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No one seems to agree on cover letters. How much time do you need to spend perfecting them? Do hiring managers even read them? Is it better to just send in your resume and call it a day?
I’m not in HR, but I’ve been approached by applicants who wondered whether their cover letter would actually be read. My answer is one not many of them wanted to hear: “sometimes.” Sometimes it will be read. Other times, you can get away with just sending in your resume — like when you network your way into applying for a position.

The truth is, you can’t really predict on a case-by-case basis — and you’re better safe than sorry. For the most part, having a cover letter will give you an upper hand in ways your resume doesn’t. It allows you to show off your writing skills, provide details that you couldn’t fit on your resume, demonstrate your passion, and show your willingness to put in as much time and effort as possible.
Seems fairly basic, right? Cover letters can hold different levels of importance to an employer depending on the industry you’re in and the job you’re applying for. If you do plan to write a cover letter, keep in mind there are certain qualities it should have that are not included in the definition above.
What to Include in a Cover Letter
So, what should you include? We’ll let the 11 templates below this list do most of the talking. No matter which one you download, pay attention to the following elements — all of which should shine through in the letter you send to your future manager.

1. Contact Information
Cover letters shouldn’t just carry your contact information, but also that of the company to which you’re applying. Contact info includes your phone number, email address, and any social media accounts you’re willing to share and receive connections to.
Home addresses aren’t required, but they can be a helpful reassurance to the employer that you already live nearby and would have no trouble coming into the office.
Avoid offering phone numbers, email addresses, or actual addresses that belong to your current employer. Using your personal Gmail address over your work email, for example, ensures your correspondence with recruiters remains separate from all of your current work communication.
2. A Personal Address Line
For as often as you see “to whom it may concern” at the top of cover letters today, do your best to avoid writing this exhausted line.
Address lines that specify a person or company grab your reader’s attention much more quickly, and show the employer that you’ve taken the time to tailor your application letter to them. Don’t have the name of the hiring manager? “Employers at [company name]” will do just fine.
3. A Hook
A “hook” is a clever introduction that “hooks” your reader into wanting to learn more. Think about yourself as a job candidate — what makes you unique? What about your career might a recruiter be intrigued by that you can package into an interesting first sentence?
4. Why You’re Qualified
It’s a no-brainer that you should summarize your professional experience in your cover letter. However, today’s best applications describe why this experience qualifies the applicant for the job they’re applying for. For example, don’t just state that you spent three years writing for a company blog. Explain that this type of work lends itself to managing your new potential employer’s content calendar every week.
5. General Knowledge of the Business
Grammatical errors could mean your application is thrown in the trash, but that’s not the only thing that could get your letter tossed aside. Using a generic “one-size-fits-all” cover letter — especially if you forget to change the name of the company — will also hurt your chances of landing an interview.
So, if you take the time to write a cover letter, take the time to comment on the business itself. Why are you applying to this company? What about their business stuck out to you as a professional?
Now, let’s take a look at an example cover letter, what makes it effective, along with 11 templates you can download or draw inspiration from.
Cover Letter Example

Image Source
The example above illustrates how to write a marketing cover letter using the elements we listed.
Besides the contact information and the address line, the first few paragraphs explain why the candidate is qualified for the position. This example uses specific data to show why they would be a good fit.
Additionally, in the second to last paragraph, the candidate discusses why they’re interested in the specific company, demonstrating general knowledge of the business.
By combining all the elements to a cover letter, this is a great example to use for inspiration.
14 Free Cover Letter Templates for Your Next Job Application
Template 1: Basic

