny stories and conspiracy theories, the content on Reddit often reflects the things that people across the world are finding interesting … in real time.

To uncover some potentially undiscovered viral content, check out the “rising” tab. This will help you jump on trends early, so you can beat all your competitors to the chase.

Creating a Calendar of Upcoming Events

Some events are always going to be massive. From the Oscars to the Olympics, the calendar is filled with world-famous events that will be latched onto by brands.

That’s why it’s so important to create a definitive calendar of upcoming events. With a calendar in place, you’ll be more prepared to create marketing campaigns in response to the events that align with your brand and your audience’s interests.

Twitters U.K.’s #OwnTheMoment Planner is a great starting point for this. The planner provides a calendar that comes fully equipped with cultural events to keep an eye on. (Think: Father’s Day, Summer Solstice, and Wimbledon.) The goal is to give you a sneak peak into the moments that Twitter believes will get people talking over social media.

(Note: Because this tool was created by folks from Twitter’s U.K. and Ireland team, many of the events are specific to that region.)

Of course, this really is just a starting point, putting together an events calendar personalised with key events relevant to your industry and audience is the best way to get the most out of this exercise.

Working Popular Trends and Events Into Your PR Strategy

Now that we have our tools and a well-stocked calendar of events, it’s time to find out how these can help us with our PR campaigns.

Let’s walk through some of the most important things to consider when executing a trend-driven PR campaign.

General Opportunity

You’ve identified a trend that you may be able to leverage. That’s great. But before you shoot off to pitch the idea to your team or client, there are two questions to ask to ensure that you’re making the right move:

Is this trend worthwhile?

Have people just started talking about this? Or is the trend coming to the end of its shelf life? Using Google Trends, we can see exactly when the trend started, as well as the peak period of popularity for the story. Ideally we’re looking for a recurring trend that people are going to be actively searching for over and over.

Is there demand for content surrounding this trend?

Is there room for a new piece of content to add something to the story? Or has the market become saturated about the trend? Using Content Explorer, we can find the best performing pieces of content for this trend, as well as the sheer amount of content concerning the topic.

If there is opportunity to build on content for this trend, it’s time to see how we can create something better than everything else out there.

Inspiration and Direction

Researching successful campaigns from past years is always a great place to start when brainstorming new content ideas. There is no point in recreating something done in the past, however, building on an idea to make it stronger is definitely a way forward.

This is where BuzzSumo comes into its own. Simply find the best performing pieces of content created for the same (or similar) trend in the past, and use this as a platform to develop bigger and better ideas.

So now that we have our idea for a perfect piece of trending content, it’s time to find out who will be interested in sharing it.

Placement and Distribution Ideas

Another three questions for you to think about when planning to distribute your content:

• Which outlets have written about this before?
• Are there any specific journalists that typically cover events like this?
• Is there anything we can give these outlets and journalists to ensure they get involved with our campaign?

To start answering these questions, look at the authorship of previous articles relating to the trend you’re working on and reach out to see if they’re still interested in this topic. Epicbeat’s influencer finder is also a great tool for identifying the key players interested in a particular trend or topic.

If the pitch is concerning a forthcoming event, remember to give them plenty of time before the date. This will make it easier for them to think about what they might need, and give you enough time to get this information to them.

As with any discussion of this type, referencing and taking an interest in an article a journalist has written before is the best way to show how invested you are in working with them. This could be the difference between a feature article online and being left on the cutting room floor.

Need Inspiration? Check Out These Examples

AO Christmas Dinner Project

The holiday season provides marketers with a great opportunity to hop on a popular trend and ride the wave. This guide to Christmas dinner from AO is a great example of how a brand can tap into a trending conversation, while providing people with unique value.

• The Idea: To create a definitive interactive guide for preparing Christmas dinner.
• The Goal: To increase brand awareness for AO.com and drive traffic to the guide.
• The Result: Multiple pieces of coverage gained on both DailyMail.com and The Huffington Post, as well as an additional 20+ links to the portal and its contents.

American Greeting’s #WorldsToughestJob

This Mother’s Day-themed campaign from American Greetings is another great example of how to leverage a trending holiday to create a really compelling piece of content.

• The Idea: To create an emotional piece of content that reminds viewers just how hard it is to be a mom.
• The Goal: To encourage viewers to show their moms some appreciation by creating a Mother’s Day card with American Greeting’s Cardstore.
• The Result: Coverage on top sites such as Forbes, Adweek, and more.

