Is employer branding used as a staffing strategy?

In a city as demanding as Dubai, you have to know how to present yourself well to the market. There’s a reputation to watch out for. How people perceive you would be crucial in your company’s development.  That’s why you need a smart staffing strategy.

In this article, you’ll learn everything about if Employer Branding is used as a staffing strategy. If you’re looking to grow as a company, this information is of interest to you. In fact, you’ll be able to know how to create effective Employer Branding. Let’s take a look:

1. What is employer branding (EB)?
2. Importance of having an effective Employer Branding.
3. What is a Marketing Recruitment (MR)?
4. Why a Marketing Recruitment is so important?
5. What exactly is an Employer Branding Strategy?
6. What are the steps for putting an effective Employer Branding plan in place?
7. Advantages of an effective EB?
8. How can Connect Staff help you?

1. What is a staffing strategy?

A staffing strategy and a recruitment one are frequently mistaken, although they aren’t the same thing. Recruiting is a phase in the staffing process that entails looking for and encouraging prospective applicants to apply for positions. Staffing is a continuous process.

Therefore, it includes the initial recruiting stage. But it also includes how you manage and keep a competent and pleased staff that is fit for purpose. This consists of putting them in the correct roles at the right time to accomplish the company’s goals. Today, it’s progressing even further.

In this sense, a staffing strategy is more akin to a “people strategy.” People strategies look at where your high-performers are and how you keep them. These strategies are also about how you offer them meaningful work.

2. What is employer branding (EB)?                 

Employer branding refers to the practice of controlling and having an effect on your reputation as an employer. This can be among job seekers, workers, and key stakeholders. It includes everything you do to market your company as a top employer.

That being said, your employer brand is your company’s reputation as a good place to work. In simple terms, it’s what potential employers and workers genuinely think about you. It’s what they tell their friends and family when you’re not there.

Though it may not be visible, your employer brand is a valuable asset that must be nurtured regularly. That is where employer branding comes in. It’s better to manage and influence rather than to own and dictate. The truth is you don’t genuinely own your EB.

Moreover, your employer’s reputation lives in the minds of prospects and workers, and it’s molded by their perceptions and impressions. You have an employer brand, whether you actively manage it or not. Candidates and workers have opinions about you, and if you don’t attempt to change them, you’re at their mercy.

3. Importance of having effective employer branding.

Before we begin, let’s go over the fundamentals. Your EB influences nearly every aspect of your organization, from recruiting and retention to performance and profitability. We all know that the numbers speak for themselves, therefore consider the statistics below:

• When people are looking for a new job, 95% of candidates say reputation is important.
• A good EB cuts your cost per recruit by half while also increasing the number of quality applications by half.
• Companies with strong EB have a 28% lower turnover rate.
• 60% of job searchers experienced a negative candidate experience, and 72% of them went on to share their stories online.
• To compensate for a poor EB, organizations must provide a 10% wage boost to attract top job candidates.

4. What is recruitment marketing (RM)?

The phrase “Recruitment Marketing” refers to the use of marketing approaches and tactics to highlight your Employer Brand. In other words, Recruitment Marketing is the act of advertising your Employer Brand through various channels.

For example, these channels may be social media, the company’s career site, job boards, and the company’s career blog. Also, people can find out about the job by existing employees, job descriptions, talent networking events, and many more.

The basic objective of any Recruitment Marketing plan is very clear. It must get the appropriate message in front of the right people at the right time and drive them your way.  This method is known as Inbound Recruiting.

Indeed, the main priority of Inbound Recruiting consistently promotes interest in your firm and creates a pool of high-quality candidates.

5. Why a Marketing Recruitment is so important?

The pre-application stage of the employment process is the focus of recruitment marketing. Its purpose is to recruit talent and encourage qualified people to apply for available opportunities. The spotlight is shining brighter than ever on the candidates. Every company’s top priority is to provide the best possible candidate experience.

Since this’s the finest talent has a plethora of possibilities from which to choose. As a result, we must have a competitive advantage over other organizations seeking the same talent. To separate their organization from the competition and attract top personnel, astute recruiters have begun employing marketing approaches and tactics.

Hence, that implies that just advertising job openings on job boards and waiting for qualified candidates to apply is no longer sufficient. If you want to win the fight for talent, you have to be smarter. You must look long-term and be proactive in raising awareness and fostering relationships.

 6. What exactly is an Employer Branding Strategy?

Employer branding is a critical component of any effective staffing strategy. A well-defined employer brand can assist you in attracting, engaging, and hiring the ideal job prospects. It’s well known that there is a war for talent in this world, and especially in the UAE.

Therefore, an intelligently planned Employer Branding strategy can be an important competitive advantage that differentiates you from the competition. To differentiate their Employer Brand, top organizations deploy advanced employer branding and recruitment marketing methods. It’s important what your workers (existing and possible future job seekers) believe about you as an employer.

Overall, their view of how you treat your workers and applicants, as well as your Employee Value Proposition, is important. So, you have to take care of it at all times.