The example above is a basic (but great) cover letter. The numbered sections are explained in more detail below.
1. Header
The level of formality your header has will depend on the company to which you apply. If you’re applying to a formal business, it’s important to use a formal header to open your cover letter, like in the sample above. Put your address, the date, and the company’s address. But if you’re applying to a company that isn’t as formal, you don’t need to include yours and the company’s addresses. You can still include the date, though.
2. Greeting
Using “To Whom It May Concern” is okay, but you may want to take the time to research the name of the recruiter or hiring manager online. If you do your research and aren’t confident you found the right name, then you should definitely use the generic greeting — but if you are sure, then it shows you put in the effort to find their name and it will catch the recruiter’s eye.
If you have the recruiter’s name, do you greet them by their full name, or by their courtesy title (i.e. Mr., Ms., or Mrs.)? Similar to the header, it depends on the company’s level of formality. If you’re applying to a corporate business, you may want to consider using “Mr. Snaper” instead of “Jon Snaper.” If you’re applying to a start-up or a business with a more casual culture, you can use “Jon Snaper,” as shown in the example.
3. Introduction
Your opening paragraph should, in 1-3 sentences, state why you’re excited to apply and what makes you the perfect candidate. Get right to the point, and don’t worry about explaining where you found the posting or who you know at the company. This isn’t a place to go into detail about why you’re a great candidate — that’s for the second paragraph. Here, simply list a few key reasons in one sentence to set up the rest of your letter. Keep in mind that the recruiter may cross-reference your cover letter with your resume, so make sure the two sync up.
4. Paragraph 2: Why You’re a Great Fit for the Job
Next, sell yourself and your experience by choosing one or two concrete examples that show why you’re a great fit for the position. What did you do at a previous company that gave you relevant experience? Which projects have you worked on that would benefit the new company? How will your prior experience help this company grow? Stay humble in your explanation of credentials while still showing that you would be an asset to the team. Use this paragraph to show you’re genuinely excited and interested in the position.
5. Third Paragraph: Why the Company Is a Great Fit for You
While it’s certainly important you’re a good fit for the job, it’s also important that the company is a good fit for you. “A cover letter typically describes why you’re great for a company — but how will you benefit from getting hired?” asks Emily MacIntyre, a Team Development Manager at HubSpot. “We want to know why our company appeals to you, and how it will be a mutually beneficial working relationship.”
In the third paragraph, show you’re serious about growing and developing your career at this new company. What impresses and excites you about the company? Is there something that you feel strongly about that aligns with the company’s goals? For example, the candidate in the sample letter used this space to show his personal commitment to environmental causes aligns with the company’s green initiatives.
6. Strong Closer and Signature
Don’t get lazy in the final few sentences of your cover letter — it’s important to finish strong. Be straightforward about your interest and enthusiasm about the new position, and tell them you’re available to talk about the opportunity at any time. Be sure to include your phone number and email address. At this point, the ball is (rightly) in the recruiter’s court to decide how to follow up.
Last but certainly not least, thank them for their time and consideration. Use a formal sign-off like “Best,” “All the best,” or “Sincerely,” and finish by typing out your full name. You don’t need to sign it with a pen.
Template 2: Data-Driven Marketing Cover Letter
Get it here.

When applying to a data-driven position, it might be tempting to inject your cover letter with, well, the data to describe what you’ve done for other employers. But in an application letter — particularly for the marketing industry — how you convey this data is just as important as the data itself.
The cover letter template above, which we created here at HubSpot, can help you present the data that’s most important to you as a candidate such that it’ll matter to your future employer.
Notice the three bullet points near the center of the letter above, preceded by the statement: “… I’ve developed a strategy that has helped the company achieve …” This setup is important, because while you can add as many statistics as you want to this template, your data points should describe how your current/former business benefited from your work, rather than how you, yourself, benefited.
Template 3: Straight-to-the-Point Cover Letter
Get it here.

Harvard Business Review contributor David Silverman hailed the above cover letter example as “The Best Cover Letter I Ever Received.” For context, Silverman believes there are only a handful of times when writing a cover letter is actually necessary:

When you know the name of the hiring manager.
When you know something about what the job requires.
When you’ve been referred to the job personally.

Under those three circumstances, a straight-to-the-point cover letter like the one above could be your best bet. Because it’s so concise, however, make a point to add your own letterhead above the message itself. It might be easy for a recruiter to sift through a short and sweet cover letter like the one above, but it’s just as easy for it to get lost in the shuffle of their application list without a unique design or format.
Template 4: Referral Cover Letter
Get it here.

Just because a friend or colleague recommended you for a job doesn’t mean the company is all set to hire you. Therefore, the cover letter template above is written specifically for referrals. We made this one here at HubSpot. Download it here (it comes with four other cover letter templates, too).
As you can see in the picture above, the first paragraph of the cover letter is dedicated entirely to acknowledging the circumstances of your applying: You know someone who works there — no harm in that. But there might be harm in not mentioning it to the hiring manager. Telling the reader about your connection at the company shows you’re aware and confident of the actions you take to get the opportunities you’re interested it.
Ultimately, it’s better than the recruiter hearing about your employee connection from somebody else.
As for the rest of the cover letter, treat your message the same way you would if you had applied with no connection from within. Your skills and successes are no less important because of your internal referral.
Template 5: Photo Letterhead Cover Letter
Get it here.

The cover letter template above was designed by Microsoft Office, and as comprehensive as it looks, it’s completely free to download and modify.
As it looks right now, this cover letter contains about half photo, half text. Feel free to shrink (and change) the image to give yourself more room to tell your story. Of course, a nice washed-out image that expresses who you are can be part of that story …
Template 6: Digital Creative Cover Letter
Get it here.

This sixth template is perfect for the applicant who wants to emphasize the many different digital channels he or she is on. The header bar also allows this template to go well with a resume of the same format.
As you personalize this letter with your own experience, make note of the social networks and industry software included in this template. You’ll see along the top that LinkedIn, email, and personal website are all available for you to fill with your own information.
The bullet points in the above template also allow you to highlight your most important skills or accomplishments for the hiring manager.
Template 7: Marketing Manager Cover Letter
Get it here.

Our seventh cover letter comes from Monster.com. This cover letter, shown above, is focused specifically on a marketing role.
Notice how the writer includes references to important marketing metrics and terminology. If you’re applying to a data-driven role, you might not want to fill the page with a story of your experience in paragraph form, like Template 1 does at the beginning of this article. Instead, consider highlighting three (or four, or five) of your successes that you believe the hiring manager would resonate most with, in bulleted form.
As a marketing professional, breaking up your letter with bulleted details like the ones above shows a respect for the hiring manager’s limited time — a mentality that all marketers must understand when communicating with a brand’s audience.
Template 8: Career Day Follow-Up Cover Letter
Get it here.

