Recruiting is never as easy as it may seem. For companies or firms that are new to veteran recruitment, getting results out of veteran talent acquisition efforts can be even harder. Veteran hiring requires a markedly different approach, one that may require you to reinvent your employer brand to reach the right veteran and military candidates. Simply creating an employer brand may not always prove to be enough, however. For a better chance of successful hiring outcomes, you need to include more precise and targeted recruitment angles in your overall hiring strategy.
Building a Visibly Veteran-Friendly Employer Brand
Not sure how to do that? There can be several ways you can position yourself as a veteran-friendly employer. Similarly, you can increase company visibility to attract a greater segment of the veteran workforce. A successful hiring outcome will always have several variables that no blog can prepare you for.
These can include the respective aptitudes of both the candidate and the recruiter. However, there may be ways to increase the chances of a successful outcome as well as the quality of veteran candidates landing on your Careers page. If that sounds like something you would want to look into, check out a few useful tips below to adapt to your unique business:
Explore a Mix of Print and Digital Ads
When dealing with the veteran candidate subset of the workforce, you need to know your audience– namely, that veteran populations come from a broad cross-section across demographics. Veterans as a group are typically one of the most diverse candidate pools in the United States.
Diversity means you have an opportunity to build stronger teams based on diverse but complementary skills and approaches. However, that also implies using a broader mix of mediums to reach this diverse veteran candidate pool. At the very least, you need to look into using:
- Digital and print branding ads in vet-focused publications.
- Banner ads on websites that see consistent vet traffic.
- Look for veteran newsletters to place ads highlighting your brand.
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Look for Veteran-Related Sponsorship Opportunities
Simply placing ads in publications may not always help. Yes, you will begin to make an impression on your intended audience, but you will still need something more visible. Events that focus on veterans are a great example.
Since these events typically cater to veterans, you can be sure most of the footfall will come from the kind of candidates you wish to target. Look for sponsorship opportunities with such events. Not only does it give your brand visibility, but you can also form an unmistakable brand message that signals you are a veteran-friendly business.
Utilize Social Media Platforms for Precise Targeting
Social media platforms offer unique opportunities to businesses looking to target specific audiences. For one thing, social platforms have billions of users all over the world. If someone owns a smartphone and has internet access, you can be sure they will have at least one social media handle to their name. As marketing gurus often point out, businesses need to make every effort to reach audiences on the platforms the audiences frequently use. The same applies in the context of building brand visibility.
In this case, you can easily configure the audience segmentation to align with social media users who have military experiences or backgrounds. This typically shows a better result in terms of the money you spend on marketing your employer brand. Targeting an audience at large means people who may not be vets could see your ads. Convincing them of your brand values is hardly critical to your recruitment goals. Instead, targeting a more refined and qualified audience means your ad is visible to people who may be more receptive to it.
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Conclusion
The tips above work well in terms of repositioning your employer brand as veteran-friendly. These approaches can also typically be leveraged for recruiting veteran candidates in parallel. The right use of the right channels will almost always trigger a boost of incoming traffic and applications on your veteran careers page.