1. Successful Employer Branding Starts Before Employment

Employer branding is all about how people who work for the organization perceive it, feel about it, and engage with it. However, just as a lot of customers are familiar with a brand, months, years, or even decades before they ever buy it, the same can be true with employees. Employer branding reaches far beyond employment because it impacts your lead generation for future talent acquisition.

Having a consistent, accessible, and relevant brand helps prospective employees become familiar with it over time. The key phase when the brand has most work to do, though, is when potential talent is actively considering career prospects. 

How is your brand described by top talent on the outside? Is this happening?

“I see “X/your company” everywhere in the marketplace with rewarding, exciting career opportunities. I hear it’s a great place to work — top of my list, I love what they stand for.”

For example, is your brand welcoming? Is it known as dependable, credible, and trustworthy? How is your culture perceived and the bigger purpose behind what drives your organisation? Does potential talent have a clear sense of your company as a potential place to work? Are they clear on your bigger purpose and the difference you’re endeavouring to make in the marketplace and what makes your brand different? Could they imagine your company being a source of pride, and failing that, at least not a source of personal embarrassment? Does it offer a strong career growth opportunity? 

© Persona Design

These are the kinds of questions that some prospective employees will have in their minds when assessing possible employer brands. While the brand alone will not be enough to persuade most people, it is part of the employer’s overall offering which could weigh positively or negatively on the decision process of prospective employees.

It’s well evidenced that these factors have become even more important and bigger choice drivers with the increase in remote working since the pandemic. Often the recruiting and onboarding processes are now entirely digital. That means that candidates may not be exposed to some of the traditional employer brand touchpoints like an office or more tangible elements of brand culture when peers are physically together.

Image via Fortune © Rolls-Royce

A B2B case study is the engineering group Rolls-Royce. It developed a sophisticated employer branding strategy around the theme of “create”, inspiring candidates to see it as being a place where they could be creative and develop their careers even within the rigidity of a mission-critical engineering environment.

Related: The Age Of Internal Branding and Selling It From The Inside Out

2. Powerful Employer Branding is Enabling Not Limiting

Successful employer branding isn’t something that gets hidden under a bushel. Instead of making employees feel a bit embarrassed about where they work, or that they ought not to speak about it, a strong employer brand is often a source of pride. It motivates employees to work harder and can turn them into effective advocates for the brand in many cases. 

A question you might ask yourself if you’re not getting unsolicited top talent inquiries or referrals through existing members of your team is where are you falling short? What’s not working? What are you missing?

These principles are true across all industries and verticals. Even if you think your company will never have the glamour of a luxury goods brand or tech giant like Apple, there need to be attractive elements to it that will motivate staff to come to work each day and feel fulfilled representing your brand. It is possible to have highly motivating employer brands no matter what sort of work you do. 

Employer brand, culture, and external brand perceptions are intentionally cultivated, nurtured, and driven by the leadership of an organsiation so if things are falling short it’s time to ask why? 

Related: How Apple Does It, Five Tips for Getting Your $1Tn Brand Personality Right

3. Brand Purpose, Brand Mission and Brand Values Are Critical to Strong Employer Branding

As many as 9 out of 10 employees are actually willing to work for less money if they feel the work they are doing has purpose [1]. It is no exaggeration to say that what brings people to work is a critical part of what motivates staff and helps drive success.

Such purpose doesn’t just evolve by accident. Brand purpose, brand vision, brand mission, and brand values are critical elements of a brand strategy. They don’t need to be complicated, but they do need to be considered. These things may evolve organically to some extent, but they need to be recognised and often also need to be stewarded. For example, if employees feel something doesn’t match with the brand values, how are they able to act on their concerns?

Related: How a Strong Value Proposition Drives Your Sales & Profits Growth

A lot of people think about brand purpose and brand values in relation to ethical brands which sell to customers. But in fact, they are much more important when it comes to employer branding. Even a devoted customer will typically only interact with most brands for a few hours a week at most. But an employee may spend the majority of their waking hours working to push forward their employer’s brand vision and objectives. So brand purpose, brand mission, and brand values are a key motivator for them in their work. 

Image via Beauty and Hairdressing © FFOR

A B2C case study is FFOR, which stands for “Free From, Original, Real”. The brand offers vegan hair products and organic hair care. The company’s consistent branding includes simple, actionable, clearly articulated brand values which can motivate employees as well as customers.

Related: Top 5 Reasons Why Brand Purpose is The Essential Growth Driver in a Fast-Changing World

4. Employer Branding Recognises the Role of Individual Contributions

Organisations often talk a lot about teamwork. Teamwork and collaboration are indeed critical to the success of high-performing organisations. However, it is also important to be able to unleash the potential of individual contributions.