This is a unique kind of cover letter from Princeton University.
CareerBuilder, Monster, and Indeed might take the lion’s share of your job searches online, but still some employment opportunities come out of a trade show, job fair, or similar networking event. For those occurrences, you have the follow-up cover letter template above.
This cover letter has everything you need to help an employer recall a conversation you had with him/her at a career fair. As you can see in the second paragraph, the letter is particularly useful to people who are about to graduate college.
Template 9: Logo and Watermarked Cover Letter
Get it here.

Here’s another cover letter template from Microsoft Office. This one has a light touch of color in the design just above the letterhead, but make no mistake — the template caters to any professional looking to make a good first impression on their future employer.
Don’t let the logo space on the top-right of the page confuse you. This can be the logo of the company to which you’re applying — to quickly get the attention of the recruiter — or your own logo. Perhaps you freelance on the side or simply like branding yourself. This cover letter template is meant for customization.
Template 10: Business Cover Letter
Get it here.

The cover letter template above is perfect for entry- and mid-level marketers who want to show a little extra professionalism in their opening note to a potential employer.
The multi-colored header (you can change the color if you wish) shows just the right amount of creativity and can go quite well with a resume of the same style. If you don’t have enough experience to fill the entire page, don’t worry. Feel free to write to a length you think is representative of who you are and what the hiring manager wants to see.
No matter how long your final cover letter is, the above template is your opportunity to show your attention to detail — from your contact information in the top header, to the personalized address line where you can include the name of the hiring manager. Like we said, “to whom it may concern” is pretty outdated, anyway.
Template 11: Entry-Level Cover Letter
Get it here.

The cover letter template above, written by HubSpot, is specifically designed for entry-level applicants.
When you only have a few years experience, it’s important to display how you gained your skills and what you learned from your education or internships. Additionally, it’s important to mention why you want to work at the company you’re applying to.
No matter your experience, the template above will help you decide what skills you want to highlight and flesh out in your cover letter.
You can download it here (it comes with four other cover letter templates, too).
Template 12: Healthcare Cover Letter
Get it here.
What stands out to me in this cover letter is the direct, straight-to-the-point bullet points that reference the job posting. The cover letter, created by The Balance Careers, cuts down on repetition by following the “I have” statement with six bullet points that highlight the applicant’s strengths, including “I have … practical knowledge of creating and implementing care plans” and “I have … a proven track record of compassionate, effective care”. 
Additionally, phrases like “I’d love to put my skills to work for your clinic” and “Please contact me at your convenience and let me know how I can help you” focus on what the business will gain as a result of hiring the applicant, rather than what the applicant is looking to gain. 
Template 13: Freelance Cover Letter
Get it here.

If you’re looking for freelance work, your biggest goal is to get your strengths across quickly, so busy clients won’t pass by your cover letter entirely. Additionally, if you’re sending out multiple cover letters to different clients, you’ll want to target each one to that client’s unique goals.
For instance, if one client is looking for SEO-optimized content related to marketing, you’ll want to highlight past experience writing marketing content; this will change if, for instance, the client is looking for fitness content. 
For this reason, it’s a good idea to structure your cover letter so you start with a) past credentials or references, and b) bullet-point information related to the client’s goal, as shown in the cover letter above. 
Template 14: Director Cover Letter
Get it here.
If you’re applying for a Director position, you’ll want to start by explaining how you’ve either successfully handled a similar role in the past, or why you believe you’re qualified and ready to handle new responsibilities for the first time. 
In the cover letter above, the candidate does a good job outlining how she succeeded in a leadership role previously: “For the past five years, I have successfully developed and maintained all data systems, including schedules and records for a business employing more than 100 people.”
You’ll want to demonstrate how your skills align with a Director position — both through organization and leadership — and, when possible, where you received recognition for your hard work (i.e. “I earned an award for Most Valuable Administrative Staff Member”). 
Writing a cover letter is easier said than done. Don’t hesitate to spend a lot of time writing and editing it. Or, ask a friend or family member to read it over and give you feedback. If the recruiter does end up reading it, you’ll be thankful you did.
Editor’s note: This post was originally published in November 2014 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

Make the most of your social media presence and turn your fans into paying customers. Get inspired by these social media marketing funnel examples & learn how to create your own SMM funnel today.

Small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) face many challenges as they grow. And in our all-digital, work-from-anywhere world, finding the right customer at the right time continues to be an obstacle. But different marketing solutions can help support SMBs as they move forward. 
Here are three reasons why SMBs need to invest and optimize in martech stacks — also known as marketing technology stacks.
Build Your Marketing Roadmap
Many small and medium-sized businesses are unsure of where to start investing in the right technology. Currently over 8,000 marketing technologies exist, and many are competing with each other, while also releasing new features every couple of months. As an SMB, it may be hard to keep up and pinpoint which marketing solutions will be the best fit for your current need, remain affordable, and be useful as they scale. 
As an SMB team, it’s time to ask yourself: What are my marketing strategies? What are my goals? What marketing solutions will help me align with my business’s needs? These questions will help you build your marketing roadmap.
Unite Different Tools for the Better 
Many marketing technologies only offer a specific solution, so it’s common to see SMBs with very complex and disjointed martech stacks as a result. But when you find a marketing technology that allows you to solve for many processes, you can achieve a more cohesive customer experience through unified systems and tools. When considering any new tool, it’s essential to understand its implications and ask yourself two questions:

Will this technology impact the processes that we need to complete?
How will this new tool fit in with our marketing workflows?

