Stylistics

Though for several years already, I prefer to use internet to read newspapers and news, I cannot deny that for instance customer magazines with special offers I still prefer to read on paper. After all, it is a good reading when you are having your morning (or afternoon) coffee. So last week, when I was looking Selver’s (local Supermarket chain) offers from their newsletter, I noticed their job ad, where they were looking for employees to several positions, such as Service Manager, Category Managers, Cleaners, etc.

To be honest, Selver is not a pioneer in the field when it comes to customer newsletters as recruitment channels. There are also other companies that have used the same method for a while now. However, it is extremely clever method that helps a company to target passive candidates who are currently not looking for a job, but when noticing your ad might consider applying for it.

It is well known fact that a large part of these newsletters are never read since most people just throw them away. This means, that to make more use of the newsletters companies must find some additional use for them to catch this way two birds with one stone.

  

Actually last week wasn’t the first time when I noticed Selver’s recruitment ads. For some time now I have noticed their job ads with new visual and to tell you the truth, I like it. What I like here the most is that they use the same layout in ALL (regardless of the location or position) their job posts, regardless of whether the advertisement is published in job portal or in newsletter.

Though, they do not state the salary of the position in that BAKER’s job ad, but there are plenty of different offerings mentioned in the post that should get attention and create interest in potential candidates. For example, they invite to join to their Sports Club for free of concessional terms, offer more bonus points with their customer program, etc.

In addition, I would like to draw your attention to the words used in the job ad (the ones that are in read and in capital letters, where they state what the job is about, what they offer, etc). Instead that to use for example: “From suitable candidate is expected to have…” (or similar), they use following: “Your job would be…”, “We are waiting for you…”, “We are offering to you”. To use this kind of second person addressee i.e. usage of word “you”, tends to connect potential candidates, makes the ad more personal to them, so that it kind of starts to “speak” with them. Also, the readers of the ad feel, that this job is really meant for me.

The same effect you get when you use words “we” and “our” in job post. Like for instance in this Selver’s ad they have used “We have been in business since…”, “At our place…”, etc. This makes a reader to feel that company opens itself up and introduces itself and expects candidates to do the same when applying for the job.

Takeaways:

-       If your company has customer magazine that you send to your clients either by mail or by e-mail (or by Direct Mail), consider also publishing your job ads in there.

-       Stylistics are important in job ad! Candidates feel more connected with open position when you use word “you” when describing your vacancy. The same recommendation also applies when you are describing your company – try to use first person addresser such as “we” and “us”.

-       You can also use help of Design Company for preparing the advertisement layout and then modifying the contents yourself as needed. To have designed layout in all job posts helps you: (1) to make your job advertisement visually more attractive and differentiate from others, and (2) to impress your candidates. They feel that company has contributed to the ad, which means that filling of the position is probably important to you.

Recruitment of younger generation

Recently I received a message from Mario Märtson, where he wrote to me about one recruitment campaign where they were looking for SUPER PURCHASER to Netimarket (an online food store). Since the feedback for the campaign has been really impressive, in candidates wise, then I decided to share their story also with you.

Firstly, take a look to the advertisement visual: the young woman on the picture looks like a shopaholic who has just seen huge discounts. This impression is supported with the description of expected candidate: “You love shopping”, “To you the Black Friday is as important as Octoberfest is for men” or “You are self-confident as Shaquille O'Neal with his right-handed jump hook shots” etc.

Maybe at first it is a bit confusing to the readers that whom this company actually is looking for: the title doesn’t say much about future job, there is no job description added, and the company is also not so well-known. But I think that the first interest is generated with this different approach and probably the brightest readers also checked out company’s web page that gives a sufficient overview of their field of activity.

Since there weren’t any high demands for the candidates as for specific education, job experience or skills, then they decided that the job would fit perfectly to younger generation.  Because of this target group they decided to have a bit different approach to the ad. Mario, the creator of the ad, explained: ‘If we would have headlined the job ‘warehouse worker’ or ‘customer service’ then probably we would have alienated the target group. So therefore we came out with new job title, design and wording’.

The outcome of the recruitment ad: the advertisement had 15,000 views and s staggering 800 candidates!

