Viral Recruiting - Something New For Me
Hi, Everyone...
This is in the 'New' department for me...
I thought I would share so you can follow my journey and learn as I learn about this...
It may be helpful for you either now or later, because this will be something I follow up on here from start to finish, so you will read about the entire process and there will be things you pick up...
Here's the "New"...
We are going to use viral recruiting to hire our next two full-time employees and prepare for hiring more in three more regions of the world.
Background:
The immediate need is for hiring 2 full-time employees for Thailand in mid-November to handle some of the tasks that are growing for our business there.
Also, as we grow the overall business, we know we will be expanding operations in three other areas: (1) China, (2) Germany/Austria/Switzerland, and (3) in the Philippines...
These three regions are the next areas we will enter heavily...We will need more qualified people who base in each them for us...
Rather than use some of the more traditional (for me) techniques to hire someone, like placing ads in local newpapers or using some sites like Monster dot com etc. we decided to go a different route.
This is the age of the internet, right? We need to act like it is what I am thinking.
Our Plan
We are going to run a limited-time viral campaign with prizes (2) that people can win in a drawing at the end of the contest period.
I am setting up the rules, pages, and etc. now, and we will use Facebook and another tool we have in our arsenal of tools to pull this off.
That other tool is specifically for use when you want to plan and run such a contest. It has all the framework forms, process to follow, and suggestions on how to set up such a contest (note it can also be used for coupons, lead campaigns, etc.).
What Will Be The Outcomes?
There will be four outcomes we expect for the contest:
(1) Brand Recognition. We hope to raise brand awareness. By recruiting for 4 areas, we will have a much broader reach and more interest from viewers/partcipants than if we only were recruiting for Thailand.
(2) More Sales. Through the interest generated we should get more traffic to our online stores, and hopefully some sales, although this traffic is likely not going to be highly targeted. This will be an ancillary benefit, it is not the focus...
(3) A Pool Of Potential Future Employees. By assessing now some potential hires for the other regions we will need as we grow, we will save time and money later when we do need the people...
(4) Hiring of Two People for Thailand. This is of course the MAIN focus of the contest, but all the other outcomes are WHY we decided to go with a contest over some of the more traditional methods like I am used to...
The more I thought about the reasons to use a viral recruiting campaign, the more it made sense to me. Paying a one-off fee to get CVs just is not leveraging your investment. This is yet another way to leverage the power of social platforms for your business.
Process
I will lay this out here in very general terms so you understand the steps, and as we go along, I will deep dive and give you updates via short posts on what goes well, what does not go well, and in general, you will be looking over my shoulder as we go through this.
It could be that you do not need this now, but down the road it could be that you will. Either way, I think that what you will read about may help you with your online marketing business.
Here's why...
As you grow your business, gathering tools to automate processes will help free up time that you can use to do other things. It is the same as with hiring people to help you with some of the more mundane tasks...
When you can add this or similar tools/tactics to your online business strategy, you suddenly literally have 4, 6, or more additional hands chipping in to get more work done, or to lessen your work. It is a natural progression of your business.
Steps For A Viral Contest
Here they are:
(1) Decide On The Intent and Prizes and How To Select The Winner(s).
(2) Plan for the Call To Action.
(3) Describe The Prize.
(4) Add In Dates of the Contest (start and end, plus date winners will be anounced).
(5) Detail All the Requirements to Enter The Contest.
(6) Plan for Image or Video to Use.
(7) Create the Terms and Conditions.
(8) Ask people to share/like/comment.
(9) Promote Viewers Liking/Following the Associated Business Page/Website.
(10) Ask people to add a mention in their comment (person mentioned will see the post on their timeline).
Other Considerations (The Tech Stuff)
(1) Remember about 70 words are visible on Facebook, so check that the cut-off is at a point you want, with the rest of the contest info following and available by clicking on 'see more'.
(2) Use hashtags for keywords - this will help increase visibility.
(3) Use emoticons and symbols for adding emphasis (people are used to seeing this these days).
(4) Get the post done in advance so you can see what it will look like and edit it if needed.
(5) Complete the associated pages and email series and then TEST to make sure they are working as expected.
(6) Plan for marketing platforms to promote through.
(7) Warm the crowd through peposting about the coming contest.
(8) Track results as the contest progresses.
(9) Use approved and accepted service to select winners and award/present the prize.
(10) Use the whole process for blog posts and PR to get further mileage from the ordeal!
