Employer branding: everything you need to know about strategy and tools
Employer branding is all about how your company presents itself as a workplace (both to current and potential employees). With a strong employer brand, you attract the right candidates, create better matches and increase the chance of retaining your key employees. In an age where candidates can quickly research you on social media, job boards and review sites, a clear employer branding strategy is no longer a nice to have, but a business-critical focus area.
On this page you get:
- A simple explanation of what employer branding is
- Why it's important
- Concrete key figures
- 4 powerful tips for your strategy
What is employer branding?
Employer branding is your company's brand when it comes to attracting and retaining employees. It's the way you market yourself as a workplace through culture, values, leadership style, employee experience and the overall candidate journey.
Your employer brand basically consists of two elements:
- Identity: your mission, values, culture and way of working together
- Reputation: the way the outside world perceives you: stories, products/services and employee experiences
Employer branding differs from classic marketing by focusing on the "employer brand" rather than customers and sales. The goal is to make it clear why talented candidates should choose you and why current employees should stay.
Why is employer branding important for recruitment and retention?
A strong employer brand has a tangible impact on who chooses to apply for your vacancies and who turns down the offer. Employers who actively work with employer branding typically experience:
- More qualified applications per posting
- Shorter time-to-hire and less reliance on expensive ads
- Better candidate experience that enhances your reputation
- Higher engagement and retention of existing employees
When candidates research you, they expect easy access to information about culture, flexibility, development opportunities, management style and purpose. If you're invisible online or only show great office photos, you risk losing the battle for the most desirable profiles to competitors who are more transparent.
The benefits of a strong employer brand are many
When you invest in employer branding, you gain a number of benefits that directly impact your business:
- The company appears more credible and transparent
- You invite potential candidates into a dialog. Even when you are not actively recruiting
- You target passive job seekers who only apply when the right match comes along
- Build a network of ambassadors who know and recommend you
- You use your employees as authentic role models and stories
A strong employer brand is both a recruitment tool and a strategic asset that can support sales, customer loyalty and overall brand positioning.
Employer branding tools: recruitment system and career site
Most companies today use an ATS to support their employer branding. In a modern recruitment system, HR and hiring managers can build customized job ads, career pages and application flows that match the company's visual identity and tone of voice.
With Elvium's recruitment system and career site solution, you can:
- Build a unified career universe where candidates quickly understand who you are as an employer
- Ensure that all job postings support your employer brand
- Create a cohesive candidate experience across channels
- Measure applications, conversions and candidate experience
This way, the recruitment system becomes not just an administrative tool, but a central part of your employer branding strategy.
Key employer branding metrics you should know
Several studies support that employer branding affects both applications and retention:
- 1. 95% of job seekers say an employer's reputation influences their decision to apply for a job.
- 2. 79% research a company's mission and purpose before applying.
- 3. 52% of employers say branding is crucial for recruiting talent.
- 4. 30% of employers say branding helps retain top talent.
Watch the video about Employer Branding:
What makes a workplace attractive to future employees?
The next generation of employees look for more than salary and title. They expect:
- Clear purpose and accountability (climate, CSR, diversity)
- Flexibility in working hours and location
- Development opportunities, learning and career paths
- A culture where they can be themselves and be heard
Companies that actively communicate these elements in their employer branding have a clear advantage in the battle for talent - especially in a competitive market.
4 powerful tips for your employer branding strategy:
Candidates remember the way they are treated - not just the content of the job posting. Set a clear service standard for response deadlines and make sure all candidates get a response, whether it's positive or not.
- Use personalized messages in your recruitment system
- Follow up quickly after conversations and tests
- Be transparent about process and next steps
A timely, personalized candidate experience strengthens your brand while lack of response or late replies hurt it.
Employees are the face of your employer brand. Companies that invest in continuous recognition and development build a healthy culture where employees want to stay and recommend the workplace to others.
- Share authentic stories about employees
- Don't just use polished campaign videos - show everyday life
- Focus on development opportunities, feedback and well-being
When employees thrive, they become your strongest ambassadors.
Just as your product has a USP, so should your employer brand: What makes you an attractive place to work compared to your competitors?