So why were they so successful with their job advertisement? Certainly, there are a number of different reasons that I could name here, one of which is that they had a salary range pointed out in the ad (written on the last line). Secondly, however, in my opinion they had the advertisement highly targeted to specific audience. Here are some examples:

- Text message. They had a short and witty description of a person whom they are looking for. Please be aware, that young people may not read the long lists of duties and requirements, because it is boring for them.

- Photos are the must-be element in youth-oriented advertising. This is what catches their eye and what they notice. The best thing in this case would be a photo of a real person telling his/her story.

- Recruitment channel: on-line recruitment portal (they used CVKeskus, well-known job portal in Estonia). Let’s face it; the majority of today’s young people have grown up in computer environment, with playing games and using Internet. This means that the first place that they probably would use to look for a job is Internet and I am pretty sure that they prefer it to newspapers.

When it comes to hiring younger generation you must also consider next:

-          They are looking for a interesting job in modern working environment.

-          They are looking for a job where they have career and development opportunities.

-          They are looking for organization that are open to change and innovation.

-          They prefer flexible work, with flexible working hours and mobile working place.

-          They have grown up in the age of computer games: use gamification during their recruitment, trainings, etc.

-          They use social media to communicate with friends and family, as well, to look for a job. Which means that companies who doesn’t have an account in Facebook, Twitter, or any other site, does not exist for them

-          Employer Brand is something that matters to them; they care of the information that they hear from their friends and based on that they make their decision either to apply for the job or not.

-          They are looking for quick recruitment processes and quick decisions. They get bored with long selection processes and accept job offer from other company.

Takeaways:

-          If your target audience is younger generation (I mean graduates and people who just entered labor market) then you need to design your recruitment message (both the text and visual) so that it is based on their preferences.

-          I would recommend usage of electronic channels such as job portals, social media, etc to reach younger audience.

-          If possible mention the range of remuneration that you offer for the job – believe me, you will get more candidates to choose from.

Comics

Key word of any kind of advertisement is AIDA i.e. attention, interest, desire, and action. To attract potential customers (in our case candidates) company must first of all make its advertisement visible. After getting the attention of potential customer/candidate, you must make them interested of the product/job so that they would desire it so badly and make their purchase/apply for the job.

Key question what each company who hires, should ask from itself is ‘how do I differentiate from other employers?’ If several companies are hiring to the same job and using the same channels, then the question is: ‘how do I get the candidate attention so that they would notice us first?’

Today my post is about usage of COMICS in job advertisement. An example that Proekspert (software engineering Company in Estonia) has used to recruit Java developers.

This time I used help of experts (all IT Specialists or Managers in their thirties) to help me with translation of the comic from ‘IT’ language ‘to my’ language.

I asked the experts to explain to me what this comic is about (hereinafter I am using the first names of experts). Kaupo: ‘generally speaking, the idea of this comic is following – wizard who supposedly means code wizard (very skillful programmer) claims that he could hex the cat or its meow’. Andrus: ‘it is play of words, meaning of word ‘hex’ here means hexadecimal or base 16 – programmers know what it means’. Kristina: ‘reference to Japanese probably means this that non-experts think that hex format is written in Japanese letters’.

If you are interested to find out what the code means you can use the converter and try to find the answer.

The other things that I asked from experts were, (1) how do they feel about job advertisement in form of comic and (2) what do they think of a non-traditional job ad with limited data. Though generally most of them said that they would prefer traditional job ads, they pointed out following.

Raivo: ‘I agree that probably for Java Developer job, advertisement doesn’t need to have a long list of duties since the jobs are basically the same in all companies and probably they plan to introduce different work related projects during the interview. Proekspert is well known company in local market which means that there is also no need to its description’. Kristina added from her side: ‘it seems that they are looking for younger specialists who know Harry Potter /…/ Specialists who are extroverts, who still have sparkle in their eyes, who joy playing games and read comics’. Andrus also pointed out ‘you need to know what this comic means and understand the joke in here, if you do so, then probably you are a right person for the job’.

I also took a look at Proekspert’s homepage to see whether they have more information available there – but turned out that the job ad there was the same as in job portal.

People who’d like to apply for vacant position should fill the application form, where they are supposed to enter only their name, age and contact data, additionally to coolest project that they have run and first steps in programming + hobbies.

