Why Bother with Employer Branding if You’re Not Hiring?

Maybe your company is just you and five stalwart staff. Maybe it’s two of you and a scrappy confluence of PR, marketing, and design agencies. If you’re a tiny team that rarely hires, should you even bother with employer branding?

After crushing yet another bag of Dang Thai rice chips from top to bottom, which I do at least once a week, I googled the company to see what their employer branding is like. 

There is a dedicated careers page linked in the footer of their site, but the page contains only a single job description. Otherwise, that’s it. They have beautiful and active social media feeds that celebrate Asian American identity and cultural contributions of Asian Americans and feature high-quality photos of Dang products with plenty of ideas for how to use them. Their brand is decidedly consumer-facing.

But this makes sense: They’re not Nestlé. The company is owned by two brothers. They make just a handful of products (each and every one of them perfect).They probably have a tiny team with low turnover and hire one person every six months to a year, if that often. As of the writing of this post, they just have one open job, a social media and design intern, a role that reports directly to the CEO; that’s how small the company is.

So, should a company like Dang even bother with employer branding? If you’re not hiring right now, if you seldom hire, what’s the point?

1. Employer branding provides value to your consumer-facing brand

Consumers are increasingly interested in what happens behind the scenes at the brands and companies they buy from. 

According to a 2020 report by Edelman, 81% of consumers say being able to “trust the brand to do what is right” factors into purchase decisions. Also, 29% said how a company treats its employees is the most important factor in deciding whether to become a loyal customer, and 27% say it’s the most important factor in choosing whether to try a brand for the first time.

Knowing that you put some thought into how you treat your staff (and even yourself, you’re staff too) will matter to potential customers, especially if you’re trying to get your brand off the ground. 

2. A tiny dose of employer branding will help you make lots of future hires

There’s no need to build a full employer branding strategy. At this point, you don’t need employer-branded video or a dedicated social account, but small investments in branding can help set you up for the moment you do need to bring someone on.  When things start getting really sweet for your company and you realize you need to hire a marketing manager or a supply chain coordinator, like, yesterday, you’re not worrying about standing up your employer brand at the same time. You’ve already laid a foundation.

Building an employer brand when you’re really small

For a tiny company who rarely hires, a simple yet meaty careers page and a few thoughtful, regular social media posts will be the foundation of your employer brand strategy. 

Also, I’m about to help you write your entire careers page. 

1. Just say that you’re really small

No need to hide it. Consumers love scrappy teams, they love family-owned businesses, they love brands that have meaningful origin stories. This should be a part of your employer brand. Your page could read:

We’re a small team who believe in making astonishingly cool plaid pants while taking care of each other. 

2. Tell us how you work

Remote? In-person? Something in between? Talk about how you work and why you choose to work that way. 

The Plaid Pants team is based in Richmond’s historic Manchester neighborhood, in the heart of the city just a stone’s throw from the James River.

We get to contribute to this vibrant and re-enlivening community by supporting our local business and residential neighbors. We buy our coffee here, we volunteer at the community garden, we eat lunch next door, we get our tattoos next to the place we eat lunch and our haircuts at the place on the other side of that. 

3. Tell consumers a little bit about your company culture

Even teeny tiny companies have culture. Yours might be something like:

We make sure we spend more time with our families than we do at work. 

Or

Because we’re so small, we make it a point to not let ourselves burn out. That’s not easy when you’re a small company like we are. Honestly, it happens sometimes, but we try to prevent this, we try to reset. Everyone in the company is required to take one long weekend each month, even our CEO, even our interns. That’s in addition to PTO. 

4. Acknowledge your hiring position

If someone has landed on your careers page, they’re looking for a job. If you don’t have open roles, say so and tell them where they can watch for open positions. 

We’re not currently hiring, but when we do have open jobs, you can find them posted here and on our social media accounts.

5. Show your leaders’ faces

Show consumers who your founders and/or leaders are. Do it on your careers page and on your social media feeds. 

Dang does this really well. Company owners Vincent and Andrew Kitirattragarn are all over their Instagram page.

On your careers page, show company leaders’ faces and include a blurb about their working philosophy.

I’ve always liked to work. I’ve always liked wearing plaid pants. How cool is it that I get to do both? 

Put your CEO on camera (an iPhone camera will do) talking about a new product or recent press coverage.

Nguyen Coffee Company out of Brooklyn does a really good job of this. Founder Sahra Nguyen shows up all over their Instagram feed promoting new products and all the great press they get.

A little video nugget of Sahra even pops up in the bottom right corner of your screen when you visit the Nguyen website. 

4. Take this time to build your consumer-facing brand

Invest thoughtful energy into your consumer-facing brand. This will be the basis for your employer brand, so the more solid this is, the easier it will be for you to scale the candidate-facing side.

This means keep your social channels active, doing promos and giveaways, and showing off your new products.

Emily McCrary-Ruiz-Esparza is a freelance writer based in Richmond, VA, who writes about workplace culture and policies, hiring, DEI, employer branding, and issues faced by women. Her work has appeared in The Washington Post, Fast Company, and Food Technology, among others, and has been syndicated by MSN and The Motley Fool.

ABOUT UNCUBED STUDIOS

Launched in 2016, Uncubed Studios is a full-service creative agency with a client list representing the most influential employers on earth along with the high growth tech companies.

The team that brings the work of Uncubed Studios to life is made up of award-winning experts in cinematography, journalism, production, recruitment, employee engagement, employer branding and more. 

Interested in speaking with Uncubed Studios? Email us at studios@uncubed.com