An effective employer brand can perform a delicate balancing act: encouraging teamwork by helping employees feel they are part of a purpose-led tribe, but also helping employees feel they have permission and perhaps even encouragement to bring their own unique contributions to the organisation — have the autonomy to get on with their job knowing their people leader is there to support and enable them.

Image via © PwC

A B2B service case study is professional service firm PwC, which has 220,000 people in over 150 countries. Through focussing on five key brand values, it enables staff to deliver the brand consistently as individuals.

Related: 6 Brand Culture Do’s and Don’ts for Attracting and Retaining Your Ideal Customers and Top Talent

5. Celebrate Positive Affirmations of Your Employer Branding

A lot of organisations seem somewhat sceptical about their own brands, and this can affect the way that their employees feel about them. If a company’s leadership doesn’t believe in its employer branding and fully integrate it into their ways of working then staff won’t either.

A good employer brand doesn’t have to be loud or in your face, but it should still be something that people feel positive about. Effective employer branding helps guide people across the organisation in key decision-making.

A simple technique to use employer branding to build a high-performing team is to celebrate positive affirmations of the brand. This could be as simple as being a small recognition of employee actions that demonstrate the brand values in action. It’s worth noting that small genuine demonstrations of appreciation go a long way because one of the biggest reasons employees leave organisations is for lack of employer appreciation.

Related: 6 Ways to Develop and Nurture a Successful Brand Culture With a Limited Budget

6. There’s No Reason to Hide Effective Employer Branding 

Sometimes there can be a sense that a brand strategy is a proprietary information that needs to be kept confidential. That may be true of some elements. But there are aspects of any brand which are meant to be shared and appreciated by audiences, including employees.

Instead of a brand being something rarely talked about or considered, a high-performing organisation will typically embody its brand in its day-to-day operations. This can be everything from using it as a basis for employee decision-making to aligning performance evaluation criteria with brand values, vision, and commercial objectives.

There are 14 key areas we map out when building a client’s brand strategy. Eight of these should be shared in the public domain in terms of communications along with the employer brand experience and customer experience — internal and external elements that need to be fully aligned and acculturated.

Image via © Social Chain

A B2B case study is provided by social media agency Social Chain. It emphasises its brand values and regularly celebrates employees bringing them to life. The brand oozes through the company’s office design.

Related: The Impact of Company Brand Culture On Driving Performance and Increasing Sales

7. Keeping Employer Branding Relevant Requires Honesty and Integrity

Like everything else, brands age. What makes a good brand today doesn’t necessarily mean it will stay that way or even relevant. Brands are like living human entities which need to be open to adaptation to thrive and sometimes even to survive.

Employees can be in an awkward position when it comes to keeping the brand relevant. They typically engage with the brand more than anyone else. This means they often have a highly developed perspective on the brand and a passion for it. But they can also feel inhibited when it comes to offering constructive critical feedback compared to, for example, customers giving feedback on their experience.

Maintaining an open organisational culture in which employees feel enabled and indeed empowered to give honest feedback and input on the brand without fear of consequences is an important way to get input to help keep the brand relevant from the people who are best positioned to give it.

Image via Wikipedia © SAP

A B2B case study is software company SAP’s focus on honesty in its employer branding. That extends to addressing openly common challenges for tech employer brands such as workforce diversity.

Related: How to Use Brand Building and Culture Integration to Unlock More Value from Mergers, Acquisitions and Divestitures

Final Thoughts

Employer branding is a simple but increasingly important and powerful tool to help you build your thriving, high-performing team, so you can grow your business’s sales and profits.

Employer branding starts long before someone joins your organisation and lasts long after they leave. That is why it is so important, especially as employees are the people who engage most with your brand, even more than loyal customers.

Key elements of brand strategy such as brand purpose, brand values, and brand mission are also critical to successful employer branding. In addition, high-performing organisations consider how to enroll employees as ambassadors and guardians of their employer brand.

How could your employer branding support you more effectively in building a high-performing team and profitable organisation?

Questions to Consider

1. How does your employer brand present itself to prospective employees?
2. What are your brand purpose, brand mission, and brand values?
3. How well understood are your brand values by people inside your organisation?
4. What do you do to celebrate positive affirmations of your brand values?
5. How do you enable and encourage staff to keep your employer brand relevant and inspiring?
6. Could you use a brand audit to help you re-evaluate your employer brand, so you can fix the vulnerabilities, leverage the strengths more effectively, and identify opportunities to have a bigger impact?