PM Guide to Recruitment Marketing by Redactive Media Group

GUIDE

JULY 2011

PEOPLE MANAGEMENT

TO RECRUITMENT MARKETING www.peoplemanagement.co.uk

THE CHALLENGES

FACING TODAY'S MARKETPLACE

EMPLOYER BRANDING ATTRACT AND RETAIN THE

MOST TALENTED INDIVIDUALS

JARGON BUSTER! INTERNATIONAL SOCIAL MEDIA WE OUTLINE THE LATEST

RECRUITMENT MARKETING

ALIGN YOUR STRATEGY &

CONCEPTS PR0MOTE EXAMINE

YOU NEED TO UNDERSTAND

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YOUR BRAND GLOBALLY

WHERE OTHERS ARE GOING

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Genius sees many solutions where talent sees just one. We’re proud to be part of a diverse, creative industry that recognises talent, and we send our warmest congratulations to the winners of the CIPD Awards. In employment and recruitment, one size never fits all. It’s about bringing many perspectives to the table and making something harmonious. At Genius we take an unbiased approach to every need, finding the solution that not only stays true to your values and character, but delivers results. We’ll help you recruit and retain the very best people with a bespoke digital presence and credible, engaging employee communications. From a whole recruitment strategy to a simple job ad, we’ll listen to you and find a way to make it all work perfectly – now that’s Genius. Visit geniusconsultancy.co.uk to find out more or call Peter Gibbons, John Langford or Janice Rae on 0117 956 5473.

Recruitment Strategies

Recruitment Advertising

Employer Branding

Employee Comms

The Work of Genius

geniusconsultancy.co.uk

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PM GUIDE TO RECRUITMENT MARKETING

CONTENTS WELCOME

MARKET OVERVIEW

Anna Scott takes a look at the buzz words in recruitment marketing, from creativity, consolidation, value and ﬁt, to retainers, project-based work and specialisation

BY ANNA SCOTT, EDITOR

EMPLOYER BRANDING

At a roundtable to discuss the current state of recruitment marketing, a number of professionals in the trade said that the public sector was a “bleak” place to be at the moment. The commercial sector, on the other hand, is seeing something of a recovery in recruitment terms. The ﬁnancial crisis and resulting recession have not had a uniform effect on all industry sectors in the past four years. Those immediately affected are starting to recover now, while public-sector cuts have taken longer to bite. As one recruitment marketer commented: “It’s been a tale of two recessions.” Agencies operating in the recruitment marketing sector have had to ﬁnd innovative approaches to winning and retaining clients in all sectors, providing them with progressive, successful and measurable solutions. This has meant embracing social media, as has been the case for a number of years now, as well as reinvigorating more traditional forms of recruitment marketing, to satisfy a range of increasingly savvy jobhunters. Consequently, the range of campaigns and channels through which recruitment advertisements are disseminated is varied and exciting. This can be seen in the impressive entries for this year’s CIPD Recruitment Marketing Awards. Coverage of the winners and runners-up starts on page 26. We hope you enjoy this year’s supplement.

JARGON BUSTER

PHOTOGRAPH: WORK COMMUNICATIONS’ AWARD-WINNING ENTRY, SEE PAGE 35

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If recruitment-speak leaves you feeling like you’re listening to a foreign language, then it’s time to brush up with PM’s guide to terminology

INTERNATIONAL

If you want to conquer the world, go local, writes Nic Paton. There’s no substitute for subtlety and regional knowledge when it comes to international recruitment marketing

SOCIAL MEDIA

Networking tools may be the new kid on the block, but they use the oldest, most powerful advertising channel in the world – word of mouth. Tim Smedley reports

AWARDS

PM GUIDE TO RECRUITMENT MARKETING Editor Anna Scott Chief sub-editor Vanessa Balloqui Art editor Robin Farley Senior picture editor Claire Echavarry Publishing director Joanna Marsh Recruitment sales manager John Seaman Senior recruitment sales executive Gill Rock Deputy production manager Kieran Tobin

The ﬁrst signs of market activity after a recession-led enforced break means now is the perfect time to revisit your employer brand, writes Carly Chynoweth

And the winner is… Anna Scott takes a closer look at what made the ﬁnalists in this year’s CIPD Recruitment Marketing Awards stand out from the crowd

LISTINGS

The results of People Management’s annual survey of the UK’s top specialist recruitment marketing agencies

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MARKET OVERVIEW

REVIVAL OF THE

FITTEST The market is on the move again but the advice for HR professionals stays the same – you’ll get the most value if you form a relationship with an agency that knows exactly what you need Words: Anna Scott

here has never been more choice available for HR professionals looking to hire recruitment marketing agencies. Whether they want to breathe life into their employer brand (see this year’s Grand Prix winner), develop a social media strategy or fill high-profile vacancies, the range of organisations and the vast array of services they offer mean HR professionals can choose a recruitment marketing solution that’s just right for their organisation. “[Agencies] are all completely different businesses with very talented people, which means we can fulfil certain functions,” says Toby Windsor, managing partner at SMRS. “There is a massive choice and clients can pick every requirement they need across the resourcing and retention area,” he adds. However, it’s imperative that HR professionals do their research and know what they want before they begin to look for it. “Problems come when clients don’t really know what they are looking for,” says Cathy Hyde, head of client service at Bernard Hodes. “Quite often clients are after a strategy, not a product, and then it’s about the expertise of our people – that is what they should pay for.”

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To be able to identify what sort of recruitment marketing would suit their requirements, clients need to understand how this sector operates and how best they can form a relationship with an agency. The recruitment marketing sector has been characterised by a great deal of consolidation among the large players and the launch of smaller, specialist outﬁts, not to mention the vastly changing recruitment landscape, in which clients’ strategies vary greatly. Furthermore, as technology progresses, the creative solutions available continue to grow.

