YOUNG CPAS USE INSTABOT TO REACH OUT FOR MEMBERSHIP
In computer lingo a “Bot” is the nomenclature for a robot program that looks for and reacts to certain parameters of people’s posting on social media. It’s what the Russians used to affect opinions on Facebook, by posting and reposting incendiary political messages. An InstaBot is the next generation of Bot. It targets Instagram.
Instagram is a social media platform similar to Facebook, but it is designed to curate images. Instagram “Users” can post images, and see other Users images. The images is labeled with “#hashtag” names. Users can choose to “like”, or comment, on an image. They can also become followers of other Users, which will cause that images from the followed user to be pushed to the followers home screen. Many users choose to become reciprocal followers of one another.
Since images have a descriptive #hashtag, it is possible to use this information to develop a Bot that is able to seek, select, and respond to the image posted. For instance, the Austin Chapter of Young CPA’s asked me to develop an Instagram Bot that would reach out to Austin area CPA’s and see if they would be interested in becoming more involved with our organization.
Bu selecting certain key words to look for in the hash tag, we were able to zero in on certain Instagram users as possible candidates who might be interested in joining our organization. We then sent them the following comment:
Based on you your picture, we think you might be interested in joining the young Cpas of Austin. If our algorithm has made an error, sorry for the inconvenience.
The Instabot searched through millions of Instagram posts, determined which were likely candidates, and then sent our message. It was remarkably successful. Admittedly. it hit a few people that were not part of our demographic (CPAS from the Permian Basin visiting) Austin but for the most part it was very effective. We have had responses from numerous young CPAs in the Austin area, and the Instabot has only been in service for 2 weeks.
The Bot did create several leads that were extremely valid. It made contact with a woman with the handle AliciaCPA. Personally I had never seen her at a meeting, and I try to go to all the meetings. The bot invited her to a meeting. She said that she would love to go, but was busy with tax season. The bot also contacted the TSCPA marketing director. Who promptly reached out to the creator( me)
The Instabot software that I used for the Austin CPA LEAP is called Social Drift. It was free for a week, and cost me $13 dollars for a week. Hence my 2 week service time. I also trialed a software package named Combin, which netted better results. Combin allowed me to contact Insta users within other peoples Instagram with certain #hashtags, and have the ability to constrain the geographical area.
The most remarkable aspect of the Instabot, is its low cost. A highly specialized 12 month campaign will cost less than $ 100 per month (subscription service charge fees). We project that it will touch base with 90% of all young CPAs/ CPA-candidates in the Austin area, 75% of young CPAs in Texas, and 18% of young CPAs in the United States.
Jack Cook is the Outreach coordinator for LEAP(Leaders Emeragining in the Accounting profession) in Austin. He works as a tax professional at Brandon K Moore Accounting . He is currently sitting for the FAR portion of the CPA. You can reach him at (907) 440-1251
Comments