So Kristina’s claim, that they are looking for playful candidates, gets confirmed here, with the questions about hobbies and video. It is not common approach (at least here in Estonia) to have question about hobbies on job application as a mandatory to answer. I can only assume that they ask it to find out whether the candidate suits to the team or not. The video clip is something that gives overview to the candidate, showing the potential coworkers and working environment.

If you feel that you want to do something good then Proekspert lets you catch two birds with one stone. Firstly, you can recommend your friend for the job (and he/she would probably be happy since it seems interesting job) and, secondly, Proekspert will make a donation to Tallinn Zoo to help them to feed jungle cat.

Actually it is not the first time to use comics in advertisements. In 40s and 50s the usage of advertisement in form of comic was fairly widespread. Here is an example of a breakfast cereal ad from www.craced.com.

Takeaways:

1. Recruitment is marketing! Do be different doesn’t need to mean that you need to copy innovative solutions that others have used in their recruitment ads. I recommend you to take a look to marketing and find different solutions what companies have used to advertise their products and service: copy from them and you’ll be different!
2. Find out what have been some earlier advertisement trends, I encourage you to revive a forgotten form and use it in your job ad as Proekspert has so cleverly done.
3. Offer recommendation incentives to person who helps you to find suitable employee. There are different bonuses that employers have offered in past, for examples money, iPad, donation, etc.

Gamification

Today my post is slightly different from my previous ones, this time: (1) this is not about one specific job ad that I found from internet job portal or newspaper, and (2) the recruitment advertisement is not from Estonia.

The other day when I was reading about different recruitment topics I found information about gamification. I hadn’t heard anything about that concept before, but there I was, readying about it. The more I read, the more excited I got. I felt that this is something really different and something that is really worth to study; and I still feel so.

So what it is? Basically, it is a recruitment strategy which uses game design mechanics and techniques in non-game contexts. Gamification is not only used in recruitment, but it is a tool that has successfully been used also in trainings, and other HR areas. To be honest, I have had also privilege to try it in one change management training.

Several well-known companies such as Marriot (they had a Facebook game called ‘My Marriot Hotel’), KPMG, etc. have used gamification for recruitment purposes.

Today I would like to introduce you KPMG’s game ’80 Days to Race the World’ that I played myself in last week. But I must warn you that this game is indeed an interesting and addictive one. I am not exaggerating when I am saying that I played it myself about 8 to 9 hours.

Now about the game; before you start to play it you are of course supposed to read the instructions of the game and the terms and conditions, so that you’d know what and how. What is this game about? Basically the players compete there by flying around the world in a hot air balloon. They must visit KPM’s offices to re-fuel the balloon and to find and solve the challenges. To pass the game player must pass 10 challenges and fly over the equator and do this within the deadline (meaning within 80 days or before game closes).

So what it all has to do with recruitment? Well, first of all, the game is targeted to those who are interested of applying to KMPG (when registering to the game players must indicate which area they are interested applying to). Secondly, by flying around the world with hot air balloon the player gets to know the company and its activities in different countries (when landing on company’s location in different countries players get the overview of that specific country’s activities). Gamification gives companies also opportunity to communicate their employer brand to external audience. With this specific game KPMG can show their global network of offices in different countries, people see that they are an innovative company with different approach to candidates, etc.

I myself am a true believer of games as HR tools. Games help people to be more open, more concentrated, more collaborative and more open to solve problems, and. This means that games give employers tools to learn more about their employees and candidates. That is because I believe that gamification is something that is worth to try.

And finally; using gamification doesn’t mean that all companies now need to invent their own computer games. You can have different playful approaches to your recruitment process; like some employers have done when recruiting IT professionals. Companies have created their own artificial databases to hide a secret code and people who were interested of the job need to find them.

Takeaways

-          You must consider that just a job advertisement itself doesn’t make desired candidates to apply to vacant position. Job ad must be attractive to potential candidates, so that they would want to apply to vacant position. One of the possibilities to attract candidates is the use of gamification in recruitment process.

-          Companies can use gamification in recruitment process to communicate their employer brand identity. Take advantage of your strengths and communicate them to your target group.

