What is Behind-the-Scenes Content?

What is Behind-the-Scenes Content?

Behind-the-scenes content pulls back the curtain on your business — showing how products are made, how your team works, office culture, decision-making processes, and the messy reality that polished marketing hides.

It’s the opposite of perfectly curated content. BTS content is raw, relatable, and real. A video of your team packing orders at midnight. A photo of the whiteboard during a brainstorm session. A Story showing the 5 failed attempts before the perfect shot. Audiences crave this because it makes brands feel human.

Sprout Social’s 2024 data found that 64% of consumers want brands to connect with them authentically. BTS content is one of the most reliable ways to do that.

Why Does Behind-the-Scenes Content Matter?

Trust is built through transparency. BTS content is transparency in action.

• Authenticity — In an era of polished ads and filtered content, raw BTS footage stands out. It signals: “We’re real people, not a marketing department”
• Higher engagement rates — BTS posts consistently outperform product posts on engagement. People love seeing the human side of businesses
• Brand voice reinforcement — BTS content shows your culture, values, and personality in a way that scripted content can’t
• Low production cost — BTS content is expected to be informal. A phone camera and natural lighting are all you need. No designer required

For small businesses and local brands, BTS content is the easiest way to compete with bigger brands on social media.

How Behind-the-Scenes Content Works

Choose What to Show

Product creation processes, team meetings, packaging and shipping, office tours, event prep, bloopers, and “day in the life” formats all work. Anything that answers the question: “What actually goes on here?”

Keep It Raw

Don’t over-edit BTS content. The whole point is authenticity. Quick phone videos, casual photos, and real-time Stories perform better than produced clips. People can smell a fake “behind the scenes” a mile away.

Post Regularly

Make BTS a recurring part of your content mix. One BTS post per week keeps your brand feeling approachable. Use Stories for daily micro-BTS moments and feed posts for bigger BTS narratives.

Behind-the-Scenes Content Examples

A local bakery films a 15-second TikTok of their baker hand-rolling croissants at 4 AM. No music, no effects — just the sound of dough and a dark kitchen. The video gets 180,000 views and 4,000 likes. People love seeing the craft.

A SaaS company posts a LinkedIn photo of their whiteboard after a strategy session, with the caption: “This is what planning our next quarter actually looks like.” It generates 150 comments from other founders sharing their own messy planning processes.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

Social media mistakes are expensive because they waste time — the one resource you can’t buy back.

Posting without a strategy. Random posts at random times about random topics. Without content pillars and a consistent schedule, you’re shouting into the void. The algorithm rewards consistency. Give it what it wants.

Ignoring engagement signals. Posting and ghosting. The platforms reward accounts that respond to comments, participate in conversations, and create community. A post with 50 comments beats a post with 500 likes in most algorithms.

Chasing followers instead of fans. 1,000 engaged followers who buy from you are worth more than 100,000 passive followers who scroll past. Focus on engagement rate, not follower count.

Key Metrics to Track

Metric	What It Measures	Good Benchmark
Engagement rate	Interactions ÷ impressions	1-3% (Instagram), 0.5-1% (LinkedIn)
Reach	Unique people who saw content	Growing month over month
Save rate	% who saved your post	1-3% indicates high-value content
Share rate	% who shared your content	Strong signal of viral potential
Follower growth rate	Net new followers per period	2-5% monthly is healthy
Link clicks	Clicks to website from social	Track with UTM parameters

Platform Comparison

Platform	Best For	Content Type	Audience
Instagram	Visual brands, lifestyle	Reels, Stories, carousels	18-34 age group
TikTok	Discovery, virality	Short-form video	16-30 age group
LinkedIn	B2B, thought leadership	Articles, documents, polls	Professionals 25-55
YouTube	Long-form, tutorials	Video (Shorts + long)	All demographics
X (Twitter)	News, conversations	Text, threads	News-oriented users

Real-World Impact

The difference between businesses that apply behind-the-scenes content and those that don’t shows up in hard numbers. Companies with a structured approach to this see 2-3x better results within the first year compared to those who wing it.

Consider two competing businesses in the same industry. One invests time in understanding and implementing behind-the-scenes content properly — tracking performance through short form video, adjusting based on data, and iterating monthly. The other takes a “set it and forget it” approach. After 12 months, the gap between them isn’t small. It’s often the difference between page 1 and page 4. Between a full pipeline and a dry one.

The compounding nature of social media marketing means early investment pays disproportionate dividends. A 10% improvement this month doesn’t just help this month — it lifts every month that follows.

Step-by-Step Implementation

Getting started doesn’t require a massive overhaul. Follow this sequence:

Step 1: Audit your current state. Before changing anything, document where you stand. What’s working? What’s clearly broken? What metrics are you currently tracking (if any)? This baseline matters — you can’t measure improvement without it.

Step 2: Identify quick wins. Look for the lowest-effort, highest-impact changes. These are usually things that are misconfigured, missing, or simply not being done at all. Fix these first. They build momentum.

Step 3: Build a 90-day plan. Map out the larger improvements across three months. Prioritize by impact, not by what seems most interesting. The boring foundational work often produces the biggest results.

Step 4: Execute consistently. This is where most businesses fail. Not in planning — in execution. Set a weekly cadence. Block the time. Do the work. Behind-the-Scenes Content rewards consistency more than brilliance.

Step 5: Measure and adjust. Review your metrics monthly. What moved? What didn’t? Double down on what works. Cut what doesn’t. This review loop is what separates professionals from amateurs.

Tools and Resources

Tool	Purpose	Price
Meta Ads Manager	Facebook + Instagram ads	Free (pay for ads)
Buffer	Social scheduling	Free tier available
Canva	Graphic design for social	Free tier available
Sprout Social	Enterprise social management	From $249/month
theStacc	SEO content that feeds social channels	From $99/month

Frequently Asked Questions

What kind of BTS content performs best?

Process videos (how things are made), team moments, and “day in the life” content tend to get the most engagement. Anything that feels genuine and unscripted resonates.

Do customers actually care about BTS content?

Yes. Consumers report higher trust in brands that show their process and people. It’s especially powerful for local businesses, D2C brands, and companies with a strong company culture.

How do you create BTS content without it feeling forced?

Capture real moments as they happen rather than staging them. Keep your phone handy. Film the actual messiness of work. If you’re thinking about lighting and angles, it’s probably not genuine BTS.

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Sources

• Sprout Social: Consumer Authenticity Report
• HubSpot: Behind-the-Scenes Content Ideas
• Later: BTS Content Strategy