Have I missed anything? Do you have any other tips for tracking down trending content? Let me know in the comments below.

Everyone gets stressed at work at one time or another.

And hey, sometimes, that can be a good thing. When you’re under some pressure and your brain’s working hard, it can make you more efficient and productive in the end — and you may even find more satisfaction with your work when it is done.

But whether the stress you’re feeling is in healthy doses or not, there are ways to make it more manageable. It turns out that 42% of Americans say they aren’t doing enough to manage their stress.

One great way to relieve stress without having to take much time out of your day? Meditation.

Don’t worry: Successful meditation does not mean you have to sit cross-legged in silence for hours on end. Incorporating just 15 minutes of concentrated meditation a day into your workday can do wonders to reduce your stress levels.

Check out the infographic below from CashNetUSA to learn the benefits of meditation, along with how to do it — from calming your mind, mind exercises, what to do with your body, and other tips for being mindful throughout the rest of your day. No matter how busy you are, making time for meditation can have a positive impact on productivity and happiness. 

A common mistake companies make in marketing efforts is positioning their company or product as the hero of the story. You may want to don the cape, drive the Batmobile, and kick the villain’s butt (and who could blame you?), but most brands overlook the interests of customers when they focus on themselves.

The harsh reality is that your customers don’t care about your company or products – they only care about how you’ll meet their needs. If you want your customers to buy your products or services, your marketing should revolve around your customer and their challenges.

According to Kapost, only 23% of B2B marketers claim to have a customer-centric marketing strategy versus a channel- or product-centric strategy. Rather than stepping outside the expertise comfort zone of their offerings, these B2B companies would rather stick to what they know and focus all marketing efforts on what they have to offer versus the more important issue of how they can meet the demands and needs of their audience. What they neglect to realize however is that this self-serving strategy minimizes golden opportunities to connect with their target market and buyer personas.

When your customer plays the starring role in your marketing efforts, they feel appreciated and are more likely to download your content, follow you on social media, fill out a contact form, and (you guessed it!) make a purchase. Research has shown that customer-centric companies are 60% more profitable than companies that don’t focus on the customer. On the same note, McKinsey found that 70% of buying experiences are based on how the customer feels they have been treated.

But building a customer-centric mindset won’t happen overnight. Before you execute a successful customer-centric marketing strategy, you need to gain a deeper understanding of what it means to be truly customer-focused.

What is a customer-centric company?

First things first, what does it even mean to be a customer-centric company? It’s not just about offering exceptional customer service; it also means assisting the customer through every stage of the buyer’s journey, from the awareness and researching stage to the final stages of decision-making and even after their purchase is complete. A customer-centric company educates their customers and helps them make an educated buying decision.

When you commit to customer-centricity, you’re placing the customer at the center of all your decisions and strategic planning. You’re creating a positive customer experience by focusing on their needs more than your profit margins. Your top priority should be making their lives easier by answering their burning questions, providing educational content or suggesting a specific solution once they’ve indicated they’re ready and open for recommendations.

A great example of a customer-centric company is Amazon. Amazon consistently delights their customer base by developing products and making decisions according to their customers’ needs and wants. While customer reviews are on nearly every site nowadays, Amazon was the first to display these reviews. Amazon CEO, Jeff Bezos, wanted to do more than just sell products; he wanted to “help customers make purchase decisions.”

Another company that demonstrates a customer-centric strategy is Apple. Apple actually models their customer service features after the hospitality industry; think, Genius Bar as the concierge. Apple is constantly on top of meeting their customers’ needs. In fact, they directly answer their customers’ emails; CEO Tim Cook has even claimed to personally answer emails daily. They let their customers know that they are appreciated by going above and beyond standard expectations for customer service.

Companies devoted to customer-centricity are there when customers need them, not only when it’s convenient for them. They provide their customers with information and access to products or accounts 24/7. USAA, for instance, was the first to create an app that would allow their customers to make deposits via their iPhone and also to send updates on account balances via text message. They empower customers to receive timely updates on their finances, and, therefore, improve customer satisfaction. 

How do you become a customer-centric company?

1) Identify Your Target Customer

Before you can make the customer the hero of your story, you need to place yourself in their shoes. To do that, you must know whose shoes you’re stepping into. Take a closer look at your existing customer base by sending out surveys or monitoring popular social media platforms.