An integrated tool is only possible when all your teams – IT, sales, support, and marketing – work together to make collaborative decisions. For example, integrating your customer relationship management (CRM) solution with your marketing automation can help both sales and marketing work from the same customer data and sell smarter. High-performing marketing teams have a martech stack that not only integrates but builds cross collaboration across several teams, providing for a unified, 360-degree view of your customer and improving customer experience.
Enable Your Teams to Make the Most of Technology 
Oftentimes, we see marketing technologies under-utilized. In fact, a Gartner study revealed that “marketers report using only 58% of their martech stack’s full capabilities, and that marketing teams that utilize less of their stack’s capabilities report a lower level of martech effectiveness.” This happens quite often in SMBs, mostly due to the fact that martech stacks are replaced or changed too often, or the staff isn’t fully trained on the marketing solutions capabilities. 
For an SMB, it can be a lot of technology to keep up with, handle, and maintain. As an easy fix, we’ve seen SMBs use online learning to help support their teams when a new marketing technology is introduced. For example, Salesforce offers Trailhead, our free online learning platform that can help anyone get started with marketing automation and customer relationship management in an instant.
Marketing Strategies & Technology Solutions that Make an Impact
Looking for cutting-edge marketing strategies and technology solutions that can significantly help your SMB?  Check out our ultimate list:
Account Based Marketing (ABM)
Account Based Marketing (ABM) helps B2B marketers meet buyer expectations with highly personalized campaigns to engage accounts or specific customers with an individualized approach. Right now, 92% of B2B marketers have an ABM program in place.
ABM works so well because of its “long game” approach — it gives so much value to the customer that when they’re ready to buy, you are at the top of their mind because you’ve delivered such a highly customized experience. This is how you build long-term customers and relationships.
Artificial Intelligence in Marketing
Artificial intelligence (AI) isn’t new, but it’s being incorporated in marketing technologies across the board. More SMB marketing teams are leveraging it to understand their data better. Businesses are leaning on analytics for business insights and efficiencies more than they did before COVID-19. In fact, 49% of companies are using data analytics “more or much more” than before. 
SMBs in particular are finding new ways to use data in response to the crisis. The combination of marketing automation and AI is empowering marketers to discover innovative ways to connect with new customers in the all-digital world.
Unified Platform
Today’s customers expect to interact with companies on a wide variety of channels, both online and offline, and their expectations for these interactions are higher than ever. So how can an organization engage with customers across an ever-growing number of channels without losing control of costs or consistency? How can it keep a sharp eye on customer experiences without adding extra checkpoints and friction that slows the deployment of marketing campaigns? 
The key is to implement a centralized solution that keeps your brand in lockstep with your business. 
At Salesforce, we focus on just that. We build all of our solutions, including our marketing automation solution, on a single platform with tools that our customers need to succeed. As SMBs expand, they can easily scale their marketing automation technology with seamless integration with other products, like Sales Cloud and Service Cloud, giving their company a single view of the customer. 
Our model has helped many SMBs bypass integration complexities. And with three releases per year synchronized across all the products on our platform, it makes it easier for businesses of all sizes to stay up to date.
This post is a part of our SMB Success Series. Stay tuned for monthly blog posts to drive your small business growth!

Headlines are the first look (and sometimes, the only look) people give your content. Think of all the times you’ve scanned title after title before clicking on the one that stopped your scroll.
You’re not the only one who whisks by without reading. We found that 73% of people admit to skimming blog posts, while only 27% consume them thoroughly. Without a compelling headline, your content will never get the eyes it deserves.
But what exactly are headline grabbers? And how do you write one that stands out among the black-and-white sea of copy monotony? Most importantly, how do you make sure it works for your audience?

Fortunately, we understand the ups and downs of crafting catchy headlines. It takes time, thought, and a few simple tricks. So settle into your favorite note-taking mode, because it’s time to learn how to create headlines that reel in readers.
Thousands of articles exist on how to write an attention-grabbing headline. Every marketer has an opinion, from fixing horrible headlines to earning more clicks.
While most compelling headlines do pull from a similar bag of tricks, what works for one person may not work for someone else. That’s because your audience, brand, voice, and content strategy differs from the companies popping up next to you in search results.
How to Write an Attention Grabbing Headline
Here’s how to make sure your headlines spark interest and work for your brand.
1. Write a working title.
Remember when you were required to turn in a rough draft of your work? Well, thank your high school teachers, because this is a great first step to finding the perfect headline grabbers.
A headline draft is called a “working title.” It’s a specific statement that clearly indicates what your post will be about. Let’s say you write a blog about topics like “getting outdoors” and “staying active.”
You can write hundreds of posts about either of those topics. But with a working title, you narrow in on a specific headline. For instance, you could create the following working titles from the above topics:

“Why Getting Outdoors Boosts Happiness and Long-Term Memory”
“Anti-Aging Activity: 7 Science-Backed Reasons to Get Off the Couch”

Each headline clearly states what your post will be about, but they still need to go through a writing workshop. They’re called “working titles” because it will take time to make them perfect. But it’s the right start to create an attention-grabbing headline.
2. Steer clear of clickbait.
We’ve all fallen into this marketing trap. You can’t help but tap on headlines like these:

“You Won’t Believe This Dog’s Dance Moves!”
“Someone Gave This Kid Scissors. Here’s What Happened Next”
“When You Read These 19 Shocking Food Facts, You’ll Never Want To Eat Again”

Oftentimes, the article you wind up reading is completely off-course from what the headline promised. Of course, carrot cake has a lot of sugar. So you get frustrated, leave the site, and vow never to return.
While clickbait can be effective for getting views, it can also annoy readers by exploiting emotional triggers like anger, anxiety, humor, inspiration, and surprise.
People won’t stick around long if you consistently overpromise and underdeliver through over-the-top headlines. But there is something to learn from the effectiveness of clickbait.
Using emotive language can resonate on a personal level and stir readers’ interest. For instance, these headlines nod to people’s emotional tendencies without being overly sensational:

“Why You Shouldn’t Always Reach Your Goals”
“Merriam-Webster Reveals What New Words Appeared the Year You Were Born”
“12 Ways to Give and Get Customer Love”

If you find yourself overpromising on what’s behind your headline, pause. Reevaluate the benefit to your audience, and reel in the bait.
3. Stay on brand.
Maybe clickbait is part of your brand strategy. If so, bring on the outrageous headlines. The point is: your brand is the starting point of your content strategy. So you absolutely need to consider it when writing headline grabbers.
(To create a brand that attracts and inspires your audience, check out The Ultimate Guide to Branding in 2020).
Let’s take a look at how two major players in the outdoor industry — Patagonia and Outdoor Research — use their distinct brands to write attention grabbing headlines.

Patagonia: “Will You Vote for Winter?”

Outdoor Research: “How To Stay Warm While Moving Fast In The Cold”

Both headlines would personally make me click, but the difference between the two is clear. Patagonia is known for their environmental activism, which comes across through the use of “vote” and asking readers to take a stance. While Outdoor Research solves a pain point through its tried-and-true gear to help customers “stay warm…in the cold.”
As you brainstorm headline ideas, revisit your target market to consider what type of messaging will resonate with your audience.
4. Turn heads.
You know that person whose look is so on-point you can’t help but do a double-take? You can make that happen with a headline grabber — if you use these writing style tips.

Build anticipation — This is all about creating intrigue so people need to find out what happened. Psychology professor George Lowenstein summed it up in the information gap theory, which states that a “curious individual is motivated to obtain the missing information to reduce or eliminate the feeling of deprivation.” Buzzfeed is known for reeling people in with headlines like “33 Amazingly Useful Websites You Never Knew Existed.” Click.

Add numbers — Studies have shown that numbers ease the stressful paradox of choice, stand out when odd, and help our brains spatially sort information. Researchers have even found that people with a number-free language are able to count. So next time you’re typing up a headline grabber, try something like “27 Data-Backed Reasons to Personalize Your Marketing.” Humans can’t resist.

Solve a problem — When we run into a problem, our brains work overtime to find a solution. Which is why headlines that offer answers are great attention grabbers. Feeling overwhelmed at work? “Quick & Easy Ways to Get Organized At Work” would immediately draw you in because it promises simple ways to solve your problem. Bonus points if you offer actionable, inventive advice.

5. Optimize for SEO.
Learning how to write an attention-grabbing headline and optimizing it for search doesn’t have to be a painful process. The key? Do your research, and sound like what you are — a human.
To find the right balance, dive into keyword research to discover what topics interest your audience. Once you have a list of relevant keywords, look at the search volume for each one to see how often it’s typed into a search engine. (If you’re new to SEO, or need to create a solid strategy, you can find helpful tips in our Ultimate Guide to SEO).
When you’ve chosen a keyword that interests your audience and has solid search volume, it’s time to incorporate it into your headline. We recommend putting your keyword as close to the beginning of your headline as possible so it’s recognized by the finicky search engine spiders. But remember to keep your headline under 70 characters so it doesn’t get chopped off in the SERPs.
Let’s say you’re putting together a blog post on branding, and your goal is to rank for the keyword “brand voice examples.” Your working title may look something like this:
“Get Inspired by These 9 Creative Brand Voice Examples”
While the sentiment is there, the keyword is at the end — and it’s lacking pizzazz. A few simple switches can turn it into a headline grabber.
“9 Brand Voice Examples to Break Out of Writer’s Block”
Moving the keyword to the front of the headline boosts SEO, and including “writer’s block” helps solve a problem that plagues every brand writer. Plus, the headline is 53 characters, so readers will see your complete headline handiwork.
While people will scroll past a perfectly optimized headline, a poorly optimized one will send you right to the bottom of search results. Try to strike a balance that works for your brand. And above all, be human. If you’re unsure whether or not your headline is strong enough to grab peoples’ attention, think: Would you click?

