COVID-19 and Hiring: Why Your Employer Brand is More Important than Ever
Many organizations get hung up on how they convey themselves to their target consumer market – and rightfully so. After all, staying in business is impossible without the purchase of products and services.
However, a company is only as strong as its weakest link. Sustaining success with revenue, profits, and brand viability only happens when employing the best available talent.
There’s a caveat to the above notion.
Namely, you must focus on recruiting those high-level workers that bring your organization to the next level. Attracting these individuals necessitates a similar approach to consumer marketing. Potential employees must buy into your organization’s core philosophies.
Given the impact of COVID-19, potential employees now seek out employer brands that have fully and successfully adapted to the pandemic’s circumstances.
Below, we’ll assess why your employer brand is crucial during the current global crisis and how to thrive in the new “normal.”
Be Visible for Your Potential Candidates
The way you market to your pool of potential candidates will share many of the same principles of reaching customers.
For starters, your employer brand messaging must reach potential employees. This can only be done with campaigns executed in highly visible spaces.
Currently, people stay home and keep away from restaurants, movie theatres, shopping malls, etc. As such, they’re filling their time with stay-at-home activities such as spending an exponential amount of time on social media.
In fact, since COVID-19, there have been 44 more average daily social media engagements throughout all networks and industries. Furthermore, even before the pandemic, 79% of job seekers were using social media during their job search.
You’ve undoubtedly adjusted your product/service marketing campaigns to meet this consumer behavior. The same should be done for your recruitment pool.
Sending the Right Message
Over one million users have joined coronavirus-related support groups on social media. Meaning, the empathy, unity, and understanding conveyed in marketing materials such as this video, are undeniably useful.
All the same, being too on the nose with your messaging might turn people off, as it might seem inauthentic. Your ideal candidate is intelligent enough to differentiate between genuine conscientiousness and disingenuous self-promoting.
Note that during a time of crisis, transparency is integral to building trust. It’s the unsureness of everything that keeps people on edge, whereas letting people know exactly where things stand gives them a sense of stability.
Speaking to the above paragraph, thoughtful analysis of the current state of affairs through blog content establishes the trust that impresses potential candidates.
The savviest, most skilled talent on the market (aka the people you want to hire) want to work for a company with their finger on the pulse. Showing an analytical approach to the pandemic combined with an empathetic, supportive attitude will attract top performers in droves.
Be Ready to Pivot
People’s emotions and sensibilities are different now than they were a year ago.
Therefore, a brand with something of an edge, focusing its messaging on wit/humor, will come across as tasteless and tone-deaf.
Furthermore, showing images of people hugging, touching, and connecting physically could now be translated as socially irresponsible.
How you pivot and tweak your marketing to meet these new criteria will impact your public standing.
Attracting talent hinges exceedingly upon your reputation. This notion rings doubly true during COVID-19, which has further placed the importance of an employer’s public perception.
What’s generating the most success for employer branding is content such as user videos, Q&As, and podcasts. Moreover, adept brands have found value in releasing the following branding materials:
- Steps you’re taking as a company to help during the pandemic
- Home workouts or other wellness-oriented content)
- Virtual events such as concerts and career fairs
RHM Staffing Solutions
Finding it hard to confidently hire the talent you need in these challenging times? You’re not alone, and RHM Staffing Solutions is here to help.
Our team of dedicated recruiters has the networks and industry know-how required to help great organizations find the talent they need to thrive.
Give us a call today to learn how we can do it for you.