If your current audience doesn’t precisely represent the market segment who could benefit from your offering, make a note of that and include these opportunistic personas in your target. List out their defining characteristics, such as their location, industry, age, needs, goals, pain points, and motivations.

Once you’ve compiled this information, you can develop buyer personas – or semi-fictional representations of your target customers based on marketing research and real data about your existing customers. These buyer personas will help you create relevant, share-worthy content that speaks to your ideal customers’ needs. When your ideal customers find content covering topics they’re actually interested in, they’re more likely to share it with coworkers and friends, spread the word about your company, and come back for more.

2) Get Everyone Involved

If you want to create a customer-centric culture, you need to have the entire team on board. All of your employees should understand your customers’ exact needs, not just your customer service department. You should provide training, education, and mentoring when employees are initially hired, and then continue to offer guidance and coaching throughout their employment. This helps all team members consider how their work and decisions directly impact the customer and the continuing success of your company.

3) Empower Your Employees

Customer satisfaction and employee morale tend to go hand in hand. According to The Harvard Business Review, contented employees are 31% more productive and generate 37% more sales than their disengaged counterparts.

Before you focus on improving your customer experience, you need to take a long, hard look at your company culture. Your employees need recognition, opportunities for advancement, job security, and thorough training before they can provide excellent customer service. Your employees will become much more engaged and productive when they know their employer cares about their welfare.

4) Allow Participation from Customers

There’s no better way to create a customer-centric culture than allowing your customers to actively participate in your brand’s story or campaign. For example, when the blockbuster movie “The Fault in Our Stars” came out in theaters, the producer Atlantic Records collected more than 3,800 pieces of fan photos over 3 days via #TFIOSencouragements on Instagram. They then compiled these photos in an online gallery where fans could view, share, and vote for their favorites.

In this case, the production team placed their potential customers in the spotlight while also sharing their relevant content. They made their fans and movie ticket buyers feel special, even if only for a moment, and created a positive customer experience.

If you want to get your audience involved in your marketing efforts, your best bet for fast outcomes is to head to the social media channels they frequent. Take the time to monitor their social media posts and pay attention to any mention of your company, your product or dialogue pertaining to the needs addressed by your solutions.

When you find the right content, engage with your audience and ask if you can republish. Also, make your user-generated content programs as easy as possible to participate in – think about using a brand hashtag rather than having customers go to the trouble of submitting a video. 

And the Customer Saves the Day…

Setting all of the above practices in motion will allow you to create and execute a successful customer-centric marketing strategy. By taking these proactive steps toward becoming a customer-centric company, you’re showing the customer you’re worth their time. When you realize all the needs, wants, and preferences of your customer and use them to shape your marketing efforts, you are ensuring that all your business decisions revolve around the customer.

When the customer knows you not only take their opinions and concerns into consideration but also that you use them to drive your strategic planning, they are more likely to return to your company for more information and to make a purchase. They will feel appreciated and understood when a product is designed to solve their specific problem, a piece of content answers their questions, and when social media posts speak to their interests.

If you want potential customers to care about you, you have to show you care about them first. Making your customers the center of your brand’s universe will help you develop a loyal following and discover new business opportunities. They’ll be the hero of your marketing strategy, but you’ll know that your company or product made it possible for them to save the day.

With over 400 million active users, brands are quickly recognizing the need to have a presence on Instagram.

But, as with any social network, the brands that are getting the most out of Instagram are the ones who are smart about what they post, when they post, how often they post, and whom they’re targeting.

But how do they know what’s “smart”?

That’s where the data comes in. There’s a whole lot of research out there about Instagram — everything from the demographics of its users and how often brands are posting, to how caption length affects engagement and what the most popular emoji is on Instagram. (See #32.)

For example, did you know that a brand would need about 2,325 Instagram followers to get 100 Likes & comments on a post? Or that brands posted an average of 4.9 times per week on Instagram in 2015? Read on to uncover more Instagram stats that’ll help you get ideas and improve your own Instagram posting strategy.

