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Out-of-the-box ABM

Extend your marketing mix outside the "Facebook/Adwords" box

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3 min read

How to recruit top talent in any job market

There's been a lot of talk regarding the ongoing war for talent. It's remarkable how much of a productivity kicker organizations get from high performers. The best workers do the best and the most work. Yet, companies are consistently awful at finding and recruiting them.

Today, the recruitment landscape is more competitive than it's ever been. So, it's more important than ever to showcase your corporate brand aptly and have your recruitment advertising reach the right people.

Of course, the war for talent doesn't spell the end for traditional recruitment platforms. Rather, it's time to up your game and consider a less conventional path to recruitment: leveraging out-of-home advertising to pique the interest of job seekers.

Long story short: employers have to be more creative as they hunt for talent.

Making OOH Media Your New Recruitment Workhorse

Out-of-home advertising is an incredibly versatile medium – you're only limited by the depths of your creativity. Let's explore three ways you can optimize your OOH ads to attract top talent and amplify your recruitment efforts:

1. The power of proximity in OOH

Out-of-home is the perfect medium for local advertising. You already know where your target audience is in clusters – in premium business districts and along popular commuting routes. With OOH, you can tailor your messaging and intercept your audience as they go about their day.

OOH is a great way to stay in the public consciousness allowing you to connect with your core audience and stay front of mind. It's the ideal platform to share important updates and run hyper-local campaigns.

2. Competitive conquesting

If you operate in a niche industry and are in search of highly qualified candidates, using jargon only your target audience would understand is the best way to attract attention and get people curious about your company.

Another thing, OOH is a not-so-sneaky way to poach your candidates from your competitors. There's no better conversation starter than some friendly warfare.

3. Make a compelling case

What do you have to offer? Is it work flexibility or a competitive benefits package? The majority of companies aren't very good at communicating the advantages of their own jobs. Unless your company is a brand name, like McKinsey, Apple, or Google, potential candidates don't know what you have to offer.

People are seeking meaningful work opportunities that offer creative outlets. One of the most effective ways to excite applicants is to showcase some creativity and demonstrate that you're a caring, thoughtful employer.

Case Study: Recruitment Advertising with Out-of-Home Media

Let's look at the case of a Chicago-based firm, Uptake, trying to recruit local top tech talent.

The challenge: Uptake, a predictive analytics startup, wanted to recruit the best and brightest of Chicago's tech talent. The firm wanted to include a coding game challenge, so they had to turn to out-of-home media to advertise the contest.

The objective of the OOH campaign was to attract tech talent by creating a fun yet challenging game. The ads had to be:

  1. Engaging enough to resonate with the select target audience and prompt them to enter a multi-step coding challenge. Those who completed the challenge would be considered for a job at the company and invited to a private VIP celebration.
  2. Achieve massive reach within the Chicago market. The company was recruiting for various technical positions spanning data science to engineering. Therefore, they needed to attract a diverse and skilled workforce.

The Solution: Uptake launched its recruiting campaign using 150 street furniture panels distributed throughout Chicago's neighborhoods. Since the company was looking to attract individuals with technical skillsets, the ads were placed in proximity to prominent universities, including the University of Chicago, Northwestern, DePaul, and the University of Illinois.

The Results: The campaign ran for four weeks straight and delivered about 34 million impressions. As a result, 15,000 people visited the company's featured starting page, and close to 500 people completed the coding challenge. Several media updates covered the story, and Uptake took to the socials to share challenge results with their audience.

Lessons Learned: To attract the best, you need to cut through the competition and incorporate messages that resonate with your target audience. Using out-of-home for recruitment advertising offers you the opportunity to pass relevant messages to the right people.

Note the use of street furniture advertising. Street furniture ads, including ads on bus shelters, bike shares, and city information panels, allow companies to connect with their audience in a more personal manner. The right format for your recruitment campaign will depend on the details. In Uptake's case, they required a format that was highly visible yet engaging that would also provide broad-based coverage in specific neighborhoods.

As you can see, OOH ads drive high impact. Since you can't turn them off, the creative media becomes imprinted in people's minds with repeated exposure helping you amplify your other recruitment channels.

OOH – Your Best Recruitment Strategy Yet

Out-of-home advertising is an excellent way to highlight your company as an employer. Humans are visual creatures, and visual storytelling can help pique a potential hire's interest. Not to mention, OOH advertising gets people talking, helping you get the word out.

Want to solve your recruiting challenges like Uptake did?

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