The pitching process The range of products and services that an agency can provide means the tender process can become complicated. When pitches go out to tender through procurement departments, which may be looking at agencies only in terms of cost, it can be difficult to compare what’s on offer. “Every agency puts a different model in front of the client, and it can become confusing,” says Hyde. Windsor adds that agencies all have different pricing models. “But whatever we do, as a sector we have to sell value,” he adds. This is a fundamental point for most in the sector. “Value is the key word here,” says Tom Chesterton, a client partner at Work Group. “The client must be able to see the value that is being added by the services we provide.” Chesterton believes organisations are becoming more educated about the breadth of channels they can use to get their message out to the people they want to communicate with. “Clients know it’s a much more complex relationship [with an agency] and they are starting to understand what that value is.” Agencies too, whether pitching to procurement or HR, must understand the business challenges clients face, and ensure that the pitch they make and the services they offer are most appropriate for that client’s needs. “For most of us [in this sector] the issues are achieving proﬁtable growth, delivering services that really do add value and ﬁnding fully committed clients who don’t just pay lip service to wanting services that will take them forward strategically,” says Guy Hornsby, commercial director at Euro RSCG Riley.

What’s on offer For many years, agencies have offered services ranging from creative print and digital artwork to employer branding or solutions to website design and management, but the nature of the contract with clients varies. Agencies are gently persuading clients to move away from a commission-based model, where agencies make their money from a chunk of the commission from placing an ad. “We have some clients who do media commissions, and we’re putting them on a retainer model,” says Sinead

Bunting, director at Media Comm. Such models allow clients to pay hourly for consultancy-style work from agencies in areas such as social media and employer branding. However, whether such a framework agreement means an organisation must always go to that agency for any recruitment marketing depends on the individual arrangement. “Clients are moving away from great big accounts with agencies and no longer award the whole lot from media buying all the way through to everything else related to recruitment communications,” says David Jenkins, managing director of Wave. “There is an opportunity to work with organisations on a project-by-project basis.” For smaller agencies, project-led work is their livelihood. Tsz Wu co-founded agency Pink Squid in 2010. “The bigger agencies don’t [always] see the worth in a £20,000 project,” he says. “They want to make sure that they secure a four-year contract for £4 million. We are more agile and we’ll say yes to a smaller contact without any retainer or side contract.” At the other end of the spectrum, some clients look for a contingency-based model in which they pay according to the number of people the agency attracts to the business. Robert Peasnell, client development director at TMP Worldwide UK, says: “If clients are running applicant tracking systems (ATS) and they know the kinds of numbers they need to get into their system, we are looking at being commissioned, and they pay on a contingent, perhead basis.” This approach allows the agency to choose what methods it will deploy to attract applicants, taking the decision out of the client’s hands. A similarly large scale approach is often adopted with recruitment process outsourcing (RPO), whereby a client outsources its entire recruitment process to an external provider. The implications vary. Some RPOs have their own recruitment marketing agencies attached, making life quite difficult for more traditional recruitment marketing agencies. Other agencies will work with RPOs to provide creative recruitment advertising. But this isn’t always easy. “RPO is typically working to a cost per hire,” says Euro RSCG Riley’s Hornsby. “And then they are working with organisations like us to source the right candidates. It can be incredibly difficult because the right solution does not necessarily ﬁt with their cost model. And that can lead to a lot of frustration.” These business models have been partly driven by the evolution of the recruitment marketing sector. Many of the historically large agencies have merged or been the subject of takeovers, leading to consolidation in some areas of the market. While smaller agencies might be agile, and consequently be able to diversify into different sectors, the larger agencies get the volume business when the deals are there, says Keith Pilling, commercial and operations director at Penna. “But bigger agencies carry a load of back-office costs,” he adds. EE

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MARKET OVERVIEW EE For both large and small agencies, the decision by clients to outsource all aspects of recruitment, often using an RPO approach, has had an impact. “We are questioning where a recruitment communications agency ﬁts into this picture,” says David Spector, head of digital and product strategy, aia. “From our perspective, it is as a consultancy. We want to be seen as people that give the strategic advice that is necessary to be successful.” As many organisations move towards direct sourcing, or try to cut recruitment costs, using recruitment marketing agencies in the same way as they would any other consultancy has become a reality. “There is a new generation of people on the client side who are used to being charged for our time and our intellectual property,” says Mark Beavan, head of digital at ThirtyThree. Media Comm’s Bunting feels the industry has evolved enough for clients to understand this approach. “Our industry suffered from years of not having transparent business models,” she says. “I think the key thing is having that transparency to say ‘this is how we make money and this is how we do what we do’. Maybe there was a trust issue.” A consultancy approach can demonstrate to clients that the agency is providing “professional services” and this can affect the nature of relationships between clients and agencies.

Managing relationships John Langford, director of a new agency, Genius, suggests that because the market has moved from a process-heavy approach to recruitment transactions towards more strategy and project delivery, there are now examples of “good old-fashioned relationship management” with clients. However, Langford has also noted a lack of continuity in some agency-client relationships over the past decade. “Weekly schedules and day-to-day contact with a client have been replaced by ad hoc projects, where you have little contact for six months,” he says. “And, now, clients don’t think twice about pulling different agencies in for different projects.” Spector adds: “There are not enough lunches; you cannot substitute that type of relationship.” But that has its own dangers, warns Beavan. Some clients may approach an agency for a variety of projects just because the relationship is good. His advice? Remember that, if a particular project does not play to your strengths, recommending another agency can also be the mark of a good client-agency relationship. “It’s the ability to say to people ‘we can’t do this, but we’ll introduce you to someone who can’,” Beavan adds. This, says Wave’s Jenkins, is a “brave call” for an agency to make. “We’re all used to saying: ‘Yes, we can do that’.” EE

THERE IS A MASSIVE CHOICE AND CLIENTS CAN PICK EVERY REQUIREMENT THEY NEED ACROSS THE

RESOURCING AND RETENTION AREA

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If you’re looking to spark interest in your employee referral scheme, by all means use a lookalike competition complete with life-sized standees and a winning trip to the Ivy. But if you’re after an agency to come up with stuff like that for you, better ask us. We can do the whole lot, from recruitment marketing through to employee comms and all those twiddly bits in the middle. We even put a movie in our last ad. Whatever your issue we’ll sort it, like the genuine people communication and consultancy experts we are. Talk to Cassie Sissons on +44 (0) 20 7551 4850 or email her on csissons@hodes.co.uk

It’s not really him, honest.

