Build it and they will come…
Building an effective employer brand is increasingly essential in attracting talent. It provides a common focal point during times of change and helps to support the kind of internal commitment required to genuinely ‘live the brand’.
Like curating content as part of any marketing strategy your main goal is to educate your audience, resulting in lead generation. Building a strong employer brand allows you to educate your audience about your company and tell your story resulting in candidate generation.
In concrete terms:
- Companies with strong employer brands have 28% lower turnover rates.
- The cost per hire is over 2 times lower for companies with strong employer brands.
- Employees working for companies where the employer brand matches their experience of working there are 22% more likely to recommend their organisation as a good place to work
Given the scale of challenges and uncertainties that today’s companies face in the recruitment market, it is little wonder that employer branding is one of the ‘must-have’ strategies that companies are adapting for future success. With 80% of talent professionals believing that employer branding is a key driver of making quality hires, companies are increasingly setting up dedicated teams to manage employer branding alone. But what evidence is there that candidates want to hear your story, what is it that they want from you and what should you be doing to create a unique candidate experience?
The Power Of Your Story
“Data can persuade people, but it does not inspire them to act; to do
that, you need to wrap your vision in a story that fires the imagination and stirs the soul…” Harvard Business Review.
This shouldn’t come as a huge surprise that 75% of job seekers consider an employer’s brand before even applying for a job.
Trying to stand out in a sea of competitors can be difficult. Grabbing the attention of your audience is important, holding it is vital. Having a relatable story that engages with their empathy is key as it feels like they are experiencing your story with you. Findings from a Stanford research study found that statistics on their own have a retention rate of 5 – 10%, but when brought together with anecdotes, retention rate rises to 65 – 70%.
Like any story, we identify with characters, in this case, your employees. Allowing them to tell their authentic stories creates empathy which transfers to your brand which is at the center of your story. This allows your audience to feel more like a participant in the action rather than just a spectator and makes your brand and your story relatable. Stories allow people to persuade themselves. Do everything you can to tell better stories and you will find that you will captivate and attract great talent.
As figure 1 and figure 2 illustrate, there is clearly a very strong relationship between knowledge of a company brand and knowledge of it as an employer Simply put, the more people learn about a company in general, the more likely they are to learn about it as an employer; and any positive impression they develop towards its offerings impacts their perceptions of the company’s employer brand. Storytelling enables you to do this and gives you a great position in the market to hire the best talent.
Source(Linkedin: Why Employer branding matters)
Driving Your Story
According to a recent study of 300 participants getting sufficient information about the company and the role is the most important driver of candidate experience. Candidates surveyed also revealed that they don’t want to just see a corporate careers page when looking for more information as they are more than likely going to experience a content gap and in turn will have a poor candidate experience.
Candidates are looking for a platform full of rich media and stories that they can relate to. 64% of job seekers surveyed by the talent board listed career sites as a top channel when looking for new opportunities. However, 57% of those candidates said that companies weren’t sharing their stories on those pages leaving a clear content gap resulting in an enormous drop off rate. This wasn’t the only area that candidates wanted to be improved in their job search they also highlighted that there is a persuasion gap and that sufficient information needed to be provided to help with that.
Filling In The Gaps
Every company is different there is no one size fits all script when telling your story. Creating authentic stories that relate back to your employer brand is what is needed and helps to fill and close the gaps in terms of content ad persuasion driving candidates to take action. Creating a persuasive story does have the foundations of five characteristics which are:
- A narrative – make sure there is a clear outline to your story
- Authenticity – don’t script, make sure all of your stories being told feel real and come from real people.
- Detail – Don’t cut corners on details
- Meaningful Challenges – Give people an overview of what it is like to work for your company and give them a sense of challenges that were overcome
- Practical Tips – Give the reader/viewer advice on your recruitment process
In sum, many more companies are now focusing on their employer branding to attract and retain the talent they need to succeed. However, there are still some significant gaps between content and persuasion. While it clearly takes time to become a leading employer of choice, we believe that adopting these practices will significantly help companies achieve this goal.
