Better brand, best talent: use your brand to attract candidates.
These days, attracting the best talent is about more than just offering a good salary and package of benefits. Because choosier candidates now make their decisions based on multiple factors – from culture and progression opportunities to flexibility and purpose – only the employers with the best brands will secure the strongest candidates.
Your employer brand is similar, albeit slightly different, to your corporate brand. Your corporate brand is how you are perceived by customers and other stakeholders; your employer brand is how you are perceived by existing staff and potential employees. Both can be positive or negative, both can be impacted by a number of factors within and outside of your control, and both can be continuously developed in order to ensure your business stays ahead of its competitors.
Here are just some of the ways you can use a positive employer brand to attract the best candidates:
Encourage employees to leave reviews
Nothing is stronger for an employer brand than strong endorsements from employees. Encouraging your staff to leave reviews on sites such as Glassdoor will help candidates to build an understanding of what your company is like to work for. Of course, there is a risk with any anonymous review process that your employees will leave negative comments if they are unhappy, but this should be considered a learning experience. You’ll know what’s wrong and how to fix it, which is important for your overall company culture and staff happiness, not just your brand perception.
Manage your online reputation
Along the same lines, managing your online reputation is important. If your Glassdoor or Indeed profile is full of negative reviews without any thoughtful responses from your business, your brand may be adversely impacted. If your social media accounts feature negative reviews from customers or employees, or they simply aren’t up to date, this can also impact your reputation. Do an audit of your online presence to establish if there are any areas of improvement, and make fixing them one of your top priorities.
No online reputation whatsoever is also a very red flag: a business without a digital presence is likely to put top candidates off, because they can’t do their research.
Have values and personality
A potential candidate wants to know what it’s like to work for your business, not just any business. Try to inject your values and brand personality into your communications. If a witty tone of voice is your thing, put amusing copy in your job ads. If your inclusive culture is your top priority, tell people about it during that first phone call. If your flexible working arrangements are second to none, put them at the top of your list of perks. And if your quirky staff are the best thing about your business, ensure candidates get to walk the floors of your building when they interview so that they can meet these great people – and see how they work – first hand.
Improve the candidate experience
The candidate experience is everything a job seeker undergoes when applying for a role with your business. This starts with the first time they view you as a prospective employer (which could be when they see your vacancy, but it may even be beforehand when they follow you on social media or visit your website) and includes every step along the way, physical and digital. A seamless and efficient candidate experience gives the impression of a seamless and efficient business. A poor experience – maybe being met by a rude staff member, being asked a bad question at interview or going through a clunky outdated application process – can put a candidate off wanting to work for you. Ensure you regularly audit your candidate experience and aim to continuously improve it from beginning to end.
If you apply the same effort to building your employer brand as you do to your corporate brand, you’ll attract the top tier of candidates in no time. Optimum Recruitment are here to advise you on every element of your employer brand, and can support you in making the necessary adjustments to secure that exceptional talent. To find out more, please do get in touch.
Posted By: Abigail Simpson
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