Clear, actionable employer branding with real ROI

Employer brand reinvented for companies who can’t afford to f*$k around.

Employer branding is so much more than pretty pictures and a polished career site.

It is the reason great talent picks your company over a million others.
It is the reason they advocate for you.
It is the reason they stay.

But employer branding has been sold for the last ten years as a kind of magic pixie dust to make you look “good.” Vague, abstract, hard to explain and harder to implement, the prices for new employer brands go up as the objective value goes down.

So let’s set things straight: Employer brand is a strategy, using your company’s differentiated value as a tool to attract the kinds of people your hiring managers really want to hire, instead of the tonnage of unhirable applications that currently flood your ATS.

Be different or disappear. Because when you lean on what makes your company different, you stop trying to compete against a million other companies and you start building a talent monopoly.

More impact because there’s less fluff
(just like YOUR company)

You’re not Google or Apple. You don’t have piles of cash or headcount to throw at your recruiting problems. If you did, you wouldn’t be reading this.

You’re a growing, scrappy company. One that can be creative in how you use your limited resources to achieve more with less. You know that playing “follow the leader” is a rigged game where only the leader can win, so you’re creating more success on the path less traveled.

Which might explain why you’ve been so hesitant to invest in your employer brand. It’s expensive. It’s time consuming. And in the end, you aren’t 100% sure it will make a difference.

What you need is an employer brand that throws out all the rules (because they were designed to serve companies 10-100 times bigger than you) and focuses on delivering impact immediately.

You need an employer brand that your recruiters will instantly understand and know how to use. An employer brand that hiring managers can use to help your team source and hire. An employer brand that builds a bridge from you to marketing, comms and even finance.

This isn't a "hiring solution." This is a business solution.

“[Our new employer brand] was extremely valuable and eye opening. We all knew we had some issues with our employer brand. Your ideas and perspective helps us design stronger recruitment messages and a much stronger employer brand marketing strategy.”
‍- Dennis M.
Marketing and Culture Leader

Stop competing to be “the best” company.
Become their favorite company.

Every company seems to be playing a game of saying they are the best. The best employer, the best culture, the best benefits, the best people, the best awards.

Competing to look like “the best” is incredibly expensive. And even when done well, the result isn’t that you stand out, but that you look and sound like everyone else.

It’s a losing strategy. Anyone can buy that award or pay for a copywriter to say nice things about the company. Gorgeous websites are only a PO and a long conversation with your finance team away. 

But no one else can be you. And that’s your secret weapon to attract and hire amazing people.

A strong brand distills what makes your company amazing (call it your “differentiated value”) so that recruiters and hiring managers know what messages will put you in a class all by yourself. That’s what I do for companies: get them to stop competing and start becoming the preferred company among target talent.

This isn’t spin or BS. This is about making the people you want to hire want to work for you.

"Thank you James for taking us on this journey. A step-by-step process with the right speed, the right methods and the right focus to find all the valuable insights in its own company. Thank you again, so much appreciated.”
‍-Theresa H
Employer Brand Manager

Employer branding isn’t expensive.
But outspending the competition sure is.

To a recruiting team, a strong employer brand is like electricity in a factory.
Electricity to power tools.
Electricity to drive automation.
Electricity to light the room after the sun has gone down.

Yes, you can recruit well without an employer brand. But it is a whole lot harder. And more expensive.

You will spend more money on ads to generate interest.It will take longer, too.You will spend energy sorting through candidates who don’t meet basic criteria.You will exhaust your hiring managers with ill-fitting candidates likely to reject your offers.

Maybe it helps to not think of employer branding as a “thing” and more at the strategy that: 
☄️Makes more prospects read and respond to outreach
☄️ Makes your ads more effective
☄️ Makes your job postings more interesting
☄️ Makes your career site more useful
☄️ Makes your Glassdoor reviews helpful (even the one-star ones)
☄️ Aligns your existing consumer message to your recruiting efforts
☄️ Makes hiring managers feel heard
☄️ Creates more “Yes!” at every stage of the candidate journey
☄️ Leads to more employee advocacy and retention

The game isn’t to be “attractive” to lots of people, but to become desirable to the right people.

“Whether you are a talent acquisition professional with an interest in employer brand or an experienced employer brander who is looking for tools to set your organization up for recruiting success. I can guarantee that you will walk away wishing someone had given you these tools years ago.”
‍-Andrea M
Director of Talent and Brand

Employer branding: ROI or don’t bother

Don’t let people tell you that it is hard (or impossible) to measure your brand. That’s a line people use to keep from being held accountable.

An employer brand means spending less on ads and agencies. What is a 10% reduction in ad/agency spend worth?
‍
An employer brand gets more people to say “yes!” to your offers. What’s the value of 10% fewer rejections?

An employer brand is the basis of your pipeline. What’s the value to your hiring managers of offering a more predictable flow of great candidates?

An employer brand attracts the right hires and sets proper expectations. What’s the value of a lower regretted attrition rate?

An employer brand creates advocates. What’s the value of a more engaged workforce aligned to a shared sense of mission?

Maybe an employer brand is tough to measure, but we can very much measure the impact of a strong employer brand. And that’s what you probably care about most.

“110% recommend! We got so much out of it and James was unreal. So patient, enthusiastic, knowledgeable, engaging, all the other great words! It really helped us open our eyes to what was already in front of us and really promote the great things that we offer!”
‍-Olivia
Human Resources Officer

Employer brand: Built for TA. Adored by finance, marketing, and hiring managers.

When you make it clear how your company is different, and apply that difference to every aspect of your talent function, a few important things will happen:

You’ll raise the bar for applicant quality.You’ll be attracting people who are ahead of the curve.You’ll have a more predictable model for hiring.You’ll lower your spend.

Put those four things together and your CFO will think they are getting an early birthday present.

And when the CFO is on your side, it’s a whole lot easier to claim your seat at the table.

Most brands are "attractive."
EBL brands are strategic and effective.

A strong brand isn’t a handful of magic words on a slide designed to be repeated over and over again. Your employees aren’t parrots, are they?

A strong brand is a strategy, revealing what you should stop doing and saying (because it isn’t helping) and where to put your resources for maximum value. It reveals hidden opportunities and shows you ways of telling your unique story (without having to buy more tools and platforms).

Think back to the last time you had to write a job posting. Or a LinkedIn post. Or a quick video. You can say anything, so you get stuck, hiding in the safe arms of “what we’ve always done before” (or just asking ChatGPT). That leads to generic messaging, which means you’ll have to spend more money and time to get people to see it or click on it.

A strong employer brand is the enemy of the generic. It takes the unique, quirky reality of your company and makes it interesting, engaging, and even endearing.

Remember, you don’t have to be “the best.” You just have to become someone’s favorite. That’s a strategy that leads to better and faster hires.

"There were no surprises in what James shared from his findings, but rather a clarity we previously had trouble defining for ourselves. The Playbook provided by James gave us actionable steps to make our messaging clear and consistent so we can truly be a competitor for top talent. For a subject that has an ROI that is often hard to quantify, James helped put things in terms that would help create buy-in from other key members of the organization!“
‍-Ashley S
Head of TA

Real ROI.
Smaller price tag.
That’s the power of a strong employer brand.

That’s what you’ll get from Employer Brand Labs.

Curious to see what a strong and actionable brand can do for you and your company? Let’s grab some time to discuss it.