There has been a major shift in the way companies attract top talent as we live in a candidate driven market. Building a strong employer brand is crucial to attracting top talent and reducing the cost-per-hire. Recruiters using antiquated recruitment methods such as “post and pray” often fail to attract top talent from the beginning of the recruitment process.
There are companies that attract talent on basis of their overall brand, however research suggests that a strong employer brand is a better predictor for interest in working at a company. Additionally, 72% of recruitment leaders around the world agree that employer brand has a significant impact on hiring.
Employer branding can be described as a strategy to present a company’s culture and values and the added value these things bring to their employees and how the company differentiates itself from competitors through its Employee Value Proposition (EVP). A strong EVP will communicate the company’s values in way that highlights what makes that workplace unique.
This is especially important for passive candidates, who are not actively looking for a new job. In the war for talent, not only recruiters are looking for the best — so are candidates. People are no longer accept the job but are looking for an employer that adds value to both their professional and personal life. Young talent are highly sensitive to employer branding. People under 40 are 61 percent more likely to have their level of job consideration associated with employer brand (LinkedIn). They are often not receptive to cold calling or emails. By spreading your employer brand, potential candidates become aware of the culture at your company. This makes them more likely to engage with you and ultimately guides them through the recruitment funnel — or they might reach out to you themselves.
A well-established employer brand helps you to target the right people for your company by sending the right messages through the right channels. Based on your candidate’s online behavior, you can target them at the right time and place and know where to get the best return on investment. When you have a clear employer brand, this eliminates the number of applicants who fail to meet your general requirements. Lastly, by communicating your standards and values, you will also attract the right candidates as they’ll have a clear and realistic understanding of what they can expect from your company.
Focusing on your employer brand will reduce your cost per hire in several ways. When you focus on your employer brand, a single creative framework with a shared selection of high-quality creative assets, rather than taking a more localised and ad hoc approach, you can save a significant amount of money. In organisations with strong employer brand the average cost-per-hire is two times lower than in companies with a moderate to poor employer brand. This is especially true for mid career candidates. For these candidates, it typically requires a salary increase or added benefits to convince them to leave their current position. For a company with a strong employer brand, the value of the conversion premium to attract mid-career candidates is half of what is demanded from an employer considered to have a poor employer brand. Besides reducing the cost-per-hire, investing in your employer brand will also help maintain your talents.
Social media is an excellent medium to empower your employer branding. To communicate with your potential candidates on social media you need to establish a consistent style and tone of your employer brand and create great content. Your tone of voice should be unique and set you apart from competitors — but most importantly match with your candidate persona. As previously mentioned, it is important that candidates have a clear vision of what life at your company is like. Show your employer brand by sharing photos and videos of your office, cool projects your teams are working on, promotional events, and by telling your potential candidates about any potential perks you have to offer them. In order to gain the awareness of potential clients you need to be present across different channels. However, not all channels are created equal. Where do you need to be? That all depends on your candidate persona. Where does your perfect candidate spend most of their time? That is where you need to be.