So, you’ve built a strong corporate brand identity, and it’s working wonders. You’re gaining leads, strengthening customer loyalty, and increasing your market share—but corporate branding is just one strand of your brand DNA. In order to create the healthiest business possible, you need to focus on employer branding, as well.
When done right, employer branding can help attract top talent, increase employee retention, boost brand advocacy, enhance employee engagement, and reduce recruitment costs. In fact, a recent HubSpot article mentioned that:
As a refresher, your employer brand is how you convey your company’s vision, beliefs, and values to the people who work for you today and those you’d like to attract in the future. It’s also the reputation you have as an employer.
In order to strengthen your employer brand and gain a competitive edge, you need to make transparency the core of your strategy. According to Glassdoor’s 2022 employer branding report:
What does transparency in employer branding look like? Keep reading for five employer branding tactics to help you gain and retain top talent:
1. Be honest about pay.
Transparency starts during recruitment. Make sure your job description is clear on salary expectations. If there is wiggle room, note that in the ad. This will show that your company is not only honest, but also flexible.
2. Create a public org chart.
A public org chart answers important questions by showing how departments are structured, who your new hire will be reporting to, and so on. It indicates that your company culture is open and transparent. When you paint a clear picture of how an employee will fit into your organization, you get a leg up on the competition.
3. Hone your core values.
Here at JK Design, we see it a lot—brand values that are clearly copy and pasted from a template. Talent will see right through the fluff. To hold their attention, spend time fleshing out your values by focusing on: what you believe, how this shows up in the world, and why it matters to employees. According to a 2023 LinkedIn article:
4. Give employees a voice.
Monthly town halls are great, but if there isn’t an action plan, your employees will feel ignored. That’s why it’s so important to share progress during these meetings. You can also start deploying and responding to employee satisfaction surveys. A heard employee is a happy employee—and those tend to stick around longer.
5. Share the good—and bad.
Today’s talent craves transparency around successes and failures. Employees can tell when you’re holding back, which can create insecurity. Be honest about any missteps, big or small. If your company made a decision that could affect employees’ careers or livelihoods, let them know asap, so they can make a plan.
Now that you know how to bake transparency into your employer brand, you’re on the way to happy employees—and a healthy bottom line.
Need help strengthening your B2B employer branding? Lean on our 37 years of experience in branding, employee engagement, and strategic execution to level-up your internal comms game. Let’s talk.