Accept no substitute

www.hodes.co.uk

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MARKET OVERVIEW

‘CREATIVITY INVISIBLE’ IS THE ADDED VALUE OF RECRUITMENT MARKETING, BUT NOBODY RESPECTS IT AT THE MOMENT BECAUSE IT’S

Creativity

One skill expected of most recruitment marketing agencies is creativity. It is the “added value” of recruitment marketing, says Pink Squid’s Wu. “But nobody respects it at the moment because it’s invisible,” he adds. Anne Riley, recruitment communications consultant and judge of this year’s awards, suggests that creativity is at the heart of the changes the recruitment marketing sector has undergone in the past few years. “Agencies have to bring in new digital skills and retrain their existing creatives,” she says. “They have had to adapt to new technologies rapidly, and have to be able to keep bang up to date.” With many recruitment drives being about hitting the target number of CVs, some people believe creativity is over-rated. But Bunting disagrees. With employer brand, for example, being such an important part of recruitment and retention, he sees creativity as essential to getting the right candidates, because potential candidates need to think: ‘Is this the place I want to work? Do I fit here culturally?’ “There is definitely room for creativity,” he adds. The definition of creativity is important here, says Spector: “It doesn’t have to be shiny and fancy to be creative.

Programmers are always creative. It is about finding the most elegant solution for a business requirement,” he adds. Beavan agrees: “The ability to bring an organisation to life online is, often, where this creative aspect is being realised.” Riley agrees. “There are great opportunities for copywriting – social media campaigns allow for real ingenuity and original thinking.” In this year’s awards there was evidence of creatives meeting these new challenges, she says, but “a change in mindset” is still needed. Many of these issues come back to defining what the sector does. “We are all very separate businesses doing different things,” says Jenkins. “On one hand, creativity is a key part of the industry. On the other, I can see the attraction for clients of just doing whatever they need to in order to get that candidate.” These sometimes conflicting client needs can contribute to the difficulties in defining the recruitment marketing sector. But they also illustrate the diversity of the industry. For HR professionals, the key is to understand what they want, which approaches are available and how best to work with agencies. For agencies, among all the other market pressures, adding value to those recruitment transactions is essential for success.

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EMPLOYER BRANDING Words: Carly Chynoweth Images: Corbis/Istock/Getty

THE NEW LAWS OF ATTRACTION The recession meant an enforced break from the recruitment market for many organisations, damaging a few carefully constructed reputations. But now is the time to repair, rebuild or relaunch the employer brand

quiet few years for recruitment has translated to an even quieter time for recruitment marketing and employer branding specialists, but there are signs that life is beginning to return. “There is increased activity in the market now, albeit from a very low base,” says John Langford, a director of Genius, a recruitment marketing agency. Jim Horsley, the chief executive of CHA, a workplace communications consultancy, agrees. “It is different to what was happening before the recession, because people are still hiring less,” he says. “It means that there is more employer branding activity focused on engaging existing employees as well as recruiting people.” Kevin Keohane, head of brand and talent at SAS, adds: “At this stage in the game, it’s as much about motivating and retaining the people you’ve got.” One obvious effect of two years of near-inactivity in the market is that many organisations are being forced to start rethinking their approach almost from scratch. “Life has changed in the past three years and, if it’s a while since they have done anything, the residual impression in the marketplace will be quite different (to the reality),” Horsley says. “What the company was saying about itself two or three years ago is probably quite different to what they need to say now… and they will be playing catch-up, big time.” Tsz Wu, the co-founder of digital creative agency Pink Squid, argues that many employers had just got to a nice point with their branding work when the recession hit. “Before that, they were producing literature, doing awareness building and talking about all the things they did and were going to do in areas like CSR and employee development and all the other pieces of the jigsaw that make up the employer brand,” he says. “But they ran out of money because the recession hit and they were not able to do what they said they were going to. They just stopped.” In some cases, this may mean that companies are actually worse off than those that never made an effort at all, as they raised EE expectations and then did not meet them, he says.

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IMAGINE

the most successful person in your company. NOW REWIND Before that pinnacle,

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WE INSPIRE LASTING BRAND RELATIONSHIPS

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EMPLOYER BRANDING

‘THE RECESSION HAS BEEN GOOD FOR EMPLOYER BRANDING AS PEOPLE ARE THINKING STRATEGICALLY ABOUT THE RESULTS THEY WANT’

WW Another issue with taking a stop-start approach is simply that it takes more effort to get people’s attention back than it does to keep it. “It means that employers have had to pick up the reins and start again with a bigger bang,” Wu says. But, in the long run, the recession could see a more strategic approach to employer branding work. Tom Chesterton, a client partner at Work Group, argues that the recession will prove to have been a good thing for employer branding as people are thinking strategically about the results that they want for their investment rather than simply splashing out. “Before the credit crunch, people were in panic mode trying to keep up (with demand for new hires), but now they are thinking that, if they are going to spend this money on employer branding, it needs to link back to the business – they need to be able to justify the investment,” he says. That has been a really key driver in making the process effective for both clients and agencies, and that has been client-driven.” Agencies can assist their clients by helping them to demonstrate the business beneﬁts of investing in employer branding, says Keith Pilling, commercial manager at Penna, an HR consultancy. “Employers are realising they will have to recruit key people going forward, but, after not having been in the recruitment marketplace recently, employer branding becomes very important,” he says. “The challenge is getting budget for it. The business is saying do more with less, cut your recruitment costs, so convincing

the financial director of an organisation that it is actually a worthwhile investment is the hard part.” The public sector finds itself facing a particular dilemma here, as – despite hiring freezes and redundancies getting all the headlines – it is still suffering from significant skills shortages in some areas, such as social work. However, budgetary and political pressures combine to make it incredibly difficult to spend money on employer branding exercises. “If a public-sector employer goes out and does a highprofile employer branding campaign, the headline in the local papers will only say ‘NHS – or government department or council – wastes money’ so it is very hard to justify,” Pilling says. And, of course, negative media stories could potentially damage the employer brand anyway. Then there’s the deeper issue: employer brands have to reflect reality, or they will do more harm than good. What you don’t want is for candidates to come on board, discover that they have been missold, and leave within six months – quite possibly criticising the organisation online and to friends at the same time, says Claire McCartney, the CIPD’s resourcing and talent planning adviser. “Employers are so keen to get people in sometimes that they don’t give a balanced view of the role,” she says. “You have to be realistic about it… and give an honest view around the culture and values of the organisation.” Employer brands should not be aspirational, Langford adds. “That’s one of the slight glitches with HR,” he EE