- Unique benefits (flexibility, pension, health, education)
- Culture (community, impact, flat structure, international environment)
- Purpose (what difference do you make to customers and society?)
A strong career site is the perfect place to communicate your USP - and link it to specific job postings.
Employer brand and corporate brand need to work together - but have different target audiences. This requires close collaboration between HR and marketing to ensure messages, tone of voice and visual identity are consistent.
Consider establishing a regular collaboration between HR and marketing, for example:
- Common guidelines for employer branding content
- Coordinated social media and career site campaigns
- Shared KPIs for recruitment, traffic and engagement
How to get started with your employer branding strategy
A convenient way to start:
- Map your current reputation
- Review reviews on e.g. job portals and Trustpilot
- Read feedback from past and present employees
- Define your identity as an employer
- What do you promise employees and do you deliver?
- Set concrete goals and KPIs
- Example: more qualified applications, lower time-to-hire, higher employee satisfaction
- Build or update your career page
- Use Elvium's career site solution to bring jobs, culture and employee stories together in one place
- Plan ongoing content and activities
- Cases, employee profiles, behind-the-scenes, events and more.
- Free guide
Download: 10 steps to good employer branding
Elvium has created the guide "10 steps to good employer branding - tailored for HR", which gives you a concrete step-by-step approach to strengthening your employer brand. The guide can be downloaded for free via the form on the page.
Use the guide as a working document with your HR and marketing team when you need to:
- Structure your employer branding strategy
- Prioritize efforts and channels
- Set goals and responsibilities
Employer branding through Elvium's career site and recruitment system
With Elvium's HR recruitment system, you can build a professional career site with employer branding built in from the start.
Elvium helps you with, among other things:
- A unified career universe that matches your brand
- Smart modules for job posting, video recruitment and onboarding
- Easily manage candidates from application to hiring
- Employer branding support from Elvium experts who can advise on campaigns, WordPress websites, video and photography
Watch a case video below:
- FAQ
Do you have questions about Employer Branding?
Employer branding is your company's brand when it comes to attracting and retaining employees. It is your company's way of marketing itself as an attractive workplace.
Good employer branding is honest. You should avoid forcing a company that you don't know. Good employer branding is about presenting your company as it is. What makes your company a great place to be? Is it the workplace culture, is it the employee benefits you offer, or is it something else?
Many companies spend a lot of resources on their employer branding because there is a big competition for talent. At Elvium, we have experts ready to help you with your employer branding. Write to Mathias at mtj@elvium.com. He is ready to guide you through complex issues related to employer branding. It can be marketing campaigns, wordpress website, video or photo for use on a website.
You can also find a lot of material on our blog page or on our page about Employer Branding.
Employer branding strategy is about mapping out a plan for how you will work with employer branding. As mentioned in the blog post, it's basically about finding your identity as a company.
With the help of employer branding and a career page, prospective employees can get an impression of your workplace when they visit your website and typically browse through categories such as 'Vacancies', 'Careers', 'About us' or 'The team behind'. With our recruitment system, you can create a beautiful and professional career site.
Your employer brand consists of two basic elements: its identity and reputation. The identity represents your company's mission, values and culture, while the reputation refers to the way others perceive your brand, including your company history and products/services. Reputation also includes your employees, and how you value or don't value them plays an important role in this perception.
It's important that your organization is aware of how essential it is to promote itself as an attractive workplace, especially in light of applicants' increased access to digital channels. Your employer branding strategy is how you differentiate yourself and attract and retain the right employees.
In a time of increased competition for talent and an increase in the use of digital channels, having a differentiated and attractive presentation of your organization is crucial to stand out from others and attract potential applicants.
Having a strong employer branding strategy is important as it can help attract and retain the right people to your organization. In a time of increased competition for talent and an increase in the use of digital channels, having a differentiated and attractive presentation of your organization is crucial to stand out from others and attract potential applicants.
A strong employer branding strategy can also help increase employee engagement and wellbeing, as employees who identify with and take pride in their workplace are typically more satisfied and engaged in their work.
There is no one-size-fits-all answer, as it varies greatly from company to company depending on industry, competition, etc. There is a lot of diversity today. If you're interested in seeing how others do it, you can see two of our customers by following the link here.