48 Instagram Stats

Click on a category below to jump to the stats for that category:

1. Instagram’s Growth
2. Audience & Demographics
3. Brand Adoption
4. Instagram Post Content
5. Instagram Posting Strategy

Instagram’s Growth

1) The Instagram community has grown from 90 million active users in January 2013 to more than 400 million active users in September 2015. Tweet this stat! (Source)

Image Credit: Statista

2) Instagram’s more than 400 million active users place it well ahead of Twitter (310 million active users) Snapchat (200 million active users), and Pinterest (100 million active users). Tweet this stat! (Source)

3) The proportion of online adults who use Instagram and Pinterest has doubled since Pew Research Center first started tracking social media platform adoption in 2012. Tweet this stat! (Source)

Image Credit: Pew Research Center

4) Instagram’s user base is growing far faster than social network usage in general in the U.S. Instagram will grow 15.1% this year, compared to just 3.1% growth for the social network sector as a whole. Tweet this stat! (Source)

5) Between 2016 and 2020, eMarketer predicts Instagram will add 26.9 million users — almost double the incremental users expected for Twitter, and far more than any other social platform tracked. Tweet this stat! (Source)

Image Credit: eMarketer

6) In 2016, 9.5% of Facebook’s global mobile ad revenues (20.1% in the U.S.) will come from Instagram. By 2017, Instagram’s share will grow to 14.0% globally (28.0% in the U.S.). Tweet this stat! (Source)

7) Instagram and Snapchat are tied for the second-highest used messaging app (behind Facebook Messenger) for millennials at 47%. Tweet this stat! (Source)

Image Credit: Refuel Agency

8) Other than Instagram’s own account, the most-followed Instagram account as of March 2016 is run by American singer Selena Gomez, followed by celebrities Taylor Swift, Kim Kardashian, and Ariana Grande. Tweet this stat! (Source)

Image Credit: Statista

Audience & Demographics

9) 52% of teens use Instagram, and nearly as many (41%) use Snapchat. Tweet this stat! (Source)

Image Credit: Pew Research Center

10) 28% of adult internet users used Instagram in 2015, up from 26% in September 2014. Tweet this stat! (Source)

11) 55% of young adults (ages 18–29) used Instagram in 2015, compared with 37% who did so in 2013. Tweet this stat! (Source)

Image Credit: Pew Research Center

12) In 2015, 59% of Instagram users used the platform daily, including 35% who visited several times a day. This 59% figure reflects a 10-point increase from September 2014, when 49% of Instagram users reported visiting the site on a daily basis. Tweet this stat! (Source)

13) It was predicted that more than one-third of mobile phone users (roughly 89.4 million Americans) will be on Instagram at least once a month in 2016. By 2017, an estimated 51.8% of social network users will use Instagram. Tweet this stat! (Source)

14) More than 75% of Instagram’s user base consists of people living outside of the U.S. Tweet this stat! (Source)

15) In September 2015, the greatest share of traffic to Instagram (23.94%) was from the U.S. Tweet this stat! (Source)

Image Credit: Statista

Brand Adoption

16) In one social media study, of five industries analyzed (beauty, apparel, big box, electronics, and home goods), only 43% engaged with their consumers via Instagram, despite Instagram’s 237% average follower growth rate. Tweet this stat! (Source)

17) Despite the rise of Instagram adoption among young adults, it was the least adopted social channel in most retail categories, with adoption rates ranging from 26% to 32%. Tweet this stat! (Source)

18) The apparel industry’s Instagram adoption rate (84%) was double or triple that of other industries. Tweet this stat! (Source)

19) In one 2015 study, 31% of B2C marketers said Instagram was a “very important” social channel and 27% said it was “not important,” while only 8% of B2B marketers said Instagram was a “very important” channel and 58% said it was “not important.” Tweet this stat! (Source)

Image Credit: RivalHQ

Instagram Post Content

20) More than 80 million photos were shared on Instagram each day in September 2015. Tweet this stat! (Source)

21) On Instagram, photos showing faces get 38% more Likes than photos not showing faces. Tweet this stat! (Source)

22) In a study of 8 million Instagram images, images with a single dominant color generate 17% more Likes than images with multiple dominant colors. Tweet this stat! (Source)

Image Credit: Curalate

23) On Instagram, images with a high amount of negative space generate 29% more Likes than those with minimal negative space. Tweet this stat! (Source)

24) On Instagram, images featuring blue as the dominant color generate 24% more Likes than images that are predominantly red. Tweet this stat! (Source)

25) There’s little correlation between caption text length and engagement rate on Instagram. Tweet this stat! (Source)

Image Credit: Simply Measured

26) When Instagram first introduced video in June 2013, more than 5 million were shared in the first 24 hours. Tweet this stat! (Source)

