The employer brand corresponds to the image of an organization, as an employer, with a specific group of talents. Talents that companies need to operate and innovate.
The stronger an employer brand is, the better the company will be able to attract, hire and retain the best talent available in the job market.
In other words, the employer brand corresponds to the reputation and popularity of your company with potential employees. But it also corresponds to the value it represents for your former and current employees.
In this article, we give a definition of the employer brand and we explain why companies must build their employer brand .
In addition, we explain how to build an employer brand , how to promote it, and give 3 employer brand examples.
Employer Brand: Definition
The employer brand can be defined as the image that a company sends back to its employees and potential recruits. It also designates all communication techniques and strategies aimed at communicating the reputation, development opportunities and values of the company both internally and externally.
From the inside for the well-being of employees and from the outside to attract new talent.
The employer brand therefore makes it possible to attract talent and retain employees by cultivating the values of the company and improving its reputation. In addition, it reinforces the sense of belonging and involvement of employees who have already been hired.
This of course leads to a better presence and greater motivation of the employees and also makes it possible to avoid too high a turnover.
Thus, employer brand refers to how potential recruits, current employees, and retirees view your brand as a workplace . She covers all HR aspects of the business, from recruitment to employee growth.
Why Build an Employer Brand
The results of a company depend on the employees who work there.
Whether for :
- Maintain a good relationship with customers,
- Develop an exceptional product or service,
- Put in place the right marketing strategies,
- Acquire new customers.
Regardless of the objective, employees have a crucial role to play in the success of a business.
To recruit the right people, develop them, and keep their loyalty, having a strong employer brand is necessary .
Avoid turnover risks
What you have to realize is that recruiting talent represents a significant cost for companies. Recruitment takes time. The onboarding of a new employee too.
If a lot of employees leave the company on a regular basis, it may spend too much time recruiting new people instead of focusing on its customers.
And if the company does not have an attractive employer brand, recruiting these talents will take more effort.
According to this LinkedIn report , a company with a stronger employer brand than its competitors can:
- Obtain a 50% reduction in the cost per person recruited.
- Hire the right people twice as fast.
- Reduce turnover by 28%.
- Receive 50% more applications.
These figures show that by investing in your employer brand, you will no longer have to spend on advertising to make your company known to potential recruits.
On the contrary, with a strong employer brand, you automatically attract the best profiles.
Potential candidates will find you and apply to your positions naturally. You won't have to spend so much time looking for your future employees, they will find you themselves.
Thus, having a powerful employer brand is a real asset. Whether in terms of recruitment or employee retention, an employer brand saves time and money.
The importance of your reputation
Today, the majority of applicants find out about the social networks of recruiters before applying.
To give you an idea, 78% of employees are interested in a company's reputation as an employer before applying. Additionally, 82% say they don't want to work for a company with a bad reputation.
This is why it is very important to develop your employer brand on LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, Glassdoor, etc.
These social networks will act as a showcase for your brand. Candidates will be able to use them to get a clear idea of your image on the job market.
Having a strong employer brand, visible online, allows candidates to be reassured and to apply more easily.
Realize compensation savings
Although this is an important factor, the most talented candidates are looking for more than an attractive salary.
According to the statistics , 67% of them would agree to be paid less if the company they are interested in has an excellent reputation. Indeed, talents would be more in search of an organization that offers:
- Opportunities for personal and professional development;
- A good working environment;
- A good reputation in the job market.
Because of this, your business won't have to spend more money than it should.
In addition, if you neglect to develop your employer brand, you risk paying more in salary bonus per recruited candidate.
So, investing in your image gives you a competitive advantage while allowing you to hire the best talent. And this, without necessarily ruining you.
Improve employee engagement
A strong employer brand will make your employees proud to belong to your organization
For most of them, it is essential to integrate a team with a good corporate culture.
This satisfaction will improve their motivation and enthusiasm. They will be more productive, more efficient, and help grow your business.
Your income will increase, which will have the effect of attracting the best profiles, who will see the success of your business. In addition, your employees will also feel more secure in their job.