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With all the algorithm updates, changing content preferences, and memes sprouting up on social media, it can be more challenging to adapt your social media marketing strategy than it was acclimating to the awkwardness of puberty.

Despite its perpetual evolution, though, social media will always have one constant — people. For the most part, human behavior has stayed the same for thousands of years, which means the principles of psychology are unwavering. So if you want to succeed on social media, you need to focus more on the people using it than the trends changing it.
To help you develop an audience-centric social media strategy, we’ve compiled these insightful quotes about social media from executives, marketers, and even celebrities. Read on to get inspired.
Social Media Quotes
1. “People want to go on the Internet and check out their friends so why not build a website that offers that? Friends, pictures, profiles, whatever you can visit, browse around, maybe it’s someone you just met at a party. I’m not talking about a dating site. I’m talking about taking the entire social experience of college and putting it online.” – Jesse Eisenberg as Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network
2. “It’s a dialogue, not a monologue, and some people don’t understand that. Social media is more like a telephone than a television.” – Amy Jo Martin, Author of Renegades Write The Rules
3. “We get to live in a time that we get to use social media as a tool. It’s not just a face on a piece of paper, and that’s what makes you someone’s favorite model. We can have a very similar sense of humor as someone, and that’s why we’re their favorite model, or our personal style, off the runway, is why we’re their favorite.” – Gigi Hadid, Fashion Model
4. “I’m very active on social media and see the huge impact it has on engaging with fans and being able to have a voice.” – Stephen Curry, Professional Basketball Player
5. “A lot of people who are ‘social media’ stars aren’t considered to be ‘real’ stars, and people underestimate the amount of work it takes to edit and upload a video every single day and document your life like that.” – Shawn Mendes, Singer
Positive Social Media Quotes
6. “Social media is not just an activity; it is an investment of valuable time and resources. Surround yourself with people who not just support you and stay with you, but inform your thinking about ways to WOW your online presence.” – Sean Gardner, Forbes Social Media Power Influencer, AI specialist
7. “Don’t use social media to impress people; use it to impact people.” – Dave Willis, Author and Speaker
8. “Get in where you fit in and then focus on that platform.” – John Lawson, Best-Selling Author and Speaker

9. “You don’t need a corporation or a marketing company to brand you now: you can do it yourself. You can establish who you are with a social media following.” – Ray Allen, Professional Basketball Player
10. “A brand is no longer what we tell the consumer it is – it is what consumers tell each other it is.” – Scott Cook, Co-Founder of Intuit
Social Media Marketing Quotes
11. “When I hear people debate the ROI of social media? It makes me remember why so many businesses fail. Most businesses are not playing the marathon. They’re playing the sprint. They’re not worried about lifetime value and retention. They’re worried about short-term goals.” – Gary Vaynerchuk, CEO of VaynerMedia
12. “A large social-media presence is important because it’s one of the last ways to conduct cost-effective marketing. Everything else involves buying eyeballs and ears. Social media enables a small business to earn eyeballs and ears.” – Guy Kawasaki, Chief Evangelist, Canva
13. “Facebook is a discovery model platform. Its primary goal is to make the audience happy. So you’ll only get ROI if you create quality content for your audience.” –
Kelly Hendrickson, Facebook Lead at HubSpot
14. ‘Instead of getting discouraged when a promising tweet doesn’t rack up the likes and retweets, pay attention to the clicks and check how long people stay on the page after coming from social. If your post is generating strong engagement, don’t worry so much about the superficial stats.” – Tallie Gabriel, Producer at Unthinkable Media
15. “When pitching to press outlets, you need to help drive traffic through social to make it worth the effort of PR professionals. In addition to traditional outlets, publications are now generating traffic from native content within social platforms. So if you want to engage with members of the press and PR professionals today, you need to analyze their social media pages to learn what kind of content they’re sharing — before pitching.” – Ryan Bonnici, CMO at G2Crowd
16. “When it comes to social media marketing, you don’t have to post 3 times a day. It’s never about how often you post but the quality of your content.” – Janet Benson Amarhavwie, Social Media Manager
17. “You have to stop doing what everyone else is doing. Listen to your gut, go in a new direction, do something you’ve never done before. Learn from the best. Success is yours if you go in your own direction.” – Amanda Weinraub, Business Owner, Social Media Manager, Web Designer
Funny Social Media Quotes
Quick Note:
We found these quotes on Pinterest. The authors are unknown, but they’ll still give you a good laugh.
18. “What happens on social media stays on Google forever.”
19. “Being famous on Instagram is basically the same thing as being rich on Monopoly.”
20. “I do not have a fake social media personality. I am genuinely this ridiculous in real life.”
21. “Tumblr is currently the only social media network that your parents haven’t ruined.”
22. “I log off because I’m bored. I log back on in five minutes because I’m bored.”
23. “For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction, plus a social media overreaction.”
24. “Thank God for Facebook or I’d have to call 598 people and tell them how far I ran today.”
Editor’s note: This post was originally published in February 2019 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