27) Despite more brands posting videos than ever before (13.2% of all posts), photos still see higher average engagement. Tweet this stat! (Source)

Image Credit: Simply Measured

28) In a study of 100 top brands, the brands’ Instagram captions averaged 2.5 hashtags per post. Tweet this stat! (Source)

29) In one study, posts with 11 or more hashtags received nearly 80% interaction, compared to just 22% when using ten and 41% when using two. Tweet this stat! (Source)

Image Credit: QuickSprout

30) Instagram posts that include both a hashtag and a location tag see higher engagement. Posts with multiple hashtags also perform better than average. Tweet this stat! (Source)

Image Credit: Simply Measured

31) Posts tagged with a location see 79% higher engagement than posts not tagged with a location. Tweet this stat! (Source)

32) The red heart is the most frequently shared emoji on Instagram, which is shared 79% more than the next most popular symbol, a smiling face with heart eyes. Tweet this stat! (Source)

Image Credit: Curalate

33) Four of the top five most popular emojis are positive smiley faces (including the laughing-so-hard-I’m-crying icon). If you look at the top 20 emojis, smileys comprise half. Tweet this stat! (Source)

34) The American flag is the only flag emoji to break the top 100, ranking #59. The next most popular flag comes from Italy, ranked #125, followed by the French flag at #160 and the Japanese flag at #166. Tweet this stat! (Source)

35) Pizza is the most popular Instagrammed food, behind sushi and steak. Tweet this stat! (Source)

Instagram Posting Strategy

36) In a study of 55 brands, the brands posted an average of 1.5 times per day. Tweet this stat! (Source)

37) By late 2014, 73% of brands were posting at least one photo or video per week, a 35% increase from 2012. Tweet this stat! (Source)

38) The best times to post on Instagram are Mondays and Thursdays at any time except between 3:00–4:00 p.m. in your target audience’s time zone. Tweet this stat! (Source)

Image Credit: Elle & Co.

39) The most common posting frequency for brands on Instagram is 11–20 times per month, with almost one-third of companies measured falling into that bucket. Tweet this stat! (Source)

40) 90% of the Interbrand 100 companies now have Instagram accounts. Of all 100 companies, 80% post at least one Instagram photo or video per week. Tweet this stat! (Source)

41) Of the Interbrand 100 companies, the number of brands that post on Instagram more than 50 times per month has doubled from 7 in 2014 to 14 in 2015. Tweet this stat! (Source)

Image Credit: Simply Measured

42) Many posts by top brands take more than 19 hours to hit 50% of their total comments, and another 10% of comments coming after 19 days. Tweet this stat! (Source)

43) Many posts continue to receive low-level engagement for days and weeks after posting. Most brand posts continue to receive Likes and comments 18–24 hours after posting, just at a slower clip than the initial fast pace. Tweet this stat! (Source)

44) People miss, on average, 70% of their Instagram feeds. Tweet this stat! (Source)

45) While Instagram is still by far the best social network for organic engagement, its per-follower interaction rate of 2.3% is barely half what it was in 2014. Tweet this stat! (Source)

Image Credit: Forrester Research

46) In a study of 100 top brands, engagement per post has grown at a rate of 53% year-over-year. Tweet this stat! (Source) 

47) In a study of several thousand brand posts, the average engagement rate is 4.3% and the median is 3.5%. That means that the average post in this sample saw 4.3 activities (a Like or a comment) per 100 followers. Phrased another way, to get 100 Likes and comments on a post, a brand would need approximately 2,325 followers. Tweet this stat! (Source)

48) One brand added 36X its typical number of new followers each day during the 4 days it ran a set of sponsored posts on Instagram, increasing its follower count by 18.15%. Tweet this stat! (Source) 

What other Instagram statistics can you add to the list? Share them with us in the comments. 

Inbound marketing has fundamentally changed the way most companies think about customer acquisition. By building a relationship with prospects before they’re ready to purchase, companies can acquire customers in a far more cost effective (and efficient) way. 

With inbound, companies earn consumer attention through great content, and as a result, it’s easier for them to move leads through the customer lifecycle towards a purchase.

Consistent readers of this blog will be pretty familiar with the value of inbound marketing, but you may be unaware of the full potential of the inbound methodology.

At Beamery, we’ve started thinking about how to apply the inbound framework beyond our marketing efforts. In doing so, we’ve come to realize just how valuable it is to think about hiring in the same way that we think about our marketing efforts.