From then on, your employees will be the first ambassadors of your company. This will have the effect of increasing the rate of recruitment by cooptation. The more positive your employees talk about you, the more good candidates you attract.
It's a virtuous circle. To achieve such a result, do not hesitate to collaborate with experts in brand creation .
How to Build an Employer Brand
Despite all its benefits, building an employer brand takes time and budget. In the rest of this article, we explain how to build your own.
Audit your employer brand
The first step is to assess how your company is perceived by your employees and the talent you want to recruit.
As explained earlier in the article, candidates do their homework before applying to a company.
To do this, they rely on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Glassdoor, Indeed etc. Glassdoor even reports that 70% of people check a company's reputation before applying.
Therefore, to build an attractive employer brand, you must first take stock of the current situation:
- What content is available online that talks about your business?
- How is this content perceived?
- Do you easily get the desired number of applications?
Once you know how your employer brand is perceived today, you can define its direction by defining its key message.
Defining your employer brand message
The second step is to create an authentic message and tone to represent your organization. What message would you like to convey to your employees and future employees?
By defining your message and delivering it, candidates will be better able to know what to expect.
Plus, make sure your brand voice remains consistent across every touchpoint.
Align the messaging on your job postings with your video content, ad campaigns, review platforms, and one-on-one conversations with your recruiting team.
Be present in the right places
Make sure you are where your target is. Whether on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, communicate your message in the right places.
For example, Microsoft uses Twitter to showcase #MicrosoftLife while McDonald's uses Snapchat to reach out to young recruits.
Use the right tools
To build an effective employer brand, it is necessary to use the right tools.
We have already mentioned social networks, but you can also use tools designed for recruitment:
- Glassdoor, which helps build your brand reputation.
- Breezy, to build an effective recruitment process.
- Welcome To The Jungle, which helps build your brand's showcase to potential recruits.
But there are also tools available to improve the experience of your employees within your company. Indeed, the experience that you will provide to your employees contributes enormously to the construction of your employer brand.
At this level, we can cite two tools:
- Lattice, to set goals and track their progress.
- Officiate, to manage all the administrative aspects related to the life of an employee.
Today's top talent is not only interested in the culture of companies, but they also want to know if they are effectively integrating new technologies.
This is why using the right tools can reassure them and show them that you are living with the times.
Review your job offers
Beyond the tools you use, take the time to review your existing job postings to make them more engaging. If they are filled with long paragraphs with technical jargon, you can definitely do better.
Illustrate what your business offers with videos and photos. The time has come to bring your job postings to life. When shooting your video, you must in particular:
- Choose a position and focus on it;
- Interview two people for the same job offer;
- Be specific in your questions;
- Stay authentic and take no more than two minutes;
- Privilege the image, not the words.
Moreover, recruiting a new employee should not only be the responsibility of the HR team. Getting your whole team on board can be effective in getting the most out of your recruiting efforts.
You can include all employees in recruiting initiatives by encouraging them to talk about your company and whether it is currently hiring for a specific role.
Wrap your message with storytelling
Storytelling is the use of story structures in marketing.
So, once you have established contact with the talent you are targeting, maintain the relationship by communicating with them regularly.
For example, you can:
- Tell the story of your employees, present their backgrounds and their goals.
- Explain why your business was created and the goals it wants to achieve.
- Present the challenges you face and how the candidate can help you.
Remember that by using engaging stories, you will more easily attract the profiles you need.
Create an impeccable employee experience
Finally, the last element that you can use to build an employer brand: take care of the experience you offer to employees.
Ask yourself the following questions:
- Do you offer a fulfilling work environment?
- Do you foster the creation of effective relationships among your team members?
- Do your employees have enough freedom to do their jobs as they see fit?
- Do you devote time to organizing team buildings and “outside work” activities?
- Etc.
All of these elements should help you build a pleasant working environment and therefore improve your employer brand. Think that if your employees are happy to work for your company, they will be your best ambassadors.
How to Promote an Employer Brand
Building an employer brand goes hand in hand with promoting it. To be effective, the management of the employer brand translates into HR communication and marketing actions that cover all branches of human resources.