Best Stock Photo Sites

Negative Space
Death to Stock
HubSpot
Picjumbo
Stokpic
CreateHER Stock
Kaboompics
Startup Stock Photos
Freerange
LibreShot
nappy
Fancy Crave
Unsplash
StockSnap.io
The Jopwell Collection
SplitShire
Life of Pix
Pexels
Gratisography
Jay Mantri
ISO Republic
PICNOI
New Old Stock
Pixabay

I got the image above for free on Unsplash.
Yet for some reason, many other publishers continue to push out cheap (and usually cheesy) stock photography to serve as a representation of their brand.

The truth is, high-quality stock photos don’t have to come hand-in-hand with a hassle or high price tag.

To prove it, we’ve compiled a list of awesome resources for free, high-quality stock images for websites, blogs, and similar online properties.
From enviable office spaces to stunning scenery, we’re certain you’ll find exactly what you’re looking for with the help of this roundup.

Best Free Stock Photo Websites for Royalty-Free Images
1. Negative Space

Negative Space offers up new free stock photos every week. All of its photos are shared without copyright restrictions, meaning you’re free to use them however you please.
From architecture to technology, Negative Space’s continuously growing collection of images is one you’ll find yourself tapping into again and again. The best part? It’s easy to filter through the gallery of photos, which are sortable by category, copy space position, and color.
Click here to view the full license details.
2. Death to Stock

When founders and photographers, Allie and David, noticed how challenging it was for businesses, bloggers, and creatives to find free high-quality images that fit their “vibe and tribe,” they stepped in.
As a result, Death to Stock was born. Simply submit your email and enjoy a new batch of photos delivered to your inbox every month.
If you do have some extra budget to spend, Death to Stock also offers a Premium membership for $15/month or $180/year. The cool part about the paid membership is that a percentage of the profit is used to fund photography trips and other creative projects to keep the resource moving forward.
Click here to view the full license details.
3. HubSpot

When we noticed there was a shortage of high-quality free stock photos available to marketers and creatives, we decided to whip up some of our own.
We’re a bit biased (since many of our own employees appear in these photos), but we think these images can help you snazz up your site or marketing materials.
Check out the following collections to get your fix:

82 Free Stocks Photos You’ve Been Searching For
250 Holiday-Themed Photos

4. Picjumbo

Need free images for your next website design or blog post? Look no further than picjumbo.
With new photos added daily, there is a wide selection of high-quality images to fit a variety of different topics.
The photographer, Vicktor, also offers unique paid packages for bloggers, designers, and agencies (starting at $10/month).
Click here to view the full license details.
5. Stokpic

Photographer Ed Gregory generously dishes up 10 new photos every two weeks that you can use on your website, as part of a template, in an ad, and … well, pretty much anywhere.
You can check out his latest 100 pictures here, or browse through categories like landscapes, people, and technology until you find the perfect fit.
Click here to view the full license details.
6. CreateHER Stock

CreateHER Stock is a stock photography site that features authentic images of Black women created by founder Neosha Gardner. While the pricing at $10 per month, there is a collection of “freebies” that includes more than 185 images. Keep in mind that CreateHER Stock is not intended for commercial use without an extended license.
Click here to view the full license details.
7. Kaboompics

Karolina, a web designer from Poland, is the creative eye behind this awesome resource for high-quality photos. From fashion to food to landscapes, her images cover a variety of different scenarios. And users have the freedom to use them for anything they’d like — commercial or not.
While there are no formal attribution requirements, Karolina does ask that you include photo credit with a link back to the site when possible. This request will help her grow the website, and in turn, provide even more awesome photos for everyone to use.
Click here to view the full license details.
8. Startup Stock Photos

“Take ’em, these things are free. Go. Make something.”
While the name is specific to startups, there are plenty of professional options to use no matter what industry you’re operating within.
Click here to view the full license details.
9. Freerange

All of the photos on the Freerange website come from a pool of both in-house photographers, as well as a growing community of external contributors.
Not only is there a lot to choose from, but the photos are good quality, too: “Images provided directly (in-house) by Freerange Stock originate one of two ways. They are either digitally photographed on Canon DSLR cameras or they are a high resolution (4000 dpi) Nikon scan of an original 35mm slide,” according to the site’s ‘About Us’ section.
Click here to view the full license details.
10. LibreShot

Photographer and SEO Consultant Martin Vorel is the creative force behind the stunning photos available on this site.
From crisp architectural shots to vibrant florals, Vorel’s collection of photos contains some of the most unique selections we’ve come across.
Click here to view the full license details.
11. nappy

nappy is a free stock photo site on a mission: “To provide beautiful, high-res photos of black and brown people to startups, brands, agencies, and everyone else.”
On their site, they talk about how many stock photo sites depict unrealistic representation, and if they don’t, there’s often a lack of diversity in the people being depicted. This presents a real problem for creators who are intentional about representation in articles, designs, and ads. nappy calls on their audience to “tackles diversity and representation one photo at a time.”
Best of all, their library is completely free.
Click here to view the full license details.
12. Fancy Crave

