Branding Part 4: Employment Branding and Social Media Go Hand-In-Hand

Social media is an easy and inexpensive way to share your organization’s employment brand and engage customers, employees and potential candidates. In our final

article of this series, we will take a look at the very basics of social media: When the optimal times are to post on various platforms, and tricks to getting past filters on Facebook.

Thanks,

Gary

Employment Branding and Social Media Go Hand-In-Hand

Social media has changed how individuals and businesses interact. Whether this is good or bad is an ongoing debate. Regardless, it is a very effective tool for organizations to

inexpensively broadcast their employment brand.

The largest social media platforms are Facebook. Twitter, and LinkedIn. Google+, Instagram, and Pinterest are rapidly growing in terms of business utilization. The most viewed site in terms

of talent acquisition at this time is LinkedIn. These platforms should be utilized to begin conversations with customers, who are essentially potential candidates.

When adding social media to a branding strategy, it is important to have a plan in place. Someone should be tasked with monitoring all platforms that the organization is utilizing so that customer posts and comments (good, bad or otherwise) can be addressed quickly. An organization’s reputation can crumble within hours of an angry post, tweet or security breach.

Social media is constantly changing, but one thing remains consistent, great content will always prevail. This content can be generated by the organization, or be reposts of compelling content from other sources. The trick is to have a publication schedule. Content can be determined a day, week or even a month in advance. Those posts can be loaded into a service

such as Buffer <-[INSERT link https://bufferapp.com] and scheduled to post on multiple platforms immediately or in the future.

Not certain when the best times to post are? Check out this guide from Fast Company ,<-

[INSERT link http://www.fastcompany.com/3036184/how-to-be-success-at-everything/the-best-

and-worst-times-to-post-on-social-media-infograph]:

• Facebook: 1-4pm

• Twitter: Monday – Thursday 1-3pm

• LinkedIn: Tuesday – Thursday

• Google+: 9am-10am

• Pinterest: Saturday mornings

Facebook has increasingly become a “pay to play” platform for marketing posts. Unless an organization pays to sponsor or boost the post, it might not show up on their follower’s timelines.

Posts with visuals, photos or videos, are more engaging and are a great way to engage on all platforms and will also help the post get past the marketing filters on Facebook. Never be shy about asking employees to like the organization’s pages. This is a great way to tap into their social networks. It is also a great idea to ask followers to share posts. This will

create a larger audience and can result in more referrals. Gaining organic followers versus those gained through paid posts, strengthens the organization’s presence on social

media.

Harnessing the power of social media is a great way to share an organization’s employment brand, engage with customers and gain referrals. With a well thought out plan that includes a

schedule for content publication and a person monitoring and replying to followers, this could be a very inexpensive branding and marketing tool.

 

Gary Vice is sought out by leaders in Software and Services who recognize the need to attract the industry’s best talent.  Through Strategic Recruiting Partners’ extensive network of relationships, they are able to identify high level opportunities for well qualified candidates.  To discover how this process can benefit your job search, simply reply to this email or call Gary at 469.402.4008.