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EMPLOYER BRANDING

‘WORD OF MOUTH IS BECOMING EVEN MORE CRITICAL IN THE WORLD OF TWITTER AND FACEBOOK’

WW says. “Its perceptions of an organisation and ambitions for it do not always sit with what the organisation is and what it needs to be successful. If you are in the car-sales business, you don’t want to think that you employ a lot of smooth-talking conniving bastards, but it sort of helps if you do.” The particular challenge here for the public sector, though, is that its reality is changing under pressure from politicians and budgetary cuts. The sector has an opportunity to present itself as a smaller, more nimble employer that requires more people to manage contracts and commission services – a task that will benefit from thoughtful employer branding – but it needs to understand what it is before it can sell it to candidates, says Robert Peasnell, client development director at TMP Worldwide. “The interesting question that won’t come into play for a while is why anyone would become a public-sector employee – apart from altruistic reasons – with the job security and the good pension and so forth taken away,” he says. “They also need to understand that the biggest group that will affect their reputation as an employer is existing staff.” Keohane adds: “It’s probably best to focus on retaining the best talent. They are the most mobile, so the challenge in the near-term is to make sure that the best people who are going to be the future of the public sector are identified and retained. The word of mouth generated by those who leave if low performers remain will be the real reputational risk to the sector.” The better you treat employees, the better the story they will share. Word of mouth, always important to employer brand because of the weight it is given by potential candidates, is becoming even more critical in the world of Twitter and Facebook. “Getting social media right is about having confidence that people are engaged and have something good to say,” McCartney says. “There may be some negative things that go out there, but mostly it is amazingly positive,” Peasnell adds. “People generally say the right thing.” The other benefit of electronic media is that it is cheap. The internet is popular with cost-sensitive clients because it can be updated much faster and more cheaply than other media– particularly useful when a business’s overall strategy is changing, Langford says. “If you want to change your graduate brochure it’s expensive, because you have to pay for 16 tonnes of paper and distribution.”

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EXPRESS YOURSELF Companies are looking for more than stand-alone recruitment marketing: they want an employer brand that ties directly to the consumer brand, says Tsz Wu, the co-founder of Pink Squid, a digital creative agency. “The first thing for HR to do is to engage with marketing and corporate communications straightaway,” he says. “If you work with them from the outset you will develop a much richer employer brand.” One of his clients, PizzaExpress, has done just that. The high-street restaurant chain has refreshed its consumer brand with an updated logo, streamlined menu and a series of new-look menus rolling out across the country, led by the launch of its funky restaurant-cum-idea-lab in Richmond, which wouldn’t look out of place in the futuristic sitcom The Jetsons. But these evolutionary changes to the business’s look needed parallel changes to its staffing, says Louise Gallant, recruitment manager at PizzaExpress. “We wanted to recruit people with big personalities who can really engage with the customer, but who also understand intuitively when people want to be left alone,” she says. To reach this audience, PizzaExpress worked with Pink Squid to develop an irreverent campaign featuring cartoon lions, heart-shaped pizzas and lines such as “you don’t have to be a puppeteer to work here, but it helps”. “We wanted to attract people who would see it and laugh and come and have a laugh with us,” Gallant says. “We wanted people who had a fun outlook on life.” The campaign proved a huge success when it was trialled for recruitment at the new Richmond restaurant; they got 1,500 applications for just 40 roles. “We attracted dancers, ballerinas, jugglers – we actually recruited a fire-eater – and musicians. And when we ran the assessment centres and saw how much fun the people were, it was just unbelievable.”

LINKS & NOTES

E PizzaExpress: See the restaurant chain’s irreverent campaign to recruit staff at its new Richmond branch pizzaexpressyourself. com

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One day, you’ll probably engage your workforce with WKH ÁLFN RI D VZLWFK Until then, there’s

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JARGON BUSTER

TALK THE TALK As the recruitment marketing sector keeps up with ever-faster technological change so the swathe of surrounding jargon grows. Here’s our handy guide to the lingo you need to know Words: Anna Scott

Applicant tracking system (ATS): a software programme designed to manage job applications and general recruitment needs for organisations. The ATS can be run in house or by an external agency.

and more. The site will be live for as long as the recruitment campaign is running and can provide one point of information for recruiters once the campaign is complete. Usually reached by clicking on an ad.

Campaign site: a website designed and built speciﬁcally for a recruitment campaign, detailing information about the job(s) being advertised, the hiring organisation, contact details

Click-through rate (CTR): the number of times in a given timespan that website users click on an online advertisement taking them to the advertiser’s site.

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Employer brand: like a consumer brand, an employer brand refers to aspects of an organisation’s reputation. Where a consumer brand refers to the reputation of products or services, an employer brand refers to the organisation’s reputation as an employer. It includes both tangible features of a particular organisation, such as the reward strategy or working environment, for example, and intangible features, such as employee perceptions of that particular brand.

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Employee value proposition (EVP): the aspects of working for an organisation that are of value to an employee. This encompasses an exchange of an employee’s skills and experience in return for the reward and recognition provided by an organisation. This concept is vital in attracting recruits to an organisation and retaining them. It is inextricably linked to employer brand. Facebook page: a profile on the social networking website that can be created by organisations, or individuals, covering a specific topic, which other users can “like”, meaning they are fans of that profile. These pages can be customised, carry adverts and be used to send out updates. Impressions: how many times in a given timespan a web page – or advert – is viewed. Each time the page appears on a computer screen is counted as an impression. Instant messaging: a way of communicating with other people online in real-time. Available on a variety of websites, including Facebook. Landing page: when a user clicks on an advertiser’s link they will be taken through to a landing page on the advertiser’s website, which is designed to encourage them to look around the site. In the context of recruitment marketing, a landing page may relate to a specific recruitment campaign or it may be the organisation’s careers page. Levels of engagement: the extent to which potential candidates engage with organisations that market themselves, and how much recruiters engage with potential candidates. Recruitment marketers seek to engage with specific types of candidate, using different targeted channels. This could include taking into account current employees’ comments on recruitment marketing campaigns, for example. LinkedIn: a social networking site used by business professionals to network, which includes making contacts and posting CVs.

