Using a Strong Company Culture To Improve Recruiting Outcomes

03.17.2022 Sara Brasfield3 min

If your business is hoping to fill open positions in the near future, you can expect a hiring market unlike anything you’ve experienced in the recent past. As of early March, more than 11 million job openings were available across the United States, underscoring how many companies are vying to hire a select number of workers.

Earlier this week, we hosted a webinar that unpacked a few key tools for increasing employee happiness and therefore impacting recruitment and retention. In this post, we expand on this topic and introduce tips for marketing your culture to attract the best talent.

A heavy supply of open positions has made the hiring market very favorable for job seekers, giving them the security to demand higher wages, flexible work arrangements, better benefits and other perks and accommodations than they might receive in a typical job market. To remain competitive, businesses are turning to new recruiting tactics that take fresh approaches to employee recruiting.

For businesses with a favorable work environment and strong company culture, these attributes are assets that can make a big difference to would-be employees—particularly workers looking for a long-term role that can help them grow their career.

As you plan out your recruiting strategy, here are five ways to leverage that strong work culture to support your hiring efforts.

1. Highlight Career Advancement Opportunities

Many businesses are drawn to job applicants looking to build a career—in part because those aspirations can be a sign of a more committed, engaged and productive worker. But employers also play a role in motivating career-minded employees through the advancement opportunities that business cultivates.

As you compete with other employers to win over a limited pool of applicants, career advancement opportunities can be a great way to set your business apart while creating additional value for a job opening. Be creative when considering how your open roles might support career advancement, keeping in mind that certain advancement opportunities may come through indirect or unlikely paths.

Franchise locations of Domino’s Pizza have used this recruiting strategy to great success by highlighting the former entry-level employees who went on to open their own franchise location. When these paths to advancement and opportunity are highlighted, even your lowest-wage workers may be inspired to work toward those goals—and your business may benefit through easier hiring and improved employee retention.

2. Take Job Seekers Behind the Scenes

Social media is a great tool for offering a different view of your company’s culture. Many recruiting ads, as well as the process of applying and interviewing for a job, only highlight a specific kind of company culture—and many applicants are aware that this public view is carefully curated to appeal to workers.

Social content that shows your office environment, employee interactions, and other slices of daily work life can be invaluable in giving authenticity to the company culture you’re trying to promote. Organic and paid social content can be particularly useful if applicants don’t have a strong sense of what your culture is like, or what they could expect working for your business. Strategic sharing of these moments can make applicants more eager to get a job at your company.

3. Speak to Your Audience Through Employee Testimonials

Potential job applicants understand that employee testimonials are curated and designed to reflect well upon the company. Yet there’s still a lot of value in having a real-life employee speak positively about their experience at the company.

TV ads, digital videos and social videos can be a great tool for interviewing employees and sharing their perspectives to would-be job applicants. You can also use this strategy when highlighting past success stories, such as former employees who went on to be business owners, executives, local celebrities or other high achievers, showing prospective applicants how a job at your company could be a launching pad to much greater career heights.

4. Diversify Messaging Through Episodic Ads

Like any other type of marketing strategy, recruiting advertisements are most effective when your audience is exposed to multiple ad impressions that feature different types of messaging.

These diverse messages can be very effective when paired with a retargeting strategy focused on visitors to your website and/or recruiting landing pages. Ad messaging can highlight compensation and benefits, flexible work options, employee testimonials and other selling points your business is using to attract talented applicants.

5. Clarify Your Position on Work-Life Balance

Flexible work arrangements and an emphasis on work-life balance are an increasingly common priority for job seekers—and with the hiring market tipped so strongly in their favor, they’re not afraid to set their expectations high in this regard.

From remote work arrangements to flexible hours to increased paid time off, many job seekers are aiming to negotiate these terms with employers, and are prioritizing job opportunities with employers willing to accommodate these desires. If your business has embraced, or is open to the possibility of remote and other flexible work arrangements, this is something you should emphasize in your messaging. Consider highlighting current employees who have taken advantage of this flexibility, or promote new workplace policies designed to support employees in striking a better work-life balance.

Ready to build an advertising strategy to support your recruiting efforts? Contact Cox Media today to see how we can help.

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About the Author

Sara Brasfield

Sara is a Marketing Manager on Cox Media’s corporate team in Atlanta, with a passion for writing and delivering relevant insights for advertisers. With more than nine years of experience in B2B marketing, Sara aims to help Cox Media’s current and future clients connect with their customers find new and unique ways to grow their business. Outside of the office, Sara loves spending time running, reading, and supporting her favorite sports teams (Go Braves & Gamecocks!).

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