Using Social Media to Strengthen Employer Brand in 2012 - Listen, Plan | Part 1 of 5

Since 2009 there has been a 209% increase in the number of companies using social media to communicate their employer brand (Global Recruiting Roundtable, 2011). But are you one of them? No? Well read on…

Today’s job seekers have the world at their fingertips (quite literally). Realistically, the types of people you are more than likely going to want to recruit have already clocked on to the fact that social media is the best place to find out the truth about your company. They might even already be talking about you online – so why aren’t you listening?

Not sure where to start? Here are a few tips from the CK Group to help you get your social media strategy kick started in 2012:

Listen:


Well first things first, you need to establish what is being said about you online before you start engaging with potential employees on social media. Here are a number on interesting tools you can use to do just that:

• Google Alerts - Set up alerts direct to your inbox to find out exactly what people are saying about you online.
• Social Mention - This software is free, and searches all real-time user generated content.
• Glassdoor - Find out exactly what former employees have been saying about your company here.

Plan:

This leads us nicely on to the next step: planning! Now, take a step back and have a think about…

• Your main goals and objectives: These must be clearly aligned with the goals and objectives of your organisation.

• The main messages you want to communicate: Here are a few ideas to get your thought process started:

1. What makes your company stand out? Eg exciting and rare job opportunities, personal development schemes, team building days, dress down Fridays.
2. Your company achievements – Eg awards, charity fundraisers, company accreditations.
3. Experiences of existing employees as they can be great brand ambassadors for your organisation.

• Which social networks are you going to use?

Remember, it’s quality not quantity that matters here. As a minimum, we recommend that you build your presence on Twitter, YouTube, Facebook and Linkedin to really step your employer branding strategy up a gear or three. In the next blog post I'd be outlining few tips from us to help you start planning your strategy for each one of these social networking sites.

About the Author: Catherine Gutsell is the Group Marketing Manager at the CK Group. She is passionate about all things digital, especially when it comes to recruitment and HR practices.