In today’s competitive employment market, organisations aiming to recruit and retain top talent have to make a commitment to maintain a strong Employer Brand.
The main element of employer branding is to develop seriously good storytelling that is authentic, realistic and offers a true insight into the organisation. A candidate who is actively job hunting, will probably review numerous bits of content before they apply for a position or communicate further with an organisation. That information needs to stand out and entice the applicant to engage, but how?
Your Story
Companies are born from many different situations. Some are start-ups from a home office, some are inherited from a long family history. Whatever the back story of an organisation, it is important to pin the reason down that they are in business and find the meaningful story behind it.
In most cases, talent looking to work with an organisation will visit their website. Using this platform as a window into the workings of a business and their team will support a feeling of familiarity and making it interactive, transparent, informative, engaging and easy to navigate will only bolster the positive impression for the user.
The power of video is now recognised in many forms of marketing and should not be feared but embraced. As part of any employer brand strategy, video is definitely in the top 5. Having a welcome message from the CEO, or a 360 of the office will again make the company appear friendly and welcoming but most of all human.
Employee stories
The best way to offer an immersive experience and to attract top talent is to show them the ‘real-life’ work experiences of current employees. Quotes, stats and mission statements have their place, but today’s talent is looking for the whole package, to include a healthy company culture, flexible working and personal development as starters.
Employee advocacy is another crucial part of any employer brand strategy. This is not a quick fix and will take time to build momentum and become a normal part of workplace life. Employees are a company’s biggest asset and they can work as remarkable brand ambassadors. What better way to showcase a company than through the eyes of its happy employees?
Encouraging your team to talk about their position, company training, social events on either on video, social media or the website. These interactions should always be voluntary and not forced upon the employee. It could be as simple as sharing images of doughnuts in a team meeting or a team building event off site. Promoting a culture of trust in employees, in how they portray themselves and what they will say, will help to cement their desire to promote where and who they work with.
Over the next few weeks we will be discussing different elements of employer branding and the connection to recruitment, top talent and the world of work. Have you experienced a great employer brand as we would love to hear about it or would you like more information on how to grow one? Please get in touch as we can help.