Micro-site or mini-site: a website dedicated to a particular market a recruiter is trying to target, such as graduates. It can be used for highvolume hire. The site supplements an organisation’s corporate website. Usually reached by clicking on an ad. Mobile site: a website designed to be accessed speciﬁcally by a mobile phone or other mobile web device. Nano-site: a mini website that can be downloaded onto a mobile phone. Companies may use nano-sites to market information about a particular job, their recruitment strategy or more general employer brand information. Pay per click (PPC): the process of paying for a listing on a search engine when certain words or phrases are searched for. The payment is made when a user clicks on the advertiser’s listing. Pop-under: a web advertisement that opens a separate window underneath the page that the user is looking at, which they see once they’ve closed this page down. Pop-up: a web advertisement that opens up over the page that the user is viewing. Portal: a website that acts as a gateway to other information on the web. It could be formed by a corporate website, linking to a careers site and ATS. A portal may also feature a search engine,

‘SOCIAL MEDIA: THE GENERAL TERM FOR THE USE OF WEB AND MOBILE TECHNOLOGY TO COMMUNICATE WITH OTHERS ON THE INTERNET’

more generalised content and access to other databases. It aims to provide one point of access for recruiters and a simpler application process. Retweet (RT): when a user posts another user’s tweet (see Twitter, below). This can allow a wider range of users to see the post. Search engine optimisation (SEO): the process of using certain phrases and words on a website that will enable it to appear higher up the rankings on a search engine. SEO uses the search engine’s “organic” search results – that is, those that appear as a result of the search engine’s calculations, rather than paidfor listings. Sentiment analysis: a technique to analyse opinions written online and on social networking sites that can be used by recruiters to learn what internet users think of an employer, for example. It has the aim of understanding the perception that potential clients have of a company. Social media: the general term for the use of web and mobile phone technology to communicate with others on the internet, using Web 2.0 technology. Web 2.0 signalled the development of technology that now allows users to generate content that is published online. In the recruitment marketing context, this can include applicants posting experiences of the recruitment process, for example. Twitter: a “micro-blogging” website, where users can post short messages (tweets) of up to 140 characters and update other users, including those who follow these posts, as well as communicate with other users directly. Tweets can contain links to other websites. Posts can be grouped together using “hash tags”, which is any word or phrase with # in front, eg, #HR or #graduatejobs. Organisations are increasingly using Twitter for recruitment campaigns. Unique users: the number of visits to a website by a “unique” computer, assumed to be a person, used to assess the popularity of a website.

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1/7/11 11:34:18

INTERNATIONAL

GLOCAL AUTHORITY We may live in a shrinking world, but cultural and language barriers mean that recruitment marketing across the globe requires subtlety and local knowledge, with even the best-known multinationals needing to ‘think globally and act locally’ Words: Nic Paton

amously branded as “the world’s local bank”, HSBC has a seductive catchphrase that, if you were to transpose the word “bank” with almost any other industry or sector, most global brands and ambitious multinationals would have given their eye-teeth to have come up with. It’s a phrase that neatly encapsulates the ongoing challenge faced by many global players: how do you establish and maintain a coherent, aspirational global brand and employee value proposition (EVP) while remaining attuned to the nuances of local and regional markets, allowing you attract and retain talent and maintain competitive advantage? This is also, crucially, an area in which recruitment marketing agencies – many of them now global players in their own right – are playing an increasingly important role. As Neil Chowings, managing director at Work Asia Paciﬁc points out, Asia Paciﬁc alone comprises 50 very different (and many fast-growing) economies with some 20

languages and as many disparate cultures between them; it’s not hard to see the value that an agency with a clear understanding of local, regional, national and global imperatives could bring to the recruitment marketing table. “Your value proposition is your organisation, and the differentiation in terms of the employment you offer is one of your unique selling points. It should be the same around the world, because that is the value of your business. What should be different is how you execute this at a local level,” he explains. In Japan, for instance, there will often be a tension between marketing yourself as a global organisation – so probably using English headlines or front pages – and recognising that national identity and language remain important signiﬁers, much like in France. So the rest of the article will still need to be in Japanese, says Chowings. “For recruitment marketing agencies the role is simply talking to clients in, say, China, Hong Kong, Singapore and Japan and showing them what is possible and how, what the EVP is, the role of external talent pools, how to roll out and articulate a brand and so on,” Chowings adds. EE

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INTERNATIONAL

WW “The classic email you get reads ‘Can you do me a media pack for Asia Pacific?’, but it just doesn’t work like that. There are so many different regions and markets to consider,” agrees Chris Plowman, Asia Pacific director at Bernard Hodes. Singapore, for example, is still heavily print-orientated, whereas China is much less so. In Japan, while midcareer hiring (which used to be virtually non-existent) is starting to happen now, the methodology can be quite different again, with referrals definitely not considered “the done thing”. “Generally, it is increasingly about trying to find niche channels and develop more creative messages to reach candidates. It is about being smarter in how we reach candidates and aiming for quality over quantity. The biggest challenge a lot of the time is just in finding high-quality candidates,” says Plowman. David Spector, head of digital and product strategy at recruitment communications agency aia, adds: “It’s difficult to validate any activity in a place where you just don’t understand the culture. That is one of the big disconnects, which is why you need to have people locally in these markets who get how it works.” With 90 offices in 35 countries, an agency such as Bernard Hodes can bring “an extraordinary body of insight” to the process of assisting companies in promoting their employer brands globally, regionally and locally, emphasises its chief executive, Helen Rosethorn. Rosethorn highlights a global bank that Bernard Hodes recently worked with on its assessment and recruitment methodologies. It discovered that some of these were being “lost in translation” in parts of Africa. “Certain assessment tests were irrelevant because of the way the education systems were structured. It can sometimes be something as simple as that. Or it may be expectations around the working week – say, the times of day you would expect people to be available for interview. That will differ in different parts of the world,” she explains. “In South Africa, there is a whole bunch of legislation around the diversity agenda that is really significant when it comes to recruitment. And the sorts of recruitment communication methods you might use in the UK or US may be wholly irrelevant to parts of the Middle East,” adds Rosethorn. “Similarly, in somewhere like Hungary, there is a mass of red tape around maternity leave legislation, so you need to understand that in relation to your staff. A global brand that did not have that local insight might find it hard to pick its way through something like that.” Effective partnerships will be the key here – as much for agencies themselves on the ground as for their global clients – argues Tom Chesterton, client partner at the Work Group.

