Shawnee Love   •  
April 13, 2018

A study in 2015, said that 63% of job seekers in Canada care about the employer brand of the companies they consider working for. That translates into almost two thirds of job seekers checking out your company before they apply and/or join.

How do they check you out?  By asking employees, employee alumni, suppliers, and customers, and by googling your company.  Googling will point candidates to your company website, relevant news or press releases, awards, and social media as well as link candidates to sites like Glassdoor for reviews of your company.  If you haven’t visited Glassdoor, I strongly encourage you go see what employees (past and present) might have said about you, because Glassdoor allows people to comment on their companies, bosses and work environments.

It is easier than ever to find out the skinny on how a company treats its employees, and that is why building your employer brand is partially about telling your story, and mainly about having a good story to tell (covered in our next blog).

For today, I am encouraging you to tell your story well on and offline.

For online, we recommend:

• Having a website (A MUST) which talks about what your company does, what it is trying to achieve, what it believes in, who you like to hire, what you offer to employees, and what kind of culture and work environment you have.
• Sharing job postings which appeal to the type of people you want and encourages them to apply,
• Leveraging social media to talk about your initiatives, activities, causes, accomplishments, awards, successes, challenges overcome, and personal stories (and share job postings too).

For offline, ensure you have:

• Good facilities and a comfortable and pleasant work setting.  Clean, bright, and well maintained buildings, modern furniture, equipment, and technology, kitchens, open gathering places, etc. all create a place people want to come to work.
• Signage and marketing collateral (brochures, ads, swag) which are appealing to the eye and good quality.
• Leaders and managers who are ambassadors for your company and represent you well.

Not only will your employment brand help people self select, but it can also encourage those who are a good fit to keep looking to your company for opportunities which helps build your candidate pipeline in the long term as well.

Finally, your employment brand is often the first touchpoint that potential employees have with your company.  What they hear and see from others and/or in the media is how they first learn of you. And we all know, you only get one chance to make a first impression.  Strive to make your employment brand one that leaves a great taste in people’s mouths and keeps them coming back for more.