What does your employer brand say?

Before you consider complex strategies for candidate attraction, have you made sure your employer brand is reaching its potential?

Every business, with the exception of new start-ups, has some kind of reputation. Whether your reputation is born out of the opinions of current and ex-employees or your customers, effective employer branding will help make you an employer of choice.

Employer branding is a strategy that’s aimed at current and potential talent, so acts as both an attraction and retention tool. The opportunities for earning and career development, in tandem with the perception of the business in a professional context all merge to form the employer brand, and it’s something that requires attention when attracting candidates.

When you implement your employer branding strategy, consider the following.

• Investigate how you’re currently viewed

Find out whether your staff considers you to be an employer of choice by setting up a system that allows open feedback. If current and previous employees aren’t conveying a positive message about you, find out why.

• Do people want to work for you?

Does your company culture make you stand out from your competitors? Figure out what makes you different, and more importantly, better than other organisations in your field; this is what you should be communicating to potential employees.

• Deliver a consistent employer brand message to all your target audiences

When you know who you’re going to aim your message at, you should take the time to decide how you’re going to do it. For instance, social media will be an effective tool for targeting graduates but might not work so well for director level. Just remember the message should stay the same, even though the delivery is different.

• Use social media and your corporate website

Social media is a great tool for projecting your employer brand, but it’s also a very public way for anyone associated with your business to damage your reputation. So, your brand message should always be consistent and you must deliver on anything that you say you will. The information you include on your website needs to align with what you’re projecting on social media sites like LinkedIn and twitter.

• Keep up-to-date

While market trends shift, you may tweak the way you operate, but essentially your corporate identity and values will remain constant. To adhere to this you should make sure the way you deliver your message is current and relevant, even though the message stays the same.

By implementing a strong employer branding strategy you attract more attention from the talent you’re looking to hire.

For more advice on employee attraction take a look at our articles on writing a great job advert and how to attract the best candidates.