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LINKS & NOTES

E CIPD factsheet on international culture, for guidance on global cultural differences that companies should take into consideration cipd.co.uk/hrresources/factsheets/ international-culture. aspx CIPD factsheet on international resourcing and recruitment cipd.co.uk/hrresources/factsheets/ international-resourcing-recruitment.aspx

“If you approach every market and expect it to be exactly the same, then you are going to fall ﬂat really quickly,” he explains. “The cultural differences are profound, and the understanding and usage of different types of media is massive. Unless you have that on-the-ground presence, or a partner based there, then you can’t have that insider knowledge about what is going to work.” Rosethorn agrees: “Global organisations often do not know the answers themselves and simply want a partner who can give them those insights. You need to have a partner with a solid, global footprint to create that connectivity and give you a really global employer brand.” History can play its part, too, with historical ties – such as those between, say, India and the UK, or other former colonial relationships (for example, if you are considering taking a British brand into Australia) – often needing to be taken into consideration. As Tsz Wu, technical director and co-founder of Pink Squid, adds: “A lot of people see a campaign and think that is the brand – but it’s not: it’s the execution for that particular audience. There is a massive part of the job that allows you to transcend all those units and regions, yet you still have to have local people that understand how to make that work.”

CASE STUDY: DEUTSCHE BANK

‘IF YOU APPROACH EVERY MARKET AND EXPECT IT TO BE THE SAME, THEN YOU ARE GOING TO FALL FLAT REALLY QUICKLY’

MediaCom has been working with Deutsche Bank to help it develop a global social media strategy, which is due to be unveiled in the autumn, says MediaCom director Sinead Bunting. One critical element is how the recruitment “conversations” (especially important within a social media context, of course) will be managed between, and across, the various countries. “It is about developing a global platform that all the different markets can go to with Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, but with regional tabs,” she explains. “As a brand, Deutsche Bank has suffered a bit from low awareness, so it is about generating a wider awareness of investment banking as a career, bringing more diversity to the bank and providing information to help the application process. Each platform meets those objectives.” “It might be information on when the bank is coming onto campus in Bangkok or regional content across Asia Pacific and so on. It is about meeting both global objectives and regional needs,” she adds. One way the agency has been able to help is through carrying out a content audit to make sure that what is being said is not overly US focused, gauging the key topics in Europe, the US and Asia, and then creating a global, digital strategic blueprint that can be both shared and built upon regionally. “Social media is, of course, a hot topic and there can be a temptation to go quick, quick, but it is important to get out there, listen and then consider what topics you need, what content is important and how platforms will interact and be integrated. It also has to take into account the user’s journey, which is no longer a linear one,” Bunting adds.

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Make sure your work gets seen by the right people. Metro and the Evening Standard are read by more Londoners who intend to change jobs in the next 6 months than any other national newspaper. For more information and to advertise call 020 7361 5007

Recruitment Source: NRS October 10 â&#x20AC;&#x201C; March 11 London ITV.

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SOCIAL MEDIA

Networking has emerged from its chrysalis, with businesses quick to see the beauty of a medium that allows them to engage with, rather than merely attract, a massive audience – and at a modest cost Words: Tim Smedley Illustration: Robin Farley

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ocial media has become an essential recruitment tool. Few major ﬁrms or agencies would admit to not having a social media presence. That said, many would privately admit to not knowing how best to use it. And others have tales of lying awake at night, fearful that somebody will say the wrong thing on Facebook or Twitter, with ensuing global headlines. That fear factor, however, appears to be declining for two important reasons. First is the increasing recognition that social media is just another tool in the box. As John Langford, director at recruitment advertising agency Genius, says: “Social media is an enabler of the oldest and most powerful advertising channel in the world: word of mouth. Which is why people believe travel advice site TripAdvisor but not the brochure. It’s powerful because it’s credible.”

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Second is that people are simply more exposed to and comfortable with social media than even a couple of years ago. “Under-30s statistically communicate more through social channels now than through email,” says David Spector, head of digital and product strategy at recruitment communications agency aia. “That is a paradigm shift.” It’s certainly proved to be a paradigm shift for recruitment. “In 2009, less than 1 per cent of new hires to Randstad UK came from social media,” says Dan Burt, strategic HR projects manager at the recruitment consultancy. “By 2010 that had jumped to 7 per cent. Fast forward to the first half of 2011 and that figure has increased significantly, running at 38 per cent in one of our larger operating companies.” The recruitment technology firm Taleo boasts 48 of the Fortune 100 as clients and Chris Phillips, its vice president, international marketing, says: “Eighty per cent or more of our clients are sourcing through social networks now. The main focus is on sourcing high-quality candidates, and particularly passive candidates – the ones who aren’t necessarily actively searching for roles – through social networks.” While there are similarities to using print media, there’s one fundamental difference, says Phillips: “Social media gives you the opportunity not just to surface the job vacancy to the candidate but to start to build a relationship with that candidate over time.” Changes in the marketplace have led to an increasingly sophisticated approach. “For companies like Coke, Nike or Apple, where their brand is inherently in the voice of consumers, social is a natural and sometimes simple step,” says Frank Durrell, head of digital at TMP Worldwide. “For others who would be considered less social, moving to a conversation rather than a broadcast mentality is harder. Either way, brands and agencies need to embrace the reasons why people use social networks in the first place.” While many employers use social media to increase the attractiveness of their brand, some prefer to use it for onboarding. Sammie Stapleton, head of recruitment

