Employee Value Proposition is used in recruitment marketing to offer a set of values to your employees in the hope of attracting new hires. As an employer, your Employee Value Proposition (EVP) will help you retain and engage employees. We are going to go through everything about EVP and how to use it to attract new hires. Ready? Let’s find out more.
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Employee value proposition’s importance and benefits
Everything about the way we recruit today is markedly different compared to a decade ago. Candidates now have much more power during their job searches. According to the latest figures, 90% of the current job market is driven by candidates. You won’t need to pick talent anymore; instead, talent picks you!
You might be thinking, how can my company be a prospective candidate’s number one choice? The first step will be to differentiate your company from its competitors by focusing on the brand image. One of the things that unify a brand image is EVP.
One of the biggest benefits of EVP is a significant decrease in recruitment costs. Just picture a world where your competitors are offering the same salaries as your organization. How can you swing a candidate towards your company? For one, you can compensate them more, or you can focus on adding value to them, honing in on all that you can offer as an employer. Emphasize all parts of EVP throughout the recruitment process. You won’t even have to offer more money to get the right person for the job! Today’s workforce cares much more about their whole experience, job satisfaction, and stimulation.
So what exactly is EVP’s use in retaining and engaging employees within this highly competitive world?
EVP – What’s it all about?
We’re talking about the total value that an employer can offer to an employee in return for their labor. EVP encompasses not only their payout but everything else that they get in return for their efforts in the workplace. If you think that you’ve heard of this before, and it’s called work benefits, there is a distinct albeit important difference. It is about striking a balance between intangible rewards, e.g., meaningful work, interesting projects, flexible hours, et cetera, and tangible rewards, e.g., benefits and compensation.
In essence, the EVP of a company helps to answer the following questions that a candidate may have:
- What’s in this job for me?
- Should I work for this company, or should I go somewhere else?
- Would this be a good place to work, and why?
- What can this company offer that others can’t?
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Key Ideas and concepts
As we’ve discussed, EVP is much more than a big paycheck. It is a comprehensive offering that a company can provide to its employees. It’s made up of five main ideas.
1. Compensation
Transcending the balance sheet, EVP is all about an employee’s satisfaction with their salary, as well as additional rewards such as promotions and bonuses. It encompasses how satisfied an employee is with the whole compensation and evaluation system within a company. This includes how fair and punctual compensation is.
2. Benefits
When prospective candidates consider EVP, they want to know about a whole range of benefits that they can get through work. A lot of these are broad benefits such as vacation days, sick days, maternity cover, et cetera, but they can also include other niche benefits such as health insurance, tuition, retirement schemes, disability benefits, and more. People want much more than just a paycheck at the end of the day.
3. Career goals
The right candidate will be keen to advance their career. EVP encompasses a wide range of factors that affect employees’ career goals and stability. There are certain things that a company can do to develop a candidate, such as provide opportunities for professional consultations, education, training, as well as feedback. The right candidate will always be looking ahead.
4. Working environment
People want to feel satisfied and engaged with their work. There are several factors that EVP encompasses related to providing a positive work environment, from facilitating a healthy work-life balance to understanding employees’ responsibilities and roles. Even social lives and mental health matter too. People want to feel happy and have a sense of achievement and autonomy at work.
5. Culture
People are highly interested in the culture of the company in a holistic sense, from the positive relationships between colleagues to collaboration, trust, team spirit, and even ethics. This part of EVP should not be brushed under the rug. It also includes how a company’s plans and goals can align with social responsibility.
Your company’s EVP
Now that you’ve heard all about it, how can your company define its EVP strategy to make it engaging and interesting for prospective candidates? It can be complicated but well worth the time and effort in the end.
First things first, define the EVP of your company by defining your ideal candidate’s persona. By looking at your ideal candidate, you can determine who you’d like to hire, attract and retain. Think about the skills, characteristics, and traits that will make up your perfect candidate. Think beyond someone who knows the skills to do your job, and focus on who will be the best long-run for it and who will thrive in your company’s culture.
After you’ve thought about this, you can define every component of your EVP, linking each of these to your ideal candidate. Think about asking yourself some of these questions about your ideal candidate:
- What benefits and salary would attract them?
- What sorts of development opportunities are they looking for?
- What do they want in terms of company culture?
- In one environment would they thrive in?
- How could I retain this candidate to want to stay at the company for the long run?
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Research is key
If you want to get the most out of your company’s EVP, you will have to put the work in and do some research. Begin with research on your current employees, following on with research into your best job candidates.
Think about what you currently offer your employees in exchange for their efforts. What are they appreciative of most? Is there anything else that you could do to motivate them? Ask your employees and yourself questions like these regularly. You can also find valuable information from your top company performers.
Pay attention to passive job seekers. These are people that aren’t looking around online to find work. Instead, they are candidates that are not currently looking for a job but would be willing to accept your better offer. Find out what this would constitute for them. It doesn’t necessarily mean a greater salary – it could also be added opportunities to grow, flexible working hours, interesting projects, and a whole lot more.To identify and reach out to these candidates effectively, consider using tools and techniques outlined in this guide on how to find social media accounts with just a few clicks.
Customize your EVP
Having the know-how and having done your research, the journey doesn’t end here. You will always have to customize over time if you want to attract the right personnel to your company. Find ways of segmenting and personalizing your EVP for the target audience.
As an example, if you’re looking to fill entry-level positions with new graduates, highlight how fun your company can be to work for, along with the opportunities to advance your career. If you want to hire young professionals who are also parents, emphasize how you can provide childcare services and focus on the work-life balance in your EVP. Always focus on your brand’s promise, and think about who you say you are as an employer.
Promotion and conversion
Thinking and planning your employer value proposition strategy means nothing if you don’t put it out there for prospective candidates to see!
In this tech-savvy and digital world, there are several different ways that you can communicate your EVP to a target audience. Think about ways that you can come up with some of the following promotional content, including:
- Team and company blogs
- Testimonials from employees
- Engaging company videos
- Social media hype about the company
- Postings in career sites
- Targeted email campaigns
- Fun and professional networking events and opportunities
Remember, only through refinement will you get things right. Marketing EVP is an inexact science, so you have to monitor and test what kind of communication works and why. Even with an ideal candidate in mind, people are complicated and have several different values and quirks to their personalities. Find out what people want!
Harness EVP today
We hope to have shown you the importance of EVP in recruiting the right talent for your business. Now that you’ve made it through our guide, you’ll have a clear understanding of why EVP is worth thinking about and how you can promote it in a way that is appealing to your ideal candidate. Hopefully, you’ll be utilizing EVP and getting the most out of it for many years to come. All the best and good luck!
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