8 Metrics to Measure the Success of Your Employer Branding Strategy

So you have your employer branding strategy built. You've started creating content. You're distributing it across your channels. Your team is attending events to meet candidates. You've been posting on your own LinkedIn. Now you might be wondering: is it working?

With any kind of campaign, it's always important to measure the success of it. Employer branding is no different. 

Employer branding measurement is key to knowing if what you're doing is working. 

So instead of wondering if it's working, here's how you can know for sure. 

Employer Branding: Measuring the Success of Your Campaigns

Set benchmarks and goals

Before you begin, or perhaps you'll need to look back at before you started your new employer branding strategy, see where your numbers at right now. 

How many candidates do you have coming in each month? How many monthly views does your careers page get? How many views are on your employee videos? Take note of all of these things so that you can see in the future just how much it has increased. 

If you're starting from scratch, that's great! Set a goal about how much you want to achieve. 

Figure out your metrics

If you're saying, but wait a minute, I don't even know what I should be setting benchmarks and goals for, don't worry. You're not alone. 

There are many ways to measure employer branding success — or lack thereof — but here are a few things that are great to look at. 

Employer Branding Metrics: Awareness

Views

If you're trying improve awareness, be sure to take note of how many views your content is receiving. Track monthly views on:

• Careers page

• Employer branding videos

• Company spotlight articles

• Day in the life articles

• Any other kind of content your employer branding team is creating

How many people are seeing the articles? And it's worth it to check out how long they spend on the page, too. If they are only there for 30 seconds, you might not have made an impression. If they spent a couple minutes on the page, they probably read the article — congrats, you got some more awareness!

Social Media Impressions

You can become aware of a brand practically anywhere. Even if people never step a digital foot on your website, they can have a lot of admiration for your brand. A big part of that can be from social media. Check out metrics on your LinkedIn, Instagram, or wherever you post:

• Social post impressions

• Social media engagements

• Social media mentions

Company reviews

It might seem counter intuitive, but company reviews can tell you a bit about the success of your employer branding efforts. Think of it this way — you share an article that helped someone picture themselves working at the company. They get hired, they're a great fit, and they have a fantastic experience at the company. They write a great review. That's a good indication that your branding is working. 

If you're getting an influx of negative reviews, there are probably a few things that need to change. But it could be a sign that your branding isn't bringing in candidates that identify with the company. 

Employer Branding Metrics: Hiring

Application Numbers

As awareness increases, the hope is that so do applications. If you're seeing an increase in the number of applications every month, that's a good sign that your employer branding efforts are working. 

Better yet — you're getting more qualified applications and having better interviews. That's the best sign that your branding is working. 

Candidate Engagement

Of course people apply just to apply and you end up getting ghosted. See if candidate responses and engagement has increased — or decreased — since your employer branding strategy took effect.

If candidates are replying more and are more engaged with recruiters, that means they are excited to apply. They want you to hire them. That's one of the best signs that your employer branding strategy is getting the job done. 

Speed of hiring

Has the time it takes to hire gone up or down? If it's gone down, that's a great thing! It might not solely be attributed to employer branding, but it could be a part of it. 

It goes back to candidate quality and engagement, right? You've attracted a great candidate. They're excited about the company. You want to hire them. They want to get hired. You make the offer. They accept. It's fast and it's wonderful!

Cost of hiring

Employers spend a lot of money on hiring, and everyone loves when the cost of something can go down. If your cost per hire has decreased, take a look and see if there's a connection between your employer branding efforts. Did you get rid of costly head hunters and now have candidates coming to you because your branding is fire? Good work. 

Employee tenure and turnover

This might be the most important of all (it's certainly the ethos at Purpose Jobs): hire people who are excited to work at your company, and they'll stay at your company for a long time. 

If, over the next months or even years, that employee turnover has decreased and people are staying at the company for longer, then your employer branding is probably doing a great job. You've brought in candidates who understand what they're getting into, who are excited about what they'll do at the company, and you've proven yourself to actually be a great place to work.

While this metric takes the longest to really see and understand the results, it's the most important one, because it's the whole reason why we do employer branding in the first place. 

And of course, if you're looking at the metrics and not seeing great results, go back to your employer branding strategy and make some changes. If awareness is still low, make some changes to your distribution strategy. If your content doesn't convert to applicants, change up some of the content you're creating. It's all about getting better and improving. Things rapidly change, too, so be sure to check in on your campaigns every so often. 

Need help getting your employer branding strategy up and running? At Purpose Jobs, we help companies build a strong employer brand to attract top talent.