‘SOCIAL MEDIA IS AN ENABLER OF THE OLDEST AND MOST POWERFUL ADVERTISING CHANNEL IN THE WORLD: WORD OF MOUTH’

marketing at PwC, is one: “Students were telling us that they would have liked to have found out more about PwC once they’d gone through the recruitment process. So we decided to have a strategic approach to using it for onboarding.” PwC created a “private room” that sits within Facebook, to which only candidates who have received job offers are invited. The users engage and form networks before even joining the company, while the recruitment team can also send out information and reminders. Stapleton and her team are currently reviewing the social media strategy, with a view to moving into other areas of recruitment, including attraction. Social media strategies are more ubiquitous and farsighted than they once were. There is still, however, a divergence in opinion over whether to keep social media campaigns on a short or long leash. Too short and, says Langford, the less credible it is: “With social media, [ﬁrms can be in danger of ] creating a slight apartheid in terms of who has access to them as a tool for recruitment.” Too long and, argues Tom Chesterton, client partner at recruitment marketing agency Work Communications, you can have some pretty dreadful campaigns: “A number of companies think they are already there because they have a Facebook page – the last update was 2009.” Durrell argues that a social media strategy should be “inherently and inextricably linked to the client’s overall communications strategy. If not, then the brand ends up appearing disjointed.” The strategy, he says, should always hark back to the purpose of using social media such as LinkedIn, Facebook or Twitter in the ﬁrst place: “to enable the audience to interact and drive the action around your existing brand – the positive conversation that will lead participants to check out your careers site and click on the ‘Apply’ button.” Unlike more traditional forms of recruitment marketing, successful use of social media doesn’t necessarily come down to the size of an organisation’s wallet. “I think it EE

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SOCIAL MEDIA

brings parity,” says Spector. “With less resource you can still message as effectively through social channels as people with all the money in the world... Yes, you can spend hundreds of thousands on amazing applications, but those aren’t necessarily going to get you the people you need.” Even at a large firm like financial and business adviser Grant Thornton, the social media output is led by a small team of trainee finance professionals in addition to their day jobs (see case study, right). Some firms prefer to go much further, such as Randstad, which invested in social media training for its internal recruiters. Arguably, different skills and capabilities are required of recruiters to engage in social media, as opposed to the polished presentation of print adverts. “You need to be comfortable socialising over social media – and be a good networker yourself,” says Spector. Or it can be as simple as choosing people internally who are already active users of social networks, as at Grant Thornton. The difficulty with social media has often been measuring the return on investment. Again, there are signs that this is changing too. Rather than “cost per hire” or “cost per application” (although those remain important), assessing the quality of applicants and hires is coming to the fore. Law firm Pinsent Masons uses a platform called BraveNewTalent, accessible through channels such as Facebook and Google, for its internship programme. “We found that the students following us on it were twice as likely to be offered an internship than those who were not using the site,” says Edward Walker, graduate recruitment manager at the firm. “By the time they submitted an application or attended an interview, they had developed a much more detailed understanding of the firm than someone who had simply read our recruitment brochure.” Stapleton at PwC agrees: “Our new recruits report a more positive experience of the onboarding process, whereas they may have been left to their own devices a little bit before.” That’s not to say there aren’t quantitative measures available too. In fact, argues Durrell: “If you can’t measure the success and demonstrate ROI for a social media

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strategy, then a client shouldn’t be proceeding.” Measures on sites can include the numbers of “like”, “share” or “follow” clicks accumulated, and how many users are clicking through to the recruitment site. Grant Thornton uses Google Analytics to look at which blogs people read the most and would like more of. As Phillips says: “The advantage of doing this online is you can track it.” That social media is here to stay is now beyond question. But what once appeared a scary new world is fast emerging as a more egalitarian – even democratic – recruitment marketing space, with opportunities for all.

CASE STUDY: GRANT THORNTON Maria Floud, head of graduate recruitment at Grant Thornton, talks about the firm’s use of social media

LINKS & NOTES

E Grant Thornton: See how this financial and business adviser tackles social media Blog: grant-thornton. co.uk/traineeblog Facebook: facebook. com/GrantThornton RecruitmentUK Twitter: twitter.com/ GT_Recruitment

We started using social media for recruitment about a year and a half ago, so we were relatively late into it. We didn’t want to do it simply because everybody else was, but at the same time there was an opportunity for us to talk directly to the market, so we decided to get involved. How we went about it was a bit different – we got together six of our recent graduate trainee cohort and said: “We want to do social media and we want you guys to create it, be responsible for it and deliver it.” We invested maybe three workshop days with the trainees at the beginning, where we gave them some prompts. But we wanted them to be running it, creating the articles and uploading straight on to the website. That may sound scary, but our objective was 100 per cent authenticity – anything less and the market might not believe they were real trainees! They decided to take us on to Facebook and created a blog, and we’ve since added Twitter feeds, a YouTube channel and a presence on forums such as WikiJob. We thought it would mostly be for attraction, but actually it’s equally about engagement with candidates who have already applied. We look at our site and Facebook and can see how people are engaging, replying to posts, following or liking. We get 8,000 applications each year and you can assess quality by the number of people who get through to the final round – that has seen a significant increase. If you engage people more and give them more information, then you get better quality.

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Pssst People can’t seem to stop talking about us. How we’ve changed. Where we’re headed. We don’t mind a bit. Between you and us, there’s lots we want to talk about too. Our expertise spans the entire employment lifecycle, so we’re never short of engaging conversation. Literally. No other business offers the individually tailored, end-to-end solutions we do – from attraction and recruitment, through development and coaching to outplacement. Listen to our clients and they’ll tell you how we’ve helped redefine the way they interact with their people. We’re Penna. We’re proud to be the name on everyone’s lips. Visit www.penna.com and pass it on.

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Scott, editor (on the left) Robinson , CIPD

Anna Vanessa

SAFE MONEY AT ASDA

A strong employer brand that focuses both staff and consumer attention on value for money has won Asda more than a loyal customer base. Anna Scott reports

Asda’s “pocket-tapping” ads were central to the supermarket’s brand for 30 years, and still remain in consumers’ consciousness. Why? Because Asda’s sole aim is to “save customers money every day”. By developing the employer brand, Work Communications and Asda have succeeded in creating an employee experience that is “joined at the hip” to this proposition, and saved the company £2.6 million to date along the way. They’ve also won the Grand Prix award at this year’s CIPD Recruitment Marketing Awards. “The second I saw it I thought it was outstanding,” says judge Anne Riley. “Great material that covers all aspects of the company and really brings the people who work there out as being key,” adds fellow judge Tom Keeney. Over three months, the Work Communications team, with the fundamental involvement of Asda’s international chief marketing officer, conducted leadership interviews, ran listening groups, interviewed candidates and engaged with over 400 employees, not to mention reviewing competitor activity and immersing themselves in the workplace. From the ﬁndings, Work was able to articulate employer brand in the acronym of Asda – Adventure, Sole purpose, Development and Altogether. Work found Asda employees honest and enthusiastic. They saw the “warts and all” version of working for this chain. While the Asda values were present in the business, cracks

