October 23, 2018
Are you having trouble convincing your C-Suite they should be prioritizing your company’s employer brand? Do you feel like a fish swimming upstream on this? If decision-makers at your company are cynical of whether employer branding is really worth the time, we’re going to arm you with some startling facts that will make them realize investing in it now will actually save you money, while increasing the quality of talent your organization can attract. This post will give you talking points and tools to leverage when going to leadership at your company in order to prove to them your employer brand is something worth investing in.
Does Employer Branding Really Matter?
While leadership at your company might have a hard time believing it, many recruiters are aware of the impact a bad employer brand can have upon the business. 72% of recruiting leaders around the world agree that employer brand has a significant impact on hiring, and even more so has a significant impact on your business’ success.
The first evidence to play in your favor is that studies have shown there is a proven ROI for employer branding. A strong employer brand can lead to 50% more qualified applicants. And a study that LinkedIn conducted found that companies with a strong talent brand get a 31% higher InMail acceptance rate and tend to grow 20% faster. A strong talent brand can also lead to 2.5x more applicants per job post on LinkedIn.
Technology Has Changed Everything
Even just 10 years ago, social media didn’t exist for candidates to share their positive or negative interview experiences with the world. These days, anyone who interacts with your brand has the ability to broadcast their experience to the world. You don’t want the majority of what potential candidates see to be one-sided. Building a budget and strategy around managing your employer brand and brand reputation when it comes to hiring can help give candidates a more realistic and well-rounded impression of what life at your company is really like.
In the digital age we live in, 79% of job seekers are likely to use social media in their job hunt and 78% of people will look into a company’s reputation as an employer before applying for a job. Because of this, companies need to not only be aware of their reputation online, but also actively involved in managing it, in order to able to draw in potential candidates.
The Millennial Dilemma and Company Culture
Many people take a company’s mission into consideration before ever applying or joining. Millennials (who make up more than a third of the US workforce) are especially motivated by a company’s purpose and mission, which makes them a flight risk if another employer more closely aligns to their values and passions. 88% of millennials believe that being part of the right company culture is very important.
And it’s not just millennials who consider culture a “deal breaker”. A Jobvite study revealed that 15% of candidates have declined a job offer due to company culture. In order to make it easier to retain your talent, you’ll need to make sure you have a clearly defined, healthy and attractive company culture intact and that you’re attracting the right talent that puts your values in action and keeps your culture consistent.
How Employer Branding Can Save Your Company $$$
Investing in and prioritizing your employer brand can also help save your company money. The LinkedIn study mentioned above also found that companies with stronger employer brands than their competitors see a 43% decrease in the cost per candidate hired.
In this booming economy, many people are more concerned with a healthy work environment or feeling valued by their company than just the number on their paycheck. CareerBuilder reported that 67% of candidates would accept lower pay if the company they were interested in had very positive reviews online.
Not only can employer branding save you money, but it could also be costing you money if you have a bad reputation. If you were to ignore developing your business’s employer brand, you risk paying almost $5,000 more in salary premiums per employee hired.
Start Now
At this point, you should be able to communicate to decision-makers at your company that the more you invest in your employer brand now, the less reactive spending you’ll have to do later, which means thousands, and in some cases, millions of dollars saved. If employer branding is something your company hasn’t given much thought to, encourage them that it’s always better to start late than never.
Once you have presented this information to your company’s leadership and made them aware of why employer branding matters, the next step is to speak with a consultant at Proactive Talent about how we can save you time and money on your hiring practices and help you attract the high-caliber talent your company needs to succeed.