Not only are the photos on Fancy Crave free of copyright restrictions, but they’re also pretty remarkable. (Can’t you practically taste those green grapes?)
All the photographer asks is that you never advertise the photographs as your own, and provide attribution when and if you can.
With two new photos uploaded daily to keep things feeling fresh, this is a bookmark-worthy resource for great photos if we’ve ever seen one.
Click here to view the full license details.
13. Unsplash

Unsplash serves up 10 new “do whatever you want” photos every 10 days.
What we love most about this resource is the uniqueness of the photos. With pages upon pages to choose from, you won’t run into any cheesy, “Smiling Boss Shaking Hands With Male Employee” shots.
Not to mention, every photo published on Unsplash is licensed under Creative Commons Zero, which provides users with the freedom to copy, modify, distribute, and use all of the photos without permissions or attribution.
Click here to view the full license details.
14. StockSnap.io

StockSnap.io proudly claims that it’s “not your typical crappy stock photo site.” And we couldn’t agree more.
In fact, its selection is so interesting and versatile that it’s almost too easy to “fall down the rabbit hole” and come to fifty-something scrolls later.
Click here to view the full license details.
15. The Jopwell Collections

Image Source
Jopwell is a career advancement platform for people of color, helping brands recruit and retain diverse candidates. Their slogan is “Representation matters,” and as part of that commitment, they’ve created a collection of stock photos that feature people of color in the workplace.
The images are free to use as long as there’s a visible attribution to Jopwell.
Click here to view the full license details.

16. SplitShire

SplitShire offers a ton of awesome free photos for you to use without commercial restrictions. Powered by Italian photographer Daniel Nanescu, all of the images available on the website are “made with love” — and it shows.
From stunning portraits to sleek work stations, we’ve got a feeling you won’t have any trouble finding the perfect photo for your next project or blog post.
Click here to view the full license details.
17. Life of Pix

Brought to you by Leeroy Advertising Agency in Montreal (and its network of talented photographers), Life of Pix is home to some awesome high-resolution photos.
All of the images are donated to the public domain, and are available for personal and commercial use.
As if that wasn’t enough, Life of Pix also has a counterpart, Life of Vids. According to its website, Life of Vids serves up free footage videos, clips, and loops, weekly. Like the images, the video content contains no copyright restrictions, and can be easily downloaded on its Vimeo account.
Click here to view the full license details.
18. Pexels

These photos are carefully handpicked from a variety of free image sources to ensure that you’re getting only the best of the best.
All of the photos that make the cut are under the Creative Commons Zero license, meaning that they are free for personal and commercial use with no attribution required. And thanks to its search functionality, turning up the right photo for your next project is super easy.
Click here to view the full license details.
19. Gratisography

With new photos added weekly, Gratisography is another awesome website serving up high-resolution photos covered under the Creative Commons Zero license.
All of the photos are taken by Ryan McGuire, a “whimsically creative visual artist, based in Ithaca, NY.” And while these photos are a bit more quirky (we’re talking everything from monster feet slippers to Vespas to bananas), they are entirely usable for the right project.
Click here to view the full license details.
20. Jay Mantri

Designer Jay Mantri has built up an impressive gallery of professional, quality images just for you and me … and everyone else.
If I had to describe Mantri’s photos in one word, it’d be “scenic.” But don’t just take my word for it. Go see for yourself.
Click here to view the full license details.
21. ISO Republic

ISO’s Republic’s mission is to “provide high-quality images to be used by designers, developers, bloggers, marketers, and social media teams.”
And all it takes is one quick scan of the website to know that it is succeeding in doing just that. (So much so that it’s hard to believe the images are free)
For those looking for access to more exclusive free photos, ISO Republic invites you to sign up for its email list and receive photos right to your inbox.
Click here to view the full license details.
22. PICNOI

Image Source
PICNOI is a free stock photo site “for a colorful world.” The photos feature people of color, and all of the images are free as long as you provide attribution (though you can choose to make a donation to support their mission).
Click here to view the full license details.
23. New Old Stock

Who can resist a good black and white photo?
This collection of vintage photos comes from the public archive via Flickr Commons. According to the website, the photos are free of any known copyright restrictions.
That said, while it’s likely that they are safe to use for things like blog posts and hero images, you’ll want to read up on the rights and usage below before you use them for any type of commercial project.
Click here to view the full license details.
24. Pixabay

Pixabay serves as a repository for a ton of quality photos that released under Creative Commons CC0 into the public domain. The site is clean and intuitive, making it easy to navigate your way through the 780K+ free photos, vectors, and illustrations.
The main search bar even allows you to filter your query down by factors like media type, orientation, color, and minimum dimensions.
Click here to view the full license details.
The perfect image can solidify your design, article, ad, or other creative. Whatever your need, there are many resources for free stock photos out there. 
Editor’s note: This post was originally published in November 2018 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.