Organizations spend hundreds of thousands on talent marketing each year—but without clear and continuous measurement, it is unclear if those investments will pay off.
Why is measuring employer brand health difficult? Employer brand health is impacted by a variety of factors, including the ever-changing technology talent can use to discover, engage, and comment on an organization's employer brand (and its competitors).
Successful employer brand health measurement means being able to measure the employer brand health metrics that matter, track employer brand health over time, and contextualize employer brand health strengths and weaknesses to adjust strategy.
Your measurement strategy should enable you to...
Build your employer brand scorecard & key performance indicators.
Understand key employer brand health metrics.
Synthesize your employer brand health & performance. Obtain the data. Tell the story.
Sustain your strategy by monitoring the data, producing regular reports and adjusting your employer brand strategy as necessary.
1. Build your Strategy
Define your Goals
Consider the outcomes that are most important to you this year. Align your measurement strategy to prioritized KPIs that map to your strategic vision.
Identify Tools and Platforms
Find technologies that create efficiencies and offer depth in collecting your insights. Make sure to include a mix of external platforms & internal ones, like your ATS (Applicant Tracking System).
Get a Baseline
Examine top companies in your niche to gain and understanding of where you are in the competitive landscape. Engage employees through focus groups and surveys for an internal perspective.
2. Understand Key Metrics
When it comes to measuring employer brand health, the fundamental issue is knowing which metrics matter. Employer brand health is multifaceted, with different employer brand metrics capturing important and unique elements of total employer brand health. Drift looks at 4 categories of KPIs that mirror the marketing funnel. Frequently, employer brand tracking will assess individual elements of employer brand health—from the broadest of general awareness, to the narrowest of how likely an employee is to recommend a company. But failure to view all of the key employer brand health metrics holistically means that organizations receive only a partial view of total employer brand health. For a robust assessment, measure each of the key employer brand health metrics to understand talent engagement with your employer brand.
Market Position
What is Market Position?
Awareness in the external talent marketplace of your employee value proposition & workplace culture.
Tools to Measure
Social media sentiment reports, Glassdoor rankings, Comparably rankings, Indeed rankings, workforce reporting, surveys, awards information.
What to Measure
Workforce Demographics & Talent Pools
Relative Reputation Ranking
Regular investigations into your direct talent competitors
Considerations
Work with a balanced slate of competitors. Look across industries to surface sources of inspiration.
Talent Engagement
What is Talent Engagement?
The impressions and associations talent connects with your organization.
Tools to Measure
Social media platform metrics (any social platform where careers content shows up), Career site analytics (traffic, return visitors, bounce rates), employee social posts, employer brand campaign metrics.
What to Measure
Audience Reached - size, demographics, competitor analysis
Clicks & Social Actions
Traffic
Earned Media Value
Considerations
If you are opting for an organic strategy (unpaid) metrics like these will be a little more difficult to come by - but it can be done!
Pipeline Health
What is Pipeline Health?
The efficacy rate (%) of your employer brand efforts - are you capturing the interest of your critical talent?
Tools to Measure
Applicant tracking system, hiring manager conversations, new hire surveys, onboarding program data, referral program data, diversity & inclusion scorecard.
What to Measure
Conversion-to-Pipeline from Key Platforms
Reduction in Time-to-Fill
Diversity of Pipeline metrics
Considerations
It may take time to see the impacts of your strategy. Be patient and engage with the data regularly.
Talent Attraction
What is Talent Attraction?
The conversions that happen as a direct result of your employer branding efforts.
Tools to Measure
Applicant tracking system, conversations with hiring managers, new hire/candidate surveys, recruiter feedback, social & digital campaign conversion data.
What to Measure
Conversion-to-Hire
Talent Response Rate
Talent Experience
eNPS
Considerations
This is a longer-term monitoring exercise. You won't see gains immediately, but they will happen with focused effort.
3. Synthesize Your Data
Prepare your data
Validate, clean and convert your data. Find the narrative in the numbers based on your goals.
Define & examine employer brand health
Look for trends, irregularities, deltas and inflections aligned to all your activities.
Report Regularly
Share your reporting with your stakeholders, parters and collaborators on a quarterly basis.
4. Sustain Your Strategy
Drive Talent Marketing Decisions
Let the data guide key decisions around where to show up, what to say and when you need to be in-market. Demographic data will tell you what resonates best with target segments.
Gain Ground, Competitively
Adjust your strategy based on intel to tell your unique story and unlock talent pools that were previously inaccessible.
Establish a cadence of iteration
Monthly reporting is best for companies with an established strategy, requiring continual monitoring.
One of the most important things to realize in tracking employer brand health is the existence of inputs & outcomes.
Employer Brand Health Inputs
Reputation & Competitive Standing; Employee Experience; Social Sentiment; Campaign Engagement; Traffic; Employee Advocacy
Employer Brand Health Outcomes
Diverse Pipelines; eNPS Gains; Faster Hiring Time; Better Retention; Earned Media Value; Stronger Affinity to Purpose in New Hires.
Get the eBook at https://www.driftemployerbrand.com/a-gift-from-drift
If you want to talk employer brand strategy, don't hesitate to reach out to chelsea@driftemployerbrand.com.