This is a guest post from Neil Purcell, CEO of Talent Works International, as part of our Recruiting Weekly Series. Neil shares his thoughts on how to succeed as recruitment becomes more like marketing.
Right now, the recruitment market is a considerable challenge for many employers. The Great Resignation isn’t slowing down, and employers are struggling to retain and attract top talent. With what feels like every employer fighting for the same skills and a limited talent pool, the power undeniably lies with candidates right now. It’s becoming clear that employers need to sell themselves more than ever to be successful and compete against the big household names. Although it’s tempting to try and fill a high volume of roles as quickly as possible, this is becoming increasingly difficult. Putting up a job ad and waiting for candidates to apply is a backwards approach, and it won’t work for everyone. In addition, many scaling businesses do not benefit from the reputation and instant brand recognition to tempt candidates of large tech corporations. As a result, the recruitment process could become longer and more challenging for these lesser-known companies as the demand for talent continues, even though their work is often more exciting.
Therefore, the businesses that will get ahead in 2022 will shift their approach to recruiting talent.
When roles are equal in terms of salary, development opportunities and the position itself, employer branding will differentiate one employer from the next. As the tech recruitment landscape becomes saturated, the attitude to recruiting needs to change. Recruiters can no longer assume that candidates will want to work for them and be desperate to take the role as in previous years. In a candidate-driven market, recruiters need to work harder to promote their open positions, which means tech recruitment is becoming more and more like marketing.
Recruiters must sell a business to a candidate by establishing unique selling points, finding emotional factors that can resonate with candidates, and ensuring that job adverts stand out from the masses posted each day. The goal is no longer finding skilled candidates but convincing them to take the role over another in the same that marketing professionals promote products and services.
Recruitment marketing is no new concept, but it’s more important than ever in the current market. This means involving the broader team in your employer brand strategy and putting as much effort into your recruitment marketing as your corporate marketing. Here are some tips for marketing your employer brand properly and promoting your business to stand out to top talent.
Make your employer brand part of discovery process
Unless you’re an infamous name in the tech field, it’s unlikely that candidates have searched for your vacancies based on your brand. Most candidates find out about opportunities through tech recruiters, job adverts on job boards or social media, they then go through the hiring process, and a decision is made. The employer brand may influence the decision if a candidate is choosing between multiple opportunities, but it doesn’t often play a role in discovering job vacancies.
If you can’t rely on your company name, tech recruiters need to be ready to promote your employer brand and company culture, as this is what will set you apart. Job advertisements need to mention your employer brand and company culture if you wish to connect with the right kind of candidate. Generic job applications will only attract generic talent.
Similarly, if recruiters are reaching out to candidates for initial conversations, they need to express enthusiasm for your employer brand right away. This should be the point that candidates learn about your business, your values, your overall mission and the culture they can expect. This doesn’t mean saying it’s a “social office” and has a “great culture”, as every employer will claim this. Instead, look at your recruitment marketing materials and Employee Value Proposition (EVP) to discover what truly makes your workplace unique and sell this.
Prioritise the right channels
If you need to hire tech talent urgently, there’s no use in overhauling your EVP or building a new careers site. These are more significant projects that will help your overall recruitment strategy in the long term but will take a long time to implement. They won’t have an instant effect and won’t help recruiters instantly. Instead, your hiring teams need to think like marketers once again. Think about where candidates spend time and where they’re most likely to discover your open vacancies or employer branding.
Marketers work on touchpoints, and it’s reported it takes around 8 to make a sale. If you’re looking to entice talent, you need to mirror these marketing touchpoints along the candidate journey. Touchpoints are simply modes of communication between a company and customer, such as online ads, emails, or face-to-face discussions. Therefore, you need to ensure that you’re using the correct channels to reach a broad and diverse range of candidates and that your employer brand messaging is consistent throughout.
If you wish to see tech recruitment success in 2022, you need to think about where your employer brand is visible and how it can be communicated at every possible touchpoint. This will help you remain top of mind for candidates and stand a better chance of receiving applications.
The more specific you are, the better
If you have people trying to sell roles, you need to educate them about the end result. Regardless of whether you’re relying on an RPO provider or in-house talent team, tech recruitment in 2022 will require an in-depth knowledge of your employer brand and what your workplace can offer that’s unique to you. Try to appeal to everyone, and you won’t appeal to anyone. Not everyone wants to work at the same type of company. Certain cultures don’t suit specific candidates; it will only hinder your recruitment and retention if you don’t outline your culture clearly.
In the current talent market, you need to ensure your recruitment marketers, recruiters and interview panels know the details of your EVP and company culture inside out. The quality and depth of your employer brand messaging will determine the quality of hire and their suitability for your business. Much like advertising a product, there are thousands of job vacancies currently out there, and your messaging needs to stand out if you’re going to get attention. A marketing tagline must be catchy and creative; if all products sounded the same, there would be little to no variation for customers to base their choice on. The same goes for your recruitment marketing. If you sound the same as every other tech business out there, why should tech candidates choose you?
It’s clear that as employer branding becomes the differentiating factor for candidates and the tech recruitment landscape becomes more hectic than ever, the attitude to recruiting needs to change. Recruiters can no longer assume that candidates will want to work for them but need to work harder to promote these roles. Tech recruitment is becoming more and more like marketing for an employer.
It means mindsets need to alter, and so do attitudes to work. However, it’s exciting and means that recruitment marketing can come to the fore in 2022.
Neil Purcell, CEO, Talent Works
Talent Works enables organisations to scale through flexible talent attraction solutions. They are allowing businesses of all sizes to realise their true potential through talented people. They combine RPO, Recruitment Marketing and Digital Resourcing solutions that deliver unparalleled results that scale with an organisation’s needs. Most importantly, they place the organisation at the heart of everything they do. Building, enhancing and amplifying employer brand, reflecting culture and ambition.