Let's take a look at the different channels you can use to promote your employer brand.
Your employees are your best ambassadors
An employee who feels good about their company is a real asset and an excellent ambassador. There's no better way to improve your employer brand than by having employees who are happy to be at work.
Your website
Your website must intrigue talents, so that they want to work with you.
They want to know what's going on inside your business. Collect stories from your employees and share them with your audience.
Each web page should highlight your values, the advantages and the benefits that your brand offers to its employees.
Use photos of your team, company outings, and community event poster to give candidates a better idea of “work life” at your company.
Social networks
Companies are mostly present on social networks.
On the one hand, the objective is to incorporate them into their marketing strategy and thus significantly increase their visibility.
On the other hand, the objective is to target good candidates by using a simple, effective and economical means.
The social networks most used to find new talent are LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook. Obviously, you don't have to limit yourself to these, but note that the networks you choose should reflect your employer brand.
The content you publish must also present or highlight:
- Your identity ;
- Your brand culture and values;
- The ambassadors that are your employees and your customers;
- The rewards and successes of your business.
The career site at the center of your strategy
Your social media posts are a great way to draw attention to your brand. However, once potential candidates are interested, they should be redirected to your career site.
The same is true for your recruitment emails, your job offers, your blog articles, etc. And this, so that they see the positions that you offer and that they can apply. To this end, it is imperative that your career site makes a good impression on them.
You should know that 85% of job seekers say they visit a company's career site before applying for a position.
Thus, it is imperative that yours can convince them to turn to your proposals. With this in mind, clearly describe the position to be filled to attract the attention of people who do not know your company.
In addition to the description of your job offers, also offer them a good user experience and additional content.
Therefore, write blog articles about your projects and your objectives, present your teams and their expertise, post quality photos, etc.
The goal is to get candidates to imagine themselves working for your brand.
Mobile first
Mobile phones have revolutionized the way we communicate, but also the way we access information.
Nowadays, we can follow the news, send and consult emails, but also consult job offers from a smartphone.
However, few companies consider adapting their career site to mobile. This type of neglect can negatively impact the perception of an employer brand and how candidates will interact with it.
The applicant integration process
Hiring the right candidates is not enough, you still have to learn how to keep them. Companies with a good onboarding process are more likely to retain new employees.
Moreover, it will also allow you to have additional ambassadors for your brand.
The onboarding process is all the more important as new employees are able to quit a job after a bad first day.
Effective integration should also be consistent with your branding on your career site.
3 Examples of Employer Branding
So far, we've covered the following:
- Definition of the employer brand
- Why it is important
- How to build it
- The tools to promote it
Before concluding this article, let's see 3 examples of employer branding that you can take inspiration from.
Uber
Uber has understood the importance of developing its employer brand, by broadcasting this video:
And for good reason, social media has supported the increase in transparency around the work experience. This is why there is increasing emphasis on the importance of human resource management and improving your brand image as an employer.
LVMH
Today, LVMH builds its employer brand with a very wide variety of content. The podcast is one of them.
With “ Tips to the Top ”, LVMH gives the floor to 12 of its employees, who recount their journeys and the pivotal moments of their careers.
This podcast allows LVMH to build its employer brand, by giving voice to those who build the group on a daily basis.
HubSpot
After video and audio, it's time to move on to writing! And with its Culture Code Deck, HubSpot is a great example of a company taking the time to build its employer brand.
In 128 pages, HubSpot presents its mission, vision, and values for establishing a strong employer brand. Today, HubSpot's reputation is second to none.
Employer Brand: Conclusion
Regardless of their size and industry, all companies are affected by employer branding.
It is true that its management requires a certain investment and many SMEs are not aware of its importance. Their priorities are elsewhere, and often no budget is allocated to them.
However, SMEs need to strengthen their employer brand more than ever to gain visibility.
They are generally little known to young candidates, despite what they can bring them in terms of skills and experience.
It is therefore necessary that they take care of their image and that they rely on a strong employer brand in order to be able to recruit the members of the next generation of talent.
