It’s no secret that the competition for candidates can be a fierce one. When you have an important vacancy to fill you can find yourself up against hundreds of other companies in the area, tenacious recruitment consultants and all number of Social Media campaigns that can distract those candidates away from recognising you as a contender! If you want to stand a chance in attracting these individuals then it really is vital that you not only nail your Employer Branding, but you invest in your Recruitment Marketing Strategy also.
The first thing you need to consider is ‘Who is creating your employer brand’? This usually boils down to a combination of the HR department, marketing team and CEO’s of the business. Before you even begin to think about marketing your employer brand you must decide what this brand actually is, and most importantly ensure this is consistent throughout the whole company. If you’re unsure where to start ask yourself this question: Why would someone want to work for you? This often includes: compensation and benefits, corporate reputation and culture, level of leadership within the company, working environment as well as your current recruitment and induction processes. Look to your HR / internal communications team as they will know first hand what your employees value the most.
Once you establish the key components you need to decide ‘How you are communicating your Employer Brand’? The best places for you to target are: Your company careers / work for us page, social media, events such as careers fairs and external companies that can help your recruitment marketing. This can involve a mixture of content to build awareness of your brand.
g. videos / interviews with your current employees, blogs written about what it’s like to work for you or first hand experience from new or established employees, images / evidence of company perks or social activities etc. Once you have solid Employer Brand Content behind your company you can begin to share this through Social Media / Networks / targeted marketing campaigns. It’s important to get creative here: “Don’t fish where everyone else is fishing” and consider channels that aren’t oversaturated by the competition to market through.
So ‘Why doesn’t everyone focus on enhancing their Employer Brand’? This is still a new concept for many people, some of the main challenges in this sector are: Engagement in the process from Senior Leadership, Obtaining an Adequate Budget, and communicating your employer branding across different departments. In short many companies are already stretched in employee time / marketing budget to focus on this. Luckily if you fall victim of this there are companies such as Job Holler that can market your employer brand for you at a manageable monthly cost!
‘What benefits do companies have from a strong Employer Brand’? Improving your employer brand and effectively marketing this to your target audience will not only help you attract the candidates you want, but it will also result in a decreased time to fill of your vacancies, increase unsolicited CV’s when you don’t have those active vacancies and in turn result in a higher job acceptance rate. Coming from a recruitment environment you see how tough competition is for companies looking to hook the best candidates. Salary isn’t enough, candidates want to be excited by the job role itself, go to companies with the right cultural fit and have an insight into the working environment before they even go for the interview! If you can effectively market this then you will increasingly on board talented people that will fit into your company culture, and weed out those that wouldn’t be suitable. At the end of the day there is no right or wrong company culture – a recruitment agency can be fast-paced, sales orientated and involve long hours where as a digital marketing agency can be relaxed, creative with a focus on flexible working. We’re all different and the key is using this information to attract and retain staffs that are the right cultural fit for you.
Sophie Heaton (Digital Campaign Manager)