-          As for the bonus, gamification can also help employers with selecting suitable candidates for vacant position. You can use your game to assess candidate’s skills, characteristics, teamwork, etc depends of the game you are using.

Expectations for 2014

Today’s post is slightly different from previous ones – instead of writing about one particular job advertisement  I will write of my own expectation to job advertisements which I hope to see in 2014.

I expect to see more exciting recruitment solutions, such as cartoons, usage of formulas, crossword puzzles, etc. They all help company to differentiate from others. As an example here is a recent job post from Krediidiinfo.

I believe to see more photos and drawings in job posts. There is a saying that one picture is worth more than 1,000 words; which means that illustrations in job ad can help an employer to support the message that they want to deliver to job seekers. In addition, pictures also help to make the job advertising visually more attractive. As an example here is a recent job ad from HR Factory – it is competency based advertisement where bubbles mark the competencies expected from candidates, the bigger the bubble, the more important the competency.

I hope that we will also see more readiness to mobile recruiting. It is well known fact that the number of smart phone users in Estonia is growing, so why not to consider it when preparing a job advertisement? One way of doing it is to use QR code in job post, like Sirje Konsultatsioonibüroo (local consultation agency) has done in following job ad.

Actually, creation of QR code is unbelievably easy, try to scan the following code, and you can see that even I managed to prepare it. What will you say if I tell you that creating it took me less than one minute?

 

I also hope that we will see more video recruitments as we’ve done so far. Just recently OÜ FIlmimees (local TV Production Company) came out with their service, where they help companies to create one minute recruitment movie. In addition to this, I secretly hope to see use of video scribing in job advertisement. Some innovative companies have already used recruitment movies in their job ads, and here is one of them:

I do think that we also see more outdoor recruitment ads, such as advertisements in bus stations, store windows, billboards, company cars, etc.

I’d like to point out here two recruitment ad examples: Maxima billboard advertising and Grossi window recruitment ad (both are retail store chains).

And finally, as for my new year’s wish, I’d like to wish that we see more exciting and playful approach to recruitment ads, such as gamifications, Facebook contests (so called share and win games), etc.

Here is a Facebook job advertisement in from Sky-Art, where they promised 50€ for this person who helps them to find a right candidate for the job. Their Facebook ad got 2018 shares, I challenge you to try to make it yourself!

Facebook

Employer branding involves the development and communication of the organization culture in order to be perceived by external target group as desirable employer. One of the possible channels for employer brand communication is to use social media. Companies can use their social media sites by posting company related information to present its identity to desired target audience, in our case, to potential candidates.

In 2013 Institute for Employment Studies run a survey for Acas. In this survey they studied HR decision makers whose organizations had used social media in recruitment. They were asked why they use social media in recruitment process. Three most commonly-cited reasons were: (1) access to wider range of candidates than with traditional recruitment methods, (2) easy to use, and (3) lower costs.

There are a lot of different social media sites available, such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, etc. Today I’ll focus only on usage of Facebook.

Probably not all of HR responsibles will agree with me, but in my opinion Facebook as a recruitment channel is clearly underestimated and underused in Estonia. There are about 1.15 billion Facebook users worldwide; according to Facebook data, it has about 540 thousand users in Estonia. Facebook itself is one of the most visited internet site in a world. And still it is poorly used by HR.

  



Last week I noticed that couple of my friends in Facebook shared ADM Interactive job ad where the company was looking for employees for several positions. I am glad to notice that even without Facebook competition game that company has got a likes and shares for the advertisement.

I’d like to point out that the same job ads is also available in Estonian internet recruitment site CVKeskus. In afore mentioned advertisement there are couple of things that I must mention: firstly, they do point out different awards that company has won (such as being in TOP 25 in Employer of the Choice competition in Estonia, winner of e-Marketing agencies by Äripäev, Estonian Business Newspaper, in two years).  Secondly, they also have hyperlinks in their job ad where employees of the company tell why it is fun to work there  and how their work environment looks in Rotermann quarters (last one is the reference to their blog, which is in Estonian, but there are some pictures of their office, so I do recommend to take a look to that since it’s quite attractive).

Did you know?

1. Facebook posts with pictures get 39% more attention (clicks, likes and comments) than posts without pics.
2. Weekday, when you post your information in your Facebook site, also mattes – best days to post are Thursdays and Fridays.

