This case study reviews how one survey campaign introduced a UK business to U.S. press and audiences hitting some of the biggest business press in the world.
Client
StandOut CV is a careers-advice company designed to provide CV/resume templates and genuine careers advice from actual recruiters. At this point, Root Digital and StandOut CV had been working together for almost three years creating Digital PR campaigns alongside other content marketing.
The client primarily operates in the UK, but in 2022 they wanted to aggressively start creating content for the U.S. market, specifically, those looking for resume tips and advice.
As part of an ongoing retainer, we were tasked with creating a campaign topically focused on resumes that would generate press coverage and backlinks in American media to support their new on-site U.S. content.
American Digital PR is slightly different from the UK, and can be challenging, but we knew we could successfully gain the client links in a new market with the right story.
Strategy
In ideation, we knew we had to be tactical, as topically focusing on resumes for a brand that offers resume advice and guides could have been perceived as too sales-driven by journalists.
We settled on the idea of resume lies as our media analysis showed this would be a topic of interest, specifically when outreach was scheduled over the end of the year and new year period.
Articles on the topic had been posted about this in previous years in key media, and this is the time of year when the ‘New Year New Me’ focus encourages people to get new jobs, where they would review their resume.
Separately, with rising inflation a core topic at the time in the U.S., we had to consider that people may be looking into other ways of landing jobs when feeling financial pressure, such as lying. This was an added angle we could use for newsjacking when inflation updates came out.
Data
Our survey was designed to get up-to-date statistics on people lying throughout the job application process and how far people may be willing to go. We ensured the questions would also allow us to run a key pitch on how inflation may be pushing people to make such choices as well as other more taboo newsworthy angles such as degree fraud.
To support the survey data, we created our own dataset into how much fake resumes, references, and college certificates would cost for those willing to pay to fake their way into a job. We did this by researching genuine illegal, or barely legal, options online that the everyday person could buy should they choose to do so.
This helped this Digital PR campaign be more than just a survey analysis and gave it further real-world impact and unique data that journalists wouldn’t be able to get anywhere else!
Results
- 100+ placements, with 85+ linked and an average DR of 67.5 for the linked coverage, as of May 2023.
- Placement highlights included Bloomberg, CNBC (x2), Forbes (x2), Entrepreneur (x3), Fortune, Fool.com, and a range of localised newspapers across the U.S., a key win to introduce the client to the States.
- Discussed as a key talking point on the Office Ladies podcast (one of the biggest entertainment podcasts in the world hosted by two actresses from the American version of The Office).
- Results were discussed on regional morning talk shows in America, with one using a body language expert to discuss the findings further.
- Featured on many non-news, but relevant, sites for the brand, such as Monster Jobs, human resources blogs, and various recruitment company websites, even other resume-advice sites!
- Gained 1,000+ clicks to the landing page through news coverage.
- Successfully secured the client their first Digital PR backlinks in the U.S. and supported their content launch across the pond.
- Were the first campaign to discuss ‘resume lies’ in 2023, with the likes of YouGov and other resume-advice sites following suit 4-8 weeks after our coverage tying into the news of a U.S. congressman admitting to lying on his resume.
While we couldn’t predict a congressman would lie about his resume, or that TikToks would go viral about resume lies, our initial media analysis showed us that this topic is discussed almost every year without fail, so we were placing a safe bet on it being newsworthy once again.
