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How to Engage Your Team in Employer Branding

As the value of employer branding in modern recruitment strategies is better understood, it’s important to consider which approach will be the most effective for your company.

While more and more businesses look for new and exciting ways to market themselves to Millennials or Gen Z job-seekers, many would be surprised to learn that they are already surrounded by a goldmine of marketing potential just waiting to be harnessed: their employees.

We’ll explore what employee-generated content can do for you and how to best manage your employees to get the most out of your employer branding strategy. But first…

What is Employee-generated Content (EGC)?

Employee-generated content (EGC) is content - whether video, textual posts, or audio - that can be distributed internally or externally for informative or marketing purposes. In this case, we’re referring to EGC as content that can be used to better sell your company culture to potential recruits.

Compared to traditional means of marketing a business, EGC that uses websites like Wantedly or social media platforms as a method of distribution are viewed to be more authentic and therefore trustworthy to new recruits.

The millennial generation, who now makes up the largest sector of job-seekers, are particularly skeptical of traditional marketing methods, and it is this same preference of personality and authenticity that has seen the rise of Influencer marketing as a powerhouse in the digital age (especially when 84% of Singaporeans are internet users).

By sharing personal anecdotes and insights into the working conditions, tasks and benefits of your company, your employees can offer a reliable, honest exhibition of your company culture that a slick, expensive campaign could never replicate.

The Hurdles and the Benefits

It’s understandable why many businesses could be concerned about this reliance on engaging employees in an area that they are untrained in. There would, theoretically, be fewer variables in your control if you are leaving your employees to tell your story rather than your marketing department.

But this is exactly where the effectiveness of this strategy is revealed. By enlisting the help of your employees in shining a light on what makes your company special, you are not only offering a chance to celebrate your company culture with your team but improve it.

Internally, employees who are asked to help generate content could be made more satisfied by your inclusion of their opinions in such a pivotal process and in turn have feelings of increased value and loyalty. Through their testimonials, you could realise further opportunities to improve your culture.

As well as that, employees have a high stake in the maintenance of their company culture. With the management of company culture being tantamount to your business's successful growth, you are giving your employees an opportunity to help attract who they will work and collaborate with on a day-to-day basis. They are effectively now a part of the recruitment process of their future colleagues.

Externally, you are offering the world - not just your potential recruiters but your customers, too - an authentic introduction to what your core values are and how they influence your practices at every level.

This is your chance to highlight the diversity in your workplace, the perks of working for you and some clear insight in to what makes you so special. Through multiple perspectives, the world can form a rounded idea of who you are and what life in your company is like.

Many potential recruits will research a company before the interview process, and if they can see tangible proof of a satisfied, engaged team, you are doing wonders in building a larger pool of hireable enthusiastic talent who are eager to share their skills and their personalities.

How to Successfully Engage Your Team

If you are going to achieve your goals using an EGC strategy, you must ensure that your employees are allowed to be genuine.

This isn’t to say that you are to give your employees a video camera, send them out into the workplace for a day and cross your fingers in the hope that they will return with something useable. The priority here is that you choose employees who want to help and who can play on their strengths to the best of their abilities in sharing your story.

Perhaps you have an employee that isn’t a writer but is bubbly and energetic. Sit them down in front of a camera and let them do their magic in explaining what they love about working for you. If the reverse is true, guide your talented writers in explaining the kind of content your after and for what platform.

However, do not take too much control of what they are to say and certainly do not let the marketing department regulate your employees content unless it is their own personal content you are wishing to share.

You want to give your employees a clear brief of what you want, support them in overcoming their weaknesses or playing to their strengths, give them guidance and training but also allow autonomy in their self-expression and ensure that they have enough time to work on their content without it affecting their other responsibilities or causing stress.

In terms of the kind of content you are after, your creativity is the limit. You could brainstorm a project as a team that will exhibit your mission statement and values and work on it together or ask for individual responses to a question for them to complete in private.

What is important is that no one is forced to participate, rather it is those that are eager to help, who are able to show off their personalities in a way that best reflects the attitudes and values behind your company culture and mission statement.

For further information on how to create a sustainable and authentic employer branding strategy, you know where to find us: sg.wantedly.com


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