Takeaways:

-         You can also use Facebook to create and communicate your employer brand image – post regularly information about company activities. This way you keep our social profile “alive” and create a strong social profile for your company.

-         Post also your job advertisements on your Facebook site – this way you can reach different users and might target passive candidates or candidates that usually are not in your target group.

-         In Facebook there is also possibility to target candidates with certain characteristics or qualifications; you need to pay for that service, but you only pay by clicks.  You can choose your targeted candidates by gender, age, education, language skills, previous job experience etc.

 

Gendered wording

There are more than 20,000 job advertisements available in different job portals in Estonia. Company that wants to stick out with its recruitment advertisement must think does it speak with potential candidates, does it has a story?

One week I noticed three G4S recruitment ads where they were looking for employees to customer sites - all of them had attractive visuals with photo materials.

First one was looking for security staff to aviation customer; in its visual there were company car and Tallinn Airport on the back of the advertisement, showing to candidates where they are expected to work.

Second one was looking for security guards for Prisma Peremarket (local retail chain), where company has used photos from customer site and added of photo of serious security person.

With third advertisement they were looking for security personnel to Solaris Center (Estonian life style center). The message of the advertisement was again supported with photo material about customer site, with added photo of male and female security guard in uniform.

Most people probably associate word ‘security guard’ with so called male job.  In Estonia the job was formerly called not ‘security guard’ but ‘security man’ (in Estonian turvamees). And even if most of us are now used to see female security guards on their job posts in different retail stores, office buildings and etc, the first thing that comes to our mind, when we think about security person is - a man! It is really time consuming to break stereotypical thinking and if a company wants to hire people from opposite sex to stereotypical position they must think how to deliver their message so that it would reach target audience. One of the possibilities is to support your message with photo, as G4S has done here. Woman who sees that add and sees a female security guard starts to think ‘if other women can do it, so can I’. Second possibility is to write to job ad that the job is suitable for men and women. Third possibility is to use gender related wording.

Just recently I found information about one research that was carried out in USA in 2011 by D. Gaucheri, J. Frieseni and A.C. Kay. This research was studying usage of gendered wording in job advertisements and in job descriptions, and its influences to job seekers.

This research revealed that women found male-dominated jobs to be less appealing, compared with the same types of jobs advertised with feminine wording. Moreover, to use masculine wording in male-dominated jobs makes the job unappealing for women because conveys that they may not belong in that job.

With the research they also studied 493 typical female- and male – dominated job advertisement and prepared a list of masculine and feminine words. According to this masculine words are: active, confident, decisive, dominant, impulsive, objective, outspoken, etc. Feminine words are: gentle, honest, kind, polite, warm, loyal, interpersonal etc.

Takeaways:

-          Use illustrative photo material in your job posts. It gives job seekers better overview of the vacant position; use pictures where employees are dressed in company’s uniform, employees filling  various job duties, photos showing different areas of the company’s core business, etc.

-          Be different from others! Instead of using layouts of job portals, try to prepare (or use agency help) your job advertisement yourself by using custom-made visuals for different vacant occupations that you offer.

-          Looking for candidates from opposite sex to stereotypical jobs, you can use supporting picture material, gendered wording or write to the job ad that the job is suitable both man and women.

Video scribing

When company looks for accountant or secretary or someone else for commonly know occupation then usually you know whom they mean. But do you know who PLAYFUL ARTIST is (in Estonian mänguline kunstnik)?

Just recently a company called HR Factory was looking for someone to mentioned occupation to OÜ Scribicon. To illustrate the job tasks of vacant position recruiting company had added a picture to the advertisement where someone has just finished story telling by video scribing.

Video scribing means that story is told by drawing picture(s) – the story could be company’s strategy, field of operations, job advertisement, etc. This means that the job of the playful artist is to help companies to tell their stories by drawing cartoons. 

Since video scribing is relatively new topic then HR Factory has also included company’s portfolio to the job advertisement – which additionally of recruitment ad also helps to advertise new area and its usage.

