by Berfu Sahin – Marketing Executive with RattleBerry
Employer branding is how your company is being viewed by others – current employees, investors, competitors and the public. Most importantly though, it represents your reputation and desirability among potential employees. We hear a lot about this recently, but I wanted to take a look at the real world impact your employer brand can have in reality. What better way to do this than with a real example?
The other day, I was chatting with one of my friends and he was explaining all the interviews that he had for a finance position. He was trying to make the decision which company he will work with. While we were talking about the all potential companies, he said: “I don’t know which one I will work for but it is very important for me to feel like ‘the company needs me as much as I need them, because we will be a team in the future and we will work for the same purpose’.” That is employer branding.
When you hear people talking about a bad interview process, slow-moving recruitment steps or a sloppy exit process from a company; this is employer branding.
When your friends share a post of an on-site or off-site event on Instagram with a caption “I love being a part of this company #BestTeamEver”, this is employer branding.
When a company shows clearly its culture and it influences you – like supporting a diverse employee pool, aiming to increase the education level in undeveloped countries or investing in technology – and when you want to work there one day just because of their culture; this is employer branding.
Employer branding, done right and across the whole spectrum, can clearly deliver a business a competitive advantage in the war for talent, so now more than ever it makes sense to break down why it needs to be part of your HR strategy.
1. You don’t need to offer a huge salary and bonus package to attract the ‘best candidate’ if you have an authentic and strong employer brand.
It is obvious that a great employer brand makes HR professionals’ life easier in many ways: when your competitors pay their employees higher than you do, it doesn’t mean they won’t want to work for your company. A strong and appealing employer brand can make you win against a competitors huge salary and bonus package to its employees.
In 2018, a good reputation and a good culture will help give you the edge in a competitive market.
What can be done?
Job descriptions and career sites are a great way to communicate with your candidates (potential employees) at the early stage. You have a great chance to show you care about them and they are important to you as a part of the family.
Lifestyle benefits, flexible working hours, ability to work from home, maternity/paternity leave are great ways to make them feel important. Criteo’s job descriptions are perfect examples of a strong employer branding.
2. You can increase your employee retention rate with a good employer brand.
Communication is much more important than ever in this age as communicating with the candidates is the first step of your company’s profile. Before recruiting, it’s crucial to set up a clear communication strategy on operational aspects such as the kind of work environment or the kind of organisation the company is. When candidates set their expectations correctly, it will be beneficial for both them and your company. Otherwise, things can go wrong
What can be done?
You should always be honest and open from beginning to the end of the recruitment process. Honesty is crucial at this stage as it will be worse if your candidates realise they made the wrong decision working for your company and begin looking for a new job. This may cause a high employee turnover rate, bad candidate/employee experience and extra time spent to fill the vacancy again.
When you understand what your candidates want you will be in a better position to communicate at the early stages what your company has to offer. such as career advancement, holidays, health club membership, etc.
3. You can reduce your costs and save time with a good employer brand.
When you have vacancies, you know that the right person is out there, but, you don’t know how to find and reach them. What if they reach you before you try to find them?
Companies with a strong employer brand and a good reputation are more likely to spend less on recruitment advertising. A good employer brand acts as a great advertising tool in itself! If you have strong employer branding, active job-seekers will be already checking your current and new vacancies.
The fact that Google gets over 2.5 million applications each year (which is equal to 6,849 per day and about 5 per minute) is a great example.
What can be done?
It would be good to encourage candidates to register for job alerts on your careers site in order to get as many applications when you post a job advertisement. Also, it is good to allow website visitors to upload their resumes and form a talent pool.
4. People talk about you when you have a good employer brand.
People talk and talk… about their life, work, colleagues, boss and so on. Whatever industry a company is in, its employees are its biggest competitive advantage.
When your employees talk about your company and their work, they talk to their friends, families, acquaintances and peers. When they convey an incredible corporate culture, demonstrate passion for your values, it feels more authentic, carries more weight and earns more trust.
This may bring you an increase in referral hires which lowers your cost per hire, more effortless on-boarding and increase in retention.
What can be done?
You can use brand influencers which may bring in 11x the ROI of traditional advertising over the course of a year and you can create shareable brand messages and content by employees (MSL Group).
So, don’t despair, you can win the war of talent if you are willing to be brave, pull back the curtain, be authentic and start promoting your employee promise and story.
About the author
Berfu Sahin is a Marketing Executive at RattleBerry providing modern marketing recruitment solutions. If you are looking for employment or need to hire the best digital, brand, product, experience design and communications professionals RattleBerry can help. Call or email to discuss what new skills you need on your team and how RattleBerry can provide them in a flexible manner.