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were appearing, with pressure mounting and teamwork and trust diminishing. So by developing an Employer Brand Management Place, which refocused leadership behaviours, re-energised reward and recognition, redesigned and relaunched the employee feedback survey and launched a health and well-being programme for employees, Work Communications, with Asda, has helped bring the workplace culture back to health. Brand components are now articulated through all communications, and Asda’s labour turnover, at 15.9 per cent, is the lowest across the grocery sector. Direct sourcing now ﬁlls 85 per cent of vacancies. Cost per hire is down more than 50 per cent on two years ago. Forty per cent of all roles are ﬁlled internally. “The results are compelling,” says judge Emma Hardaker-Jones. The work itself “felt right”, adds judge Natalie White. “The video impressed me, and all the other pieces complemented it.” The award for best Employer Brand, that Work Communications has won, is one of 14 categories. This year, the 31st year of the awards, sees the launch of a new award, for Social Media. This category is open to all recruitment work using social media and looks at interaction with potential candidates, raising an employer’s brand and the impact made through creative use of social media. The winners and runners-up are detailed in the following pages.

RISING TO THE CHALLENGE Headlines about unemployment create a monochrome image, writes Vanessa Robinson, head of HR practice development at the CIPD. But the labour market isn’t like a tap – on or off. Even in the worst times, there are employers recruiting. And now, as the economy shows signs of recovery, we see organisations in parts of the private sector recruiting, although in much of the public sector the scene is downright bleak. But one thing we find in conversations with CIPD members – and our latest resourcing survey – is that, although the volume of applications has shot up, it’s still a challenge to find quality applicants. And even more of a battle to win their attention and commitment – which is where recruitment marketing comes in. The entries for the CIPD Recruitment Marketing Awards showcase innovation and return on investment. Digital channels are seen as a critical part of the recruitment strategy, but throughout the submissions we’re seeing agencies exceed their clients’ expectations across all channels. I hope you find the entries for this year’s CIPD Recruitment Marketing Awards as inspiring as we have – well done to all this year’s winners!

THE JUDGES

The judges: Manjoor Azizul, creative director & co-founder, Pink Squid; Angela Baron, adviser organisation development and engagement, CIPD; Louis Clement, creative partner, Skive; Manda Crowder, partner, andsome; Rupert Grose, CEO, Euro RSCG Riley; Emma Hardaker-Jones, head of resourcing, BP plc; Mark Horley, global creative director, Work; Tom Keeney, director ER and resourcing, BT Group; Malcolm Kemp, director of talent acquisition & development, Betfair; Jim Landen, creative director, Bernard Hodes; Finn Lynch, director, Blackbridge; Claire McCartney, adviser resourcing & talent planning, CIPD; Anne Riley, recruitment communications consultant; Vanessa Robinson, head of HR practice and development, CIPD; Andrew Soane, director of client development, Penna; Perry Timms, head of talent, Big Lottery Fund; Steve Vranakis, creative director, VCCP; Natalie White, head of corporate marketing, CIPD; Keni Wong, senior art director, TMP Worldwide. Visit www.cipdrmas.co.uk for further information

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GRAND PRIX

Presented by

CLIENT: Asda AGENCY: Work Communications CREATIVE TEAM: The creative team at Work and People People Communications In their own words, the team at Work Communications “knew they had to dig deep into the psyche of Asda to understand what makes it tick and what it is like to work there”. The company spent a lot of time researching this, and it paid off. “This is the best work I have seen across all categories in all my judging,” one judge remarked. It was felt that the campaign had provided great material that focuses on all the people who work at Asda.

VIEW ONLINE: peoplemanagement.co.uk/grand711

LINKS & NOTES

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E For details of all this year’s winners and awards, visit peoplemanagement.co.uk/recruitmentmarketing

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AGENCY OF THE YEAR

AGENCY: Wave CLIENTS: Bloomberg, Brentwood School, Cognizant, FT, G4S, Hitachi, RADA, YHA The professionals at Wave do not expect many in the recruitment marketing industry to know who they are. Fewer than three years ago, Wave was an agency whose sole purpose was media buying. Moving into the creative sector, the small agency has quietly won 29 new clients in the past 12 months, and names Bloomberg and G4S among its larger clients. But it’s not just financial success in a tough recession that has won Wave the Agency of the Year award. Wave’s approach feels “fresh, innovative and client-centric” says Emma Hardaker-Jones, awards judge and head of resourcing at BP. “A lot of agencies don’t want to work with clients unless they’ve got big budgets,” she adds. “Wave has done fantastic things with small budgets.” A recruitment campaign for G4S costing £4,000 resulted in a 300 per cent increase in response from the previous year, and scooped Wave this year’s Recruitment Effectiveness Award. And further innovative work is shown in the social networking website created for client YHA, which gives candidates unrestricted access to YHA’s staff, and on which employees can share their unmoderated experiences and opinions about working for YHA. While this may seem high-risk for the employer, YHA is delighted with the results. “Put simply, we couldn’t be happier with Wave,” says YHA’s resourcing manager, Chris Young. “We have seen the quality of candidates improve, and we believe this is down to them being better informed and fully engaged from the content of the sites.”

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AGENCY PRINCIPLES: Wave functions by some simple guidelines: ● consider every pound spent is its own; ● imagine the talent it is after for clients will work directly in the agency, and; ● do whatever it takes to meet the requirements of the client. As the agency itself says: “We never forget that it’s all about the clients and the relationships we have with them.” JUDGES’ COMMENTS: Natalie White, one of the judges, and head of corporate marketing, CIPD, describes the “passionate” communication style shown by Wave. “I first heard of Wave last year when we awarded the Best Press Ad to

them,” she adds. “I’m impressed they’re growing and meeting client expectations in terms of service and return on investment.” And, as judge and recruitment communications consultant Anne Riley concurs: “Wave is a small agency doing big things.” WAVE KEY FACTS: Services: Client training, corporate and recruitment literature, diversity consulting, employee communications, employer branding, event management, graduate recruitment communications, media buying, research projects, response management, retention strategies, website design/management.

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CIPD RECRUITMENT MARKETING AWARDS 2011