One More Reason To Go Through All Of This
I believe that leveraging the viral phenomena available through the social networks from time to time will be a long term winning strategy for us. This is a fairly simple and straightforwad contest, and there are limited pieces to the puzzle.
Cutting our teeth and learning what works and what does not, plus going through the process one time will allow us to make the next ones go smoother. Yes, that is yet one more reason for doing this .
We will be adding in monthly contests with REALLY big prizes for winners. This one has two relatively small prizes ($100 each), but as we get familiar with running contests the prize value will go WAY up as will the appeal of participating....
Conclusion
I hope that you have picked up a few things so far, and I would be interested in hearing from anyone with experience running online social viral contests for their online marketing or related businesses.
Follow-on posts will describe in detail the steps as we go through them, and I will report on results throughout the contest period. The prizes will be awarded in mid November, so we are not talking a super long period of time...
I hope everyone is having a great day!
Remember also: I believe in ALL of you!
Cheers!
Dave : )
Recent Comments
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I do not spend any real time on social sites, so I have no input for you and I am not going to be hiring anyone for my little empire, but thank you for laying out something that seems like it covers all of the bases!
Yes, Mickey, this is also totally new territory for me. A viral recruiting contest to hire 2 employees? What the heck???
As you build your business, it could very well be that having some VAs take care of your mundane work makes some sense.
This might be a tool that would be useful for you at that time (or you could just go out and use a service to get a VA hehe)...
Thanks for your feedback/stopping by...
Cheers!
Dave : )
That is interesting! Has it been a positive experience? VAs I think is the way to go as an interim step to having full-time employees. It frees up time for the business owner...
I have a lot of experience with consulting, not that much with VA (other than local stuff I have been pulled into a few times over the last few years since starting with online marketing)...
Consulting 10-15 years ago was a big portion of my income. It was not virtual work though, more on the ground and on-site stuff, lots of gathering information, organizing and writing, and then completing and submitting contract proposals...
It was kind of a "Have laptop and experience - Will travel (for the right price)" situation. Highly focused niche with little viable competition to deal with. In-depth knowledge and experience with the subject in demand helped make me an in-demand commodity...
I got to go to such places as Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Turkey, UAE, Afghanistan, The Philippines, China, Japan, Korea, etc. plus in the USA, CA, and many other US states for these gigs..
Ridiculously good pay, expenses paid, and long hours for 30 - 60 days from start to finish with each contract...It was sweet...
Going back to the present...
Right now, we have full-time employees only, but in reality, they are doing what VAs do...My idea is to have a stable of folks that we can hire on an independent contractor basis as we need for others requiring such support...
Cheers!
Dave : )
I like to keep my work close to home. (My health will not allow me to move about the world too well.)
I have been consulting, by phone and email, with many people over the years.
For example, I helped set up a food truck for some guys in Arizona and a couple of websites in South Carolina, all through online communications.
Most of the work I have been doing is writing web content for many folks through article brokers we have all heard of.
That is what I love about the online environment. So much can be done right from home. I remember when there were few jobs that fell into that category, these days, too many...
I am wondering what is going to happen when robots take over 80% of manufacturing jobs, trucks drive themselves, and brick and mortar stores and grocery chains go away...
Massive amounts of jobs are just going to disappear. As much as some people yearn for the good old days, they are not coming back.
I think there massive social upheavals coming, perhaps they are already underway. On the other hand, members here are a jump ahead I think.
Through developing an online business they are already making that transition to what will be, and although I know this business has been around a while, it still has a lot of legs...
Good conversation...
Cheers!
Dave : )
Thanks for sharing this.
It does show as well that many companies are taking some of these routes for recruitment and gradually the norm ceases to exist.
I need to join the digital bandwagon properly asap.
Yes, the big companies have been using this tactic, and until recently (maybe a few years ago) the process has been too hard to do for most.
Now there are a number of companies that offer support for this viral thing. In our case, we have outright purchased a tool to set up and track viral campaigns...
Let;s see how it works!
Cheers!
Dave : )
Absolutely!
Working through the steps now as described above....
We want to be live with this in the next day or so (by the weekend start)...
