How Marketing Can Increase Your Odds In a Competitive Job Market
According to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, as of Sep. 2, 2022, there were 11.2M open jobs in the U.S, and only 6M unemployed workers. If every unemployed person in the country found a job, we would still have 5.2 million open jobs. Virtually every industry is currently struggling with a vexing labor shortage. From entry-level jobs in retail and customer service to highly specialized positions in medicine and engineering, organizations are having a hard time filling roles. And as companies try to meet what seem to be relentless customer demands, understaffed and overworked teams are struggling to keep up and stay motivated.
Data from August 2022 BLS Employment Situation report.
In the technology sector—especially in advanced tech companies—talent shortages have always been an issue, making the last couple of years particularly painful. According to a report from tech recruiting platform Dice, due to the “Great Resignation,” tech salaries increased 7 percent on average between 2020 and 2021 alone. And despite the shortage, demand is only expected to increase. For example, the artificial intelligence (AI) software market could more than double in size over the next three years, according to data from Statista. This leads to remarkably high demand for human resources with specialized skill sets; for companies developing cutting-edge technologies, there are simply a finite number of people with the education and/or experience needed to drive product and service innovation in their niche. In this strange post-pandemic job market, a scarcity of career fairs and industry trade shows only exacerbates recruitment challenges.
At OmniScale Media, where we exclusively support advanced technology companies, we’ve seen firsthand the pains these challenges cause among the companies that we’re exposed to. Virtually all of them have wrestled in one way or another with attracting new people and finding needle-in-the-haystack skillsets. In many cases, their struggles have led to discussions with OmniScale about how marketing can help. The fact is that marketing can play a surprisingly significant role in attracting and retaining talent. This post explains why and provides three essential steps for ensuring that your marketing is helping rather than hurting talent acquisition.
Image matters
Newton’s first law of motion states that “an object will not change its motion unless a force acts on it.” The same is true for talent visiting your website or job listings; they need to include the right messages or “forces” to give people a reason to stop browsing and dive in further. If your messages are confusing or somehow miss the mark up-front, great candidates may move on and never look back.
So how does marketing fit into this equation? The general perception is that marketing teams are responsible for brand awareness, thought leadership, demand generation, and publicity—activities generally geared towards attracting customers and driving sales. Ever since the pandemic hit, however, things have changed significantly. Today, work-from-home possibilities have given people in many roles more flexibility and choices than ever. And since getting on the radar of talent is increasingly challenging in this high-stakes competition, expanding your marketing strategy to factor in prospective employees’ needs, expectations, and desires can be game-changing.
It’s all about creating an image of opportunity in prospects’ eyes — the fact is that it takes strategic thinking and careful execution. After all, you may be up against far larger companies with deep resources for recruiting the best talent. So, if a potential employee lands on your website and they have a hard time understanding what you do, are uninspired by your messaging and mission, or simply can’t find any resources about company culture and what makes your organization a great place to work, what’s the point of further effort or investigation?
Fortunately, many people are driven by more than the highest salary or the prestige of working for a big brand. Your marketing challenge is compellingly articulating what your company is all about in terms of technology, core values, mission, and trajectory, so prospects see potential and get excited about the possibility of joining a great team. And a big part of the challenge is looking at your website and the pages that job prospects will be most interested in and gravitate to through their eyes and updating accordingly. And then you need to think about your tactics for getting on their radar.
Marketing tools for talent acquisition
Beyond having a site that caters to potential employees, in addition to customers and investors, it’s also important to actively pursue talent through marketing efforts. And while your imagination is the limit, in most cases, that’ll typically involve a few key channels and resources.
- Social media – If a job prospect is interested in working for you, there’s a good chance they will look at your company’s posts on their favorite social media platform. According to the 2021 Future of Recruiting Study from CareerArc, 86% of job seekers use social media in their job search to search for relevant jobs, apply to jobs directly from social sites, and engage with job-related content. Between LinkedIn, Reddit, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, you have all kinds of opportunities to highlight jobs and company culture. Simply sharing pictures from events and praising contributions from team members can go a long way to conveying what it’s like to work for you. The goal is to humanize your company and give job prospects and customers a sense of what you’re all about. (With the bonus of making employees feel valued).
- Newsletter – Monthly newsletters are a great way to stay on your customers’ radar and an easy and cost-effective way to highlight job openings that readers can share with friends and colleagues.
- Blog posts – Q&As with executives or star employees that include references to culture or mission. Posts highlighting contributions or participation in trade shows or networking events. Perspectives on the importance of company values within your niche. You can use your blog to trumpet key aspects of company culture and speak to prospective employees.
- Advertisements – Active candidates are more likely to see and act on paid media such as job boards, job ads, and PPC campaigns. Paid social media can give a short-term boost to your content while reaching passive candidates and new audiences outside of your organic reach through targeting. Some examples include boosted or sponsored posts, social ads, and purchased ad space on the platform.
- Places to land – Whether job candidates find your company organically or via any of the above channels, the messages on pages you use in your calls to action (typically about and careers pages) are critical. Be sure to review both pages from the perspective of whom you’re trying to attract and tailor your content accordingly. Your about page is a great opportunity to provide a brief history of your company and what it does and clearly articulate your mission and values. Your career page should be integrated with your overall site look and feel and be easy to navigate. It also provides an ideal space for letting your culture and brand really shine through both in the copy and photos. And keep in mind that it can help if the job descriptions themselves reflect team personalities.
Seeing the results
Branding matters to potential employees. According to The Undercover Recruiter, more than 80% of recruiting leaders feel that employer branding significantly impacts talent acquisition, and 53% would invest in employer branding ahead of new technology (39%) and better sourcing tools (38%). At OmniScale, we’ve seen this firsthand. For example, one of our highly specialized startup clients in the semiconductor space was having trouble finding a CEO and growing their team with the right talent. After reviewing their site, we noted that their branding looked dated and that it wasn’t easy to quickly understand what they did and the importance of it. They also didn’t have a careers page. OmniScale Media provided strategic messaging support and helped them update their brand and website. Within three months of launching the new site with an integrated careers page, they were able to grow their team by 46% and hire a CEO.
Three essentials for alluring top talent
To attract and retain top talent through marketing, you need to have a good marketing foundation in place. And for many advanced tech companies, that means prioritizing three things.
- Update and fine-tune your messages and brand narrative – When job prospects land on your website, it’s important that they quickly understand what your company is all about and see an organization they could quickly get behind. Remember that cultural messages and values must be genuine (i.e., employees are living them), or they can come back to bite.
- Update your website to reflect your messages and culture – Once you’ve nailed down messages that resonate with prospective talent, ensure your site reflects them visually and in words. In some cases, this could mean updates to just career and/or about pages. Or it might mean a more extensive overhaul across multiple site pages.
- Get the word out – As soon as you deem your site ready, it’s time to intensify recruitment efforts using whatever channels make the most sense based on the resources you’re trying to attract.
One step at a time
If the steps above sound like a lot, remember that it’s important to frequently revisit and evolve your messaging anyway and that any messaging exercise can factor in customers, investors, and job prospects. Moreover, many of the practices and steps described above have the added benefit of making current employees feel more valued, which can help with retention.
If you have more questions about how marketing can help your organization attract top talent, please contact us at connect@omniscalemedia.com!