7. What are the steps for putting an effective Employer Branding plan in place?

There’s a process for making a successful staffing strategy and great recruiters understand this. Hence, they know how to create and implement an effective EB strategy, and they’re full of creative EB ideas. The following are the five steps to develop an EB strategy:

7.1. Step 1: Establish your Employer Branding objectives.

Firstly, you have to consider what you hope to achieve with your Employer Branding approach. Among the most common EB objectives are:

• Increase the number of job applications.
• Get bigger the number of high-quality prospects.
• Boost online engagement, candidate engagement, and Employer Brand awareness.
• Enlarge trust with current candidates.
• Climb the number of visitors to your career site.
• Rocket the number of applicants by using social media.
• Improve your referral rates.
• Become greater the offer-acceptance rate.

7.2. Step 2: Create a Candidate Profile.

Secondly, a critical stage in this process is to define your applicant persona. You cannot deliver tailored communications to the applicants you want to attract until you know who your ideal candidate is. Here’s a cheat sheet to help you define a candidate profile:

• Bio. Determine who your perfect candidate is. How old they should be, what’d be the position they’ll apply for, and what titles they should have. Plus, you have to say how much experience the applicant must have, in addition, to the number of their social background. Also, you have to mention the salary.
• Goals. Knowing why the applicants want to change their jobs, their life goals, and their career inspirations.
• Job search behavior. Determinate if you look for active or passive candidates.
• Personality. This means the personality traits you’re looking for in an employee.
• Motivation. Show something to motivate them to work with you. These motivations may be a firm’s reputation, values, norms, payment, benefits, work environment, etc.
• Skills. Here is where you determine the area in which they should have the most knowledge and experience.

7.3. Step 3: Create an Employee Value Proposition.

Thirdly, if job seekers have chosen you and decided to stay, it means that you like them as an employer. This’s possible thanks to developing an effective Employer Value Proposition. Your EVP is the message you’ll send to your candidate personas. The following are the five major components of any EVP:

• Compensation. Here is where the satisfactory salary, the compensation system, and the raises and promotions are. Also, you must mention the timeliness, fairness, and evaluation system that you offer.
• Benefits. These are time off, insurance, holidays, satisfaction with the system, education, retirement, and flexibility.
• Career. You’ll offer your employees the ability and chance to progress and develop stability, training, and education at work.
• Work environment. In the office, there’ll be recognition of autonomy, personal achievements, understanding of one’s role, and responsibility.
• Culture. In the work culture, there’ll be an understanding of the firm’s goals and plans, friendly colleagues, leaders, and managers. Besides, there’ll be social responsibility, collaboration and team spirit, and support.

7.4. Step 4: Define the channels to promote your Employer Brand

There are approximately ten touchpoints with prospects before they are hired. They’re so-called candidate trip stops. Many of these touchpoints may also be used to promote your EB. These are just a few of the ways you may advertise your EB:

• Social networking sites.
• Job search websites.
• Current workers.
• Workshops and lectures.
• Inbound recruiting.
• Job postings.
• Managing Candidate Relationships.
• The application procedure.

7.5. Step 5: Evaluate your Employer Branding success.

Lastly, HR Analytics and evaluating the most essential hiring metrics have emerged as some of the main objectives for HR professionals. With this in mind, you should evaluate the performance of your EB based on the goals you established at the beginning.

On the other hand, data-driven recruiting is impossible to do without the correct recruiting tools. As a result, there are several HR technology tools available today to assist HR professionals in improving their Employer Branding strategy.

8. Advantages of an effective EB?

Undoubtedly, the benefits of enhancing the employer brand in the company transcend the internal environment.  Also, it can end up positively influencing the company’s numbers and the image it projects to the outside world.  Some of the main advantages of incorporating an EB strategy in your company are:

• An EB encourages employee motivation, dedication, and trust in the firm.
• It promotes a better work atmosphere, as well as increased production and efficiency in the organization.
• A great EB reduces personnel turnover and prevents work-related stress.
• Improves the exterior image in the eyes of clients, suppliers, and industry professionals.
• It increases the number of candidates that are interested in working for the firm.
• An effective EB contributes to the transfer of values and the reinforcement of corporate culture.
• It gets a bigger distinction from competitors.
• An EB enhances the sector’s standing.
• It climbs the company’s social position.

9.         How can Connect Staff help you?

Certainly, an Employer Brand is an important piece of the staffing strategy. Therefore, you must take great care of how you sell yourself in the market. It could be very difficult and take longer.  However, there’ll be always a convenient solution for you to choose from.

In this case, Connect Staff can get you an amazing HR support staff for making an effective Employer Brand. And as a result, you’ll attract a lot of qualified job seekers to build a strong workforce. Also, you’ll position as one of the most prestigious companies in the Dubai market. 

Would you like to contact Connect Staff to obtain more information on how to use employer branding as a staffing strategy? If you have any questions, call us on +97143316688. You can email us at contact@connectstaff.ae and you’ll talk to one of our representatives who will answer your questions.