Employer Branding and International Recruitment

What is employer branding?

“An employer brand includes the market’s perception of your company as an employer but also describes your promise (or employee value proposition) to employees in exchange for their experience, talents, contacts, or skills.

Employer branding…is simply how you market your company to desired job seekers”.

Employer branding has come into its own in the age of digital marketing, social media and the rise of video content. Never has it been easier to connect career opportunities and employer culture content with prospective staff in creative, personal and fun ways.

Market clarity

The real power behind well-curated employer branding is in market clarity and definition - it’s a brand anchor you, your staff, your customers and your wider network are attached to, and sets you apart from your competitors.

This, naturally, has enormous benefits for multiple aspects of your business, especially in the field of international hiring.

Employer branding and your business

Employer branding is known to be an incredibly effective recruiting and talent attraction tool, but it’s also a powerful element behind successful business operations.

A creative, relatable and meaningful employer brand campaign is beneficial to your wider operations by:

• Defining your working culture in the eyes of your stakeholders and generating stakeholder “buy-in” to your company or product.
• Being a primary conduit for talent outreach, network curation and recruitment.
• Being one of, if not the most important element in retaining talent in your company.
• Establishing and maintaining a positive business reputation in your community and with your competitors and supply chain.

As the UK’s Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development highlights, more than anything a good employer brand helps “establish credibility”. This brand and work culture positivity impacts almost every business function, from sales to marketing and indeed to recruitment.

Employer branding and international recruitment

Whilst it’s imperative brands do everything they can to create attractive, creative employer branding messaging and campaigns, here at Relocate.me we’re mindful of how any established hiring strategy works in the context of international markets and international hiring.

To this end, we conducted a poll with our Telegram followers: What is the most important factor for you when considering an employer abroad (other than pay)? Poll recipients were offered multiple choice, and their answers are telling:

• Visa sponsorship - 68%
• Relocation Assistance - 58%
• Location - 48%
• Tech stack - 35%
• Product/what the company does - 32%
• Flexible working hours - 25%
• Hybrid work policy - 21%
• Company’s brand - 15%
• Company’s scale and impact - 14%
• Diversity of team - 11%

How to balance employer branding against the demands of international workers

The poll results put a twist on employer branding hiring supremacy. Employer branding is important but needs to be part of a wider recruitment package that prioritizes the efficiency of relocation and legal administration first.

But in our view, employer branding is how you guarantee talent buy-in and conversion - it’s the final, integral piece of the puzzle that will tip a candidate from “maybe” to “I can’t wait to work there!”.

Content ideas for international hiring and EB

The most effective way to guarantee continued employer branding presence in international hiring strategies is to fold employer branding curation into relocation functionality and processes. For example:

• Branding presence - if your priority has to be admin functions like visa sponsorship and details on relocation, utilize every webpage, social media post, email and DM to your candidate in communicating your brand presence and confidence in helping them achieve that.
• References and connections - good employer brands are forever going above and beyond to help candidates understand how and why working for them is a good thing. If the vast majority of international talent stress is focused on admin worries, relocation and immigration paperwork, rather than offer career storytelling videos or a snazzy career page (which you should do anyway!) offer instead connections to third-party companies who can help make relocation easier, and provide resources on relocation companies who can quickly and efficiently help your candidate. Use employer branding channels to help!
• International brand storytelling - finally, consider helping candidates better understand your international hiring efforts by focusing EB content on telling the stories of international workers who have already made a move. You can do this via case studies, videos, testimonials, even including international hires in initial screening and interview stages.

There are some critical rules to remember about employer branding that brands would be wise to follow - namely it can’t do the recruiting heavy lifting for you, but it can elevate and augment your international hiring efforts.