We’ve seen fire hand exactly how effective this formula is for improving recruiting, which is why we’re sharing our process with you below. 

Recruitment vs. Marketing: How Do the Two Compare?

It’s easy to hire with a short-term mindset. In fact, many people reduce it to this simple transaction: Send out a job advert, screen applicants, and make a decision.

You’re probably starting to think that this process sounds a lot like the way companies used to compete for potential customers. Traditional marketing relied on ‘interrupting’ your flow of activity to grab your attention. But these tactics don’t work too well anymore.

As a result, many marketers have changed tack. They’re reaping the rewards of an inbound strategy — one that focuses on building relationships over making a quick buck. And forward-thinking companies are using this framework to build relationships with candidates well before the application.

At a time when getting the very best people through the door is becoming harder and harder, engaging the candidates that don’t apply might be the best way to win the hiring game.

Here’s how to put inbound recruiting into action …

How to Get Started With Inbound Recruiting

1) Create candidate personas.

Creating buyer personas is crucial to every targeted marketing strategy. You need to have a clear picture of who your ideal customer is if you want to craft an effective plan to reach them.

The same applies to recruiting. You need to know who you are really looking for when you have an open role. Forget the job title and the company name, what does your ideal new hire really look like?

Once you’ve established this, you can start thinking about the ways that you can attract this ideal candidate, as well as the kinds of content that they would find valuable.

So how do you go about this? Fortunately, there’s a simple formula to creating your own candidate personas:

• Review your current process. Are you currently attracting quality applicants? How are you currently trying to connect with relevant candidates? Are you using LinkedIn? Is this working?
• Define your company culture. What helps employees succeed at your company? What skills are valuable? What traits do you hold dear? An easy way to gather this information is to survey employees or other stakeholders in the hiring process.
• Create your persona narrative. Use your new definition of company culture –and the traits that you know help people flourish — to put together a persona of your ideal candidate. This persona should be different for each new role that you’re hiring for, but will share some underlying traits.
• Create relevant content. Brainstorm the type of content that your persona would find valuable based on their unique wants, needs, values, and challenges.
• Share your content. Find the best forums to connect with your persona and share your new content. Depending on who you’re looking for, the right forum could be anything from Twitter to online gardening forums.

Ultimately, this candidate-specific content will bring relevant people to your site and introduce them to your brand — the first step towards getting them to apply.

2) Start prospecting to fill the funnel.  

Modern sales and marketing is a symbiotic relationship. Sales teams are fed by a steady stream of leads from marketing. It’s the foundation of how online businesses generate customers and revenue.

For sales teams to be successful they need that influx of leads. They need marketers to constantly fill the top of the funnel with interested prospects. However, pipeline isn’t just a revenue requirement — it’s also central to effective recruiting.

In modern talent acquisition, candidates care about where they’re applying. It’s your job to attract them to your brand and make them interested in learning more. Companies need to do more to start relationships with candidates that haven’t applied if they want to build a recruiting pipeline that gives hiring the same predictability as sales.

Case Study: Spotify

Spotify’s recent sponsorship of the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Tech is a great example of how to use event marketing to attract qualified candidates. 

One of the music service’s key hiring pain points is the ability to attract technical talent, specifically female tech talent. By sponsoring this event, they not only got access to a pool of talented engineers, but also had the chance to make a positive statement in the ongoing debate over women in tech.

But you don’t need the resources of Spotify to get this kind of effect, in fact, you don’t even need to sponsor an event. Instead, try inviting candidates to schedule a Google Hangout with members of your team.

This worked particularly well with one of our customers: They set up a monthly Google Hangout between their head of engineering and all the engineering candidates that they’d encountered that month.

It’s a small time commitment (30 minutes), but the candidates get to ask questions, feel like they’ve been given special treatment, and get insights into what life as an engineer at the company is really like. Needless to say, their application rates (and quality of applicants) have gone through the roof.

3) Create opportunities for micro-conversions. 

Many of the people that come to your website are not ready to make a buying decision. This is why calls-to-action and content such as ebooks, whitepapers, and webinars are such widely adopted marketing tactics.

Instead of asking a prospect to make a full conversion (e.g., signup or demo request), you can entice them to make a ‘micro-conversion’ where they exchange their email address for valuable content.

