If you run a successful business, chances are you take advantage of different avenues to create a brand that attracts customers. This includes social media, content marketing, and enticing advertisements across multiple channels. If you want to attract quality talent to bring your business even more success, you must put just as much effort into your employment branding strategy. In a Hiring Insights eBook recently published by recruiting software company iCIMS, 90% of HR professionals surveyed agreed that having a strong employer brand is more important than it was 5 years ago. And a recent employer branding study from CareerArc found that 75% of job seekers consider an employer’s brand before even applying for a job.
What is Employment Branding?
Employment branding is how a company presents itself to both potential job candidates as well as current employees. A strong employment branding strategy produces a reputation for the company as a great place to work that sets you apart from the competition. As a result, the most qualified candidates feel compelled to apply to your company. Some of the common aspects of a company that makes it a place people want to work at is a positive company culture, attractive benefits and perks, career growth potential, comfortable work atmosphere and work-life balance. Gathering feedback from your current employees as well as candidates that apply and interview at your company is the best way to find out what already makes your company a preferred place to work.
How to Build a Strong Employment Branding Strategy
There are multiple aspects involved in building a strong employment branding strategy. Here are some of the most important you should address:
1) Candidate Experience
If a candidate has a negative experience applying to your company, it can seriously damage your employment brand. Aspects of a poor candidate experience include failing to notify candidates of their application status, making applications too complicated and time-consuming, failing to help candidates feel comfortable during interviews, and not giving feedback after interviews. According to a candidate experience study from CareerArc, 72% of job candidates who have a poor experience will share that experience either online or with someone else directly. That’s an easy way to create a reputation that your company is not a place people want to work.
2) Go the Extra Mile with Social Media
One of the most effective tools to help you create a strong employment branding strategy is social media networks such as LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. But you must go beyond simply creating an account and posting a few updates. It’s important to share interesting and eye-catching content that shows your company is a great place to work. This can include blog articles, videos, infographics, awards your company has won, photos of company events, etc. Take advantage of relevant hashtags when posting jobs, especially on Twitter. Some general ones include #jobseekers, #jobopportunity and #hiring. You can also use hashtags relevant to the type of job you are posting, such as #salesjobs and #retailjobs. Also, social media networks such as Facebook allow you to create a separate page for those interested in working for your company.
3) Employee-Generated Content
The best people to promote your company as a good place to work are the people that already work for you. As part of your employment branding strategy, include employee-generated content on your careers page. You can have employees write reviews or blog articles about what a day in the life of an employee is like, create videos that show your workplace in action, and feature employees who have received recent accolades.
4) Make Job Descriptions More Exciting
You must work your employment brand into job advertisements you are posting on your careers page, online job boards and social media. Go beyond the job description to include the most attractive employee benefits and perks that come with the job, aspects of the company culture that employees are drawn to, and awards or honors your company has received.
5) Build a talent pipeline
One of the reasons it’s so important to create a positive candidate experience as part of your employment branding strategy is that even if an applicant doesn’t get the job they apply for now, they could be perfect for a future role at your company. Keep all those that have previously applied to your company informed of future job openings as well through social media (especially LinkedIn) and regular e-mails with the latest news and content form your company. LinkedIn is also an excellent place to search for and build a network of passive talent that you can draw from when a job opens at your company.
Author: Jessica Cody
Jessica Cody, a native of Fairfield County, Connecticut, has a background in online marketing and public relations. Currently, she works at VHMNetwork LLC in the role of Marketing Analyst. She is a graduate of the University of Connecticut, where she studied Journalism and Political Science. She is also an avid runner with a passion for the outdoors.