One of the key recruitment areas in 2014 would be video recruitment. According to Statistics of Estonia the computer and internet usage among Estonian labor force (ages 16-74) is about 80%. Considering the fact that year by year this number is raising then companies should take this into consideration when they plan their recruitment strategies. Companies who want to stand out with their job advertisements should consider using video scribing in their ads.

Anyways, I’m happy to see that such new method has arrived to Estonia. I do hope that recruiters also see this as an opportunity to create attractive job advertisement and that in close future we can see some video scribed job advertisement in here.

Takeaways:

- Consider using visual effects when recruiting candidates to not so well-known positions.

- Additionally to you job advertisements in print media, publish them also in Internet; there you can use different innovative recruitment methods such as video scribing, recruitment movies, etc. Do not underestimate older generation usage of computer and internet – they also use it when they are looking for a job.

- Do not be afraid to use innovative recruitments solutions. International survey* that was carried out in 2013 brought out important findings: firstly, 60% of employees in survey agreed with the statement that they expect companies to be demonstrating innovation in the ways they recruit talent. Secondly, 55% agreed with statement that even if they are happy in their current role, they would consider leaving it if were approached in an innovative way.

*Futurestep (global industry leader in high-impact recruitment solutions) conducted a survey in eight countries, exploring the impact of innovation in recruitment and talent management. The study involved 4,000 employees and 800 professionals.

Typography

Try following: find some official document or letter that you have in your computer (could be contract, e-mail, etc.). Probably you wrote it by using Times New Roman or Arial font, i.e. font types that are usually used for such official letters. Now mark the whole text with Ctrl-A and change the font style to Bradley Hand ITC or Forte. You can also try to change the color (use whatever color you’d like except dark colors) and the size (anything bigger than 12 pts is fine) of the text. How does it feel? Does it still feel like an official document?

With the above-stated example I wanted to show you that font style, size and color create some certain associations in readers. This means that preparing a job advertisement you must consider not only pictures and contents but also typography that you are using so that it could support the message that you want to deliver to your readers.

Let us now take a look now to Kuursaal’s (well-known tavern in Pärnu) job advertisement where they are looking for waiter/sales pro. In addition to quite witty approach to recruitment (stating that the person is ‘wanted’ not that we are hiring, recruiting, etc.), their job advertisement looks attractive, stylish and rises some associations in readers.

Font style: in this ad Kuursaal has used variety of western-type font styles (for example Book Type) that helps the readers to capture the nature of the tavern. When you take a look to their homepage you can see that the selection of this font style is not random. Background, which looks like on an old authentic paper, shows that they have been thinking the whole thing thru. So all in all, the message and stylistics, font style, layout – they all support each other and make the job advertisement whole.

Readability of the ad: to make the ad easier to read and to stress whom they are looking, Kuursaal has used capital letters.

But be careful, when using capital letters. Generally it is not recommended to use them in text that is longer than one line. This is because that we are used to read (small)letters and we are able to read them faster and understand them better. In addition, the contours of the letter generate certain visual perception in the brain, so that we actually do not need to read all letters one by one, since we already know what word it is. But allegedly we do not have same perception in reading capital letters. To illustrate that claim I looked up one post that just recently circulated in Facebook:

“I cnduo't bvleiee taht I culod aulaclty uesdtannrd waht I was rdnaieg. Unisg the icndeblire pweor of the hmuan mnid, aocdcrnig to rseecrah at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno't mttaer in waht oderr the lterets in a wrod are, the olny irpoamtnt tihng is taht the frsit and lsat ltteer be in the rhgit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it whoutit a pboerlm. Tihs is bucseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey ltteer by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Aaznmig, huh? Yaeh and I awlyas tghhuot slelinpg was ipmorantt! See if yuor fdreins can raed tihs too.”

What is particularly heartwarming in that job advertisement is the promise that company will give a personal feedback to all candidates. In fact, this is exactly the kind of statement that creates a positive image of the company.

Takeaways:

- Use the same typographical elements in your job advertisement that you have used in your website or in other advertisements that you use for your products or service

- To emphasize your message you can use either CAPS or bold. But beware not to overuse them.

- Add to your job ad the information whether and when candidates get feedback. If you feel that you cannot give feedback to all candidates then point that also out, then people do not mind so much if they don’t get it. If you are confident that you can contact all candidates then make sure that you fulfill your promise.