Recruiting is no different. Many people that come to your careers page aren’t ready to apply (yet). After all, applying for a job is a pretty big investment. Sometimes they just want to find out more about your company or learn about relevant opportunities — so make sure you’re making that information readily available and provide them. 

Whether you present them with related blog content, point them towards other company resources, or provide them with an opportunity to stay up-to-date with future job openings, providing these alternative options helps to keep them engaged with your brand.

Case Study: Lockheed Martin

Lockheed Martin — a global aerospace, defense, security, and advanced technologies company — offers candidates the option to join their ‘Talent Community’ if they’re not ready to apply. As a result, they’re left with a huge pool of talent to tap into over time.

To join the community, potential applicants must specify their areas of interest, as well a preferred time frame for how often they’d like to be contacted about opportunities. This makes it easy for their team to source the right candidates, for the right jobs, at the right time. 

You may not have Lockheed’s resources, but the key thing to learn here is focus. Communities based around a specific skillset or persona, will have a better chance of success than ‘generalized’ ones.

4) Start turning those leads into applicants.

As any great lifecycle marketer will know, getting a prospect’s email address is only the first step. Turning leads into customers can be a lengthy process with numerous different touch points.

Inbound recruiters face the same issue. After they capture contact information for candidates, they still have to sell their company and convince people to apply. In other words, lead nurturing is just as important for recruiters as it is for marketers.

Most companies lean heavily on email marketing for this. Comfortably the most effective tool, it’s 40x more effective than Facebook and Twitter combined for customer acquisition.

Well-timed email is also your best bet when it comes to nurturing your new hiring leads. Keep candidates in the loop about new opportunities that match their skillset, major company news (e.g. funding) and relevant events (e.g. graduate hiring fairs).

It goes without saying that all communication should be targeted. Only sales candidates should receive emails about sales roles. This sounds simple, but it can be the difference between successful nurture and irritating your entire candidate database!

Here’s are a couple of quick examples of the kinds of messages that are effective:

Find something worth sending

If your company has been in the news or released something cool, one of the first things you should do is tell your candidates. Smart people typically want to work at companies that they perceive as successful.

Share your culture

Show candidates what you’re like when you’re not tied to your desk. 56% of people see your culture and brand as the most important thing when they make a job decision.

As you can see, the best nurturing emails provide candidates with something of value, not just a bunch of different job links.

You might not end up hiring everyone you make an effort with, but that’s not the point. Maybe six months down the line a great salesperson will have read another one of your ebooks and changed his mind. Maybe a top engineer has been following your email updates and wants to get involved.

It can take a lot of touch points to influence a decision, so you never know when these relationships will start to pay off. Invest the time in building them now to reap future rewards.

5) Optimize and iterate your recruiting efforts.

It’s pretty rare that new company initiatives take off without a hitch. In fact, there’s usually a little tweaking necessary before things run completely smoothly. This makes a culture of testing and optimisation crucial to success. And the same can be said for your inbound recruiting efforts.

You need to test different content formats to attract candidates. You need to explore different ways to connect with prospective employees. And you need to experiment with different career page designs to encourage visitors to apply.

To get the data you need, you’ll need to lean on your marketing automation software or Google Analytics to track how candidates are finding your content. For example, if your team has been sharing content on LinkedIn, dig into the numbers to see if candidates are clicking through to your site and converting into applicants or new leads. If not, maybe it’s time to try a different approach.

You should also use your analytics platform to determine what content is most effective at turning prospects into applicants. Are there particular landing pages on your careers site that have a higher conversion rate? Are certain job descriptions encouraging more applicants than others?

Make sure you use your learnings here to improve your less effective content –constantly tweaking your approach is the best way to get better results.

However, data only paints part of the story. We recommend asking applicants how they found out about your company, and why they applied. You can add this to your application form as a short question, or ask it in the first interview or screening. This should give you a little more information on what gets people interested in applying.

Ultimately, the key to optimising your inbound recruiting machine is finding a repeatable model. You need to know what kind of content helps you connect with talented people and start producing more of it.  

Immerse yourself in the data and you’ll see what works for you.

Getting Started

Inbound marketing has fundamentally changed the way that we acquire customers, so it shouldn’t come as a surprise that it has other applications. Inbound recruiting is a developing area, but if you give it enough attention, you should be able to reap the rewards.

Do you use inbound techniques to fuel your recruiting process? If so, share your ideas in the comments below.