How to Use Employer Branding to Become a Talent Magnet

Recruiters at Google probably have a much easier time of it than you!

It’s not because they’re necessarily any better at their job, it’s because Google’s employer brand is so strong.

The company has become THE place to work for many great engineers. Everyone has heard of Google and the exciting projects that it’s working on, (self driving cars being perhaps the most famous.)

Therefore, whenever a sourcer reaches out to a top candidate, they’re already predisposed to listen to whatever it is they have to say.

This is the power of branding!

You may not have the resources or reputation of Google, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t build an awesome brand.

Below are 3 immediate steps you can take to build your employer brand and become a talent magnet.

1. Build your company’s brand on social media

Whatever you think about the value of social recruiting, it’s undeniable that social media is an excellent tool for brand amplification.

The network you target should be closely aligned with your talent strategy - i.e. who are you trying to hire.

We’re going to look at LinkedIn as a case study, but the tips and tactics here can be applied across a range of other platforms.

Case Study: LinkedIn

The sheer quantity of talent on LinkedIn, (there are 364 million professional members), makes it pretty essential to have a strong brand presence on the network.

As a brand it all starts with your company page - it’s a pretty basic first step, but (if used correctly) it’s a great way to share updates and engage candidates.

Engagement is the golden metric when it comes to social media - it’s one of the best barometers of success.

It also has a genuine impact on sourcing success. LinkedIn data suggests that people that have interacted with your brand before are 2x as likely to accept cold In-Mails.

The problem is, with all the social noise out there already, it’s hard to get candidates to listen.

To break through, we need to stop treating social networks like a megaphone and get better at starting relationships with candidates.

Here are a few hacks to get you started:

i) Questions and contests

Try asking questions to spark dialogue or inviting candidates to ‘take action’ in competitions.

People tend to feel more valued, and will always respond better when you invite them to offer an opinion.

For example, Hootsuite increased engagement dramatically by asking their audience about their most memorable social media story of the year.

Quick tip:

Be cautious of any ‘trolls’ that may try and destroy your brand and always take the high road if you’re getting asked sensitive questions.

ii) Write updates (that are actually interesting)

Do you think candidates find company updates interesting?

In general, the answer is no, they're just not compelling enough to click on.Companies like Buzzfeed have made an art form out of 'click-bait' titles that capture consumer attention.

People are used to seeing this kind of sensationalist language online, so its no wonder that updates that aren't attention grabbing fall by the wayside.

There are a few (very simple) copywriting tricks that all the best updates share. You can use these tactics to immediately make your updates more interesting and increase click-through rates:

Updates on events that you might be involved with tend to perform particularly well. Take a look at Coca-Cola‘s update below on notable moments Sochi Olympic Games (an event they sponsored), and the positive feedback it has generated in the comments.

iii) Demonstrate your company culture (in the right way)

People want to understand the environment that they will be spending 8+ hours a day in!

Use your LinkedIn page to broadcast your company’s unique selling points.

What’s the best format for this?

Stand out to your audience by using multimedia elements like videos, photos and slideshares.

Visual information is processed far quicker by the human brain - studies suggest it takes as little as 13 milliseconds to register an image!

Volusion uses Slideshare to create and share interactive content to help candidates learn more about their company culture.

Their slideshow of pictures covers a range of team building or cultural activities is a great example of an effective and inexpensive way to promote company culture.

2. Leverage your employees

What do you think candidates trust more - your employees words or your corporate message?

The more you can involve your team and make hiring a company-wide responsibility the better. How do you do this?

i) Incentivise referrals

The simplest (and best) way to bring employees into the hiring process - incentivise them.

The best referral programs are highly visible throughout the organisation - everyone knows about them, and everyone knows exactly what they entail.

We’d recommend offering 1.5x the reward for new technical referrals, (they’re more valuable and the reward should reflect that), and using a 3 month clawback to make sure that you’re not paying out for bad hires.

ii) Webinars & Hangouts

Webinars are typically used by marketing teams to engage a large number of leads or customers at one time, but they can be repurposed as an effective recruiting tool.

Encourage interested candidates to join a webinar where one of your team talks about your company and your cultural values.

This tactic works even better when you involve other members of your team.

Try getting your Head of Engineering to host a Google Hangout for all technical prospects. It’s a great way of giving people insights into your working culture, and really appeals to high quality candidates.

Your sourcers can then use the list of webinar signups as a resource when looking for candidates, (it’s a group of people that have shown an active interest in your brand!)

To get started with this tactic we’d recommend using any of these tools:

iii) Social networks

Encourage your team to be active on a range of social networks.

Monitoring software like Mention or Tweetdeck will let your team keep an eye on brand mentions and help them connect with people who show an interest in your company.

If they have relevant skillsets, the people that interact with your team on social media can be great targets for your recruiting team.

3. Careers Page

Interested candidates will almost always end up on your website, (specifically your careers page.)

Most want to learn as much as they can about your company before they apply.

Ensuring that candidates find what they’re looking for here is essential.

One of the biggest problems we see with careers pages is conversion.

For the majority of companies the only conversion point is the application. The problem here? Most candidates aren’t ready to apply!

As a result, 98% of candidates will leave your page without taking action…

You can change this by offering ‘micro-conversion’ points.

This is another marketing idea repurposed for talent acquisition. Give candidates small ways to interact with your brand that will ultimately lead to an application.

For example:

Let people leave their email to join some kind of talent community. You get a new hiring lead, candidates have a new forum to hear about exciting company updates and relevant information.

Beamery customers will be pretty familiar with this idea - our widget button makes this process pretty seamless (there’s an example on our homepage). Check out a demo if you’re interested in learning more...

Summary

Employer Branding often seems pretty intangible. If you take incremental steps to improve your brand though, you can use it to get real results.

If you want to become a talent magnet, you need to take the necessary steps to get your careers page and social brand up to scratch and make hiring a company-wide priority.