: )
More than welcome to follow this Harvey. I think it has application also to what we are doing here. We can use viral marketing to bring attention to our offers. Cheers! Dave : )
Very interesting concept with limited risk and significant potential for gain. Thanks Dave. Jay
Hi, Jay...That is what I thought too. At first, I was very reluctant to do this, I had to be talked into it. The more I looked into it the better I felt about it. Now we will see...Stay tuned! Cheers! Dave : )
Hi MIke...Not a problem on sharing and I am going to show everyone as much as possible with the process...Cheers! Dave : )
Good, James...This should be an eye-opener for us all hehe! In reality, the money we will spend will be less than if we had gone the traditional route and we get a lot more mileage out of the endeavor...Cheers! Dave : )
Great Tania... This will be our first stab at this viral thing, it should be interesting... Cheers! Dave :)
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Hi, Dave...this sounds big, if not huge! One daft question from my end. Why do you need real people based in a different country, like Thailand, for? I mean, can't you reach your audience from your keyboard on your own computer?
Hi, James...
Fair question. Two of our niches involve promoting the travel market segment/specialty products. Having real people on the ground is an integral part of the overall plan.
One program we are developing is monthly contests where winners will get 2 free air tickets and 1 week in a hotel at our cost in the regions...
This is a giveaway on steroids? I am quite sure that many people will want to share our contest with friends for a chance to get a week for 2 in a nice hotel in Bangkok, with a few guided tours thrown in...
Initially, this program will start in Thailand where we have a pretty strong presence already (production of some of our own products, a registered business/banks accounts, and employees)...
I should add here that my business partner's wife (he is a close friend for over 25 years now) is from Thailand, and her family has been in business for many years there, and have helped with contacts, warehousing, production, etc.).
She is actually on the ground there, while my partner bases in Germany (Bavaria). Me? I am mostly in Dubai. I have close contacts in PH, so I handle that area, while the partner handles Germany and Thailand...
It works...
So what we are starting in Thailand we will replicate in other areas as well as monies allow and the demand is developed....
China is unique in that we will also source/ship from there (this is well down the road, on the horizon - I have some good contacts in China and have operated from there in the past)...
Back to the viral contests to find 2 people for Thailand (and line up more for other areas)...
Our people will meet the winners of these contests at the airport, take care of them during the week stay, and also record some of their experiences while they are in Thailand...
This footage and audio/photos will be fed back into the marketing program, along with articles, etc. The idea is that people will be more aware of the brand and will stop by the stores/buy more...
The other angle to this is that we will have that team member (who speaks the native language as well as English) conduct a variety of travel, cooking, and interviews on the street with locals, expats, plus take pictures that we use/own, etc.
That is one person.
The other will help us with the back end stuff that has to be done for the growing business as well as the websites, i.e. help with the warehousing and shipping side during busy times, manage the websites and other paperwork for that area, and perhaps will also get involved in writing drafts of blog posts, etc.
Other regions down the road...
The Philippines and China are a bit different. China is as I have mentioned above, while in The Philippines we will have the additional team members take care of our needs as we grow and offer such services to others (VA support)...We already have a presence there as well...
Bottom Line
We are thinking long range and taking baby steps along this path, Adjusting as we go along, measuring things as we go and grow, and adding new things that make sense as possible.
One additional area that is also in our vision is the USA. At some point, we will have to register a business (likely in Delaware) and establish accounts/an office/operations there (office/warehouse operations in Florida).
Long-term, the vision is that we will have a physical presence in the center of Europe (Germany), in Asia (3 locations), in MENA (Dubai), and in the USA.
We feel that we can support just about anything from these points, and can go in a number of different directions as we grow. All of this starts with one step at a time, of course...
Kind of long, sorry for that, but now you know a bit more about what we are thinking/planning as we get this initial viral recruiting campaign underway...
There is no doubt in my mind that we will make mistakes on this first one. But that is what it is all about...Nothing ventured, nothing gained!
Good question!
Cheers!
Dave : )
Ahhhh.... I see what you mean and where you're getting at. Your explanation makes it a great deal clearer to me now. I didn't know that you have a travel niche, along with specialty products.
I must admit that your prizes are the mouth-watering type, and I'm pretty sure that many will be those who will try their luck at winning such fantastic holidays.
I went wrong in my line of thoughts as I didn't realize you actually have your own products for sale. I thought you were pushing somebody else's products, and you were an affiliate for that. My apologies for assuming that. Which is why it brought me to my question as to why you need to have actual people out there, in real life, when I was under the impression that every corner of the Globe can be covered from one's own keyboard in the comfort of an office, even if it's up in Mount Everest :)
Good luck in this super venture, Dave, and I can only wish you the best of success all around :)
James
Thanks, James...So far so good! Cheers! : )