What is a recruiting video and how can it help me reach my recruitment goals?

What is a recruiting video and how can it help me reach my recruitment goals?
Recruiting videos, or recruitment marketing videos, are a powerful tool to attract top talent and showcase your company’s culture and values. Whether you’re hiring for a specific position or looking to build your talent pipeline, a well-crafted recruiting video can make a significant impact.
What is the purpose of a recruitment marketing video?
The purpose of a recruiting video is to create a positive impression of the organization and entice potential candidates to apply for open positions. These videos typically highlight the benefits and opportunities that come with working for the organization. Recruiting videos can be shared on various platforms, including social media and the company website.
Here are some steps to help you create an effective recruitment marketing video, based on our experience working with clients:
Step 1: Define your audience and message
Before you start filming, think about who your ideal candidate is and what message you want to convey. What are the unique aspects of your company culture that set you apart from competitors? What are the key values that drive your team? These messages will guide the questions you ask employees on camera. You can craft your questions to elicit these messages.
Step 2: Identify video participants
To capture the messages you want to convey, it’s important to have the right people on camera, sharing their experience. Make sure you include people who are in the same roles you’re recruiting for, as well as leaders of those teams, so candidates can get a sense of who they’d be working with and who they’d be working for.
Step 3: Film your video
Film in a variety of locations to give a comprehensive view of your company and use plenty of b-roll footage to keep the video visually interesting. It’s important to make sure that the video flows seamlessly and keeps the audience engaged throughout.
Step 4: Edit and refine
Get the interviews transcribed, so you can choose the best clips and weave them together into a cohesive story. Use music and captions to enhance the viewing experience. Add a call to action at the end of the video, such as encouraging viewers to visit your careers page or follow your company on social media.
Step 5: Promote your video
Share the video on your company’s social media channels and website. Consider using paid advertising to reach a wider audience. Monitor the performance of your video and update it over time to keep it relevant and improve its impact.
What should a recruiting video include?
Recruiting videos invite potential candidates to imagine what it’s like to work for an organization. Videos should paint a picture of the facility, the team and the surrounding area if relocation is likely. When woven all together, the testimonials and footage of the team in action should be inspiring.
- A well-crafted recruiting video should convey:
Company culture: Showcasing the company culture is essential to help potential candidates understand what it’s like to work for your organization. This can include highlighting team-building activities, company events, and the day-to-day atmosphere in the workplace. - Benefits and perks: Highlighting the benefits and perks that come with working for the organization can be a significant factor in attracting top talent. This can include healthcare benefits, 401(k) plans, flexible schedules, and other incentives.
- Career development: Potential candidates want to know that there is room for growth and advancement within the organization. Including information on career development opportunities, training programs, and mentorship programs can be essential in attracting top talent.
- Brand identity: Creating a recruiting video that reflects your brand identity can help potential candidates understand the company’s values, mission, and vision. This can include incorporating the company’s logo, color scheme, and overall tone.
What questions should video testimonials cover?
Including testimonials from current employees can help potential candidates understand the work environment, as well as gain insight into what it’s like to work for the organization.
When interviewing current employees, it’s best to put them at ease in front of the camera. Start by asking easy, no-brainer questions, working up to questions that may require a more thoughtful response. For example, start by asking:
- How would you describe what you do?
- How long have you worked here?
- Why did you choose to work at this company?
Then dive into deeper insights about the person’s role by covering:
- What drew you to this field of work?
- How does your current job compare with previous jobs you’ve had?
- What do you look forward to at work?
From there, questions can shift into insights about the team and culture of the organization, such as:
- Tell me about your coworkers.
- How would you describe the leadership here?
- Do you feel this company is welcoming to everyone, that it’s a place where anyone would feel included?
If the role is one that candidates are likely to relocate for, then dig into questions that will give viewers a flavor of the surrounding area:
- How would you describe this city/region to someone who’s never been here?
- How would you describe the local community?
- What do you like to do outside of work?
And finally, close out the interview with forward-looking questions:
- What makes you want to stay with this company?
- What advice would you give someone who’s considering moving here for a job with your company?
What does a finished recruiting video look like?
We recently helped a healthcare organization with a series of videos to help with recruiting for their hospitals in Alaska.
A scripted video conveyed the breadth of the organization’s presence across Alaska.
An interview-style video communicated what it’s like to work at the largest hospital and trauma center in the state.
A video was created to showcase a long-term acute care and inpatient rehab hospital.
A video showed how working in Seward, Alaska could be someone’s next big adventure.
Need help crafting your video or developing a comprehensive recruitment strategy?
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Key trends in email marketing

Key trends in email marketing
There is one thing marketers can be certain about when it comes to marketing: email still works. Sure, it might be tempting to shove aside that geezer of electronic communication in favor of hot young marketing whipper-snappers like TikTok and connected TV, but the truth is, old-reliable email is estimated to bring in $51 for every dollar spent, and has been rated the top form of digital marketing. Further, revenue from email marketing is estimated to nearly double by 2027. With all that in mind, here are some of the key trends in email marketing.
Hyper-personalization
The inbox is a highly competitive place, and customers can quickly spot the difference between a message that’s speaking to them specifically and one that belongs in the junk folder. That’s why hyper-personalization of your email marketing campaigns is key.
Email segmentation is nothing new, and it’s proven to be effective: personalized content can lead to a six-fold increase in transaction rate. It’s also essential: customers have come to expect direct, specific engagement that feels like it’s meant just for them. That means segmenting your list and creating dynamic content that’s relevant to each group. The more you can make your audience feel like you know their interests, the more likely they are to engage. At the same time, there’s a fine line between piquing a customer’s interests and overdoing it. Be the cool friend, not the nagging aunt. Luckily, there are advanced tools such as automation, AI, and Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP), which can help.
Gamification
The email marketing trend of gamification continues to grow. Options for adding game design elements to your emails include quizzes, a quick puzzle or a matching game, one that is goal-oriented to get the customer something tangible and actionable, like a coupon code or an exclusive first look.
Dark mode
Another example of simple functionality that makes a big impact in an email campaign is utilizing the Batman-esque cool of Dark Mode. According to Earthweb, Dark Mode is preferred by over 80% of users. Making sure that your emails look great and function properly in the upside-down will be key, as improperly rendering emails can trigger spam filters. Without dark mode functionality, subscribers might not see your email at all.
Empathy and trust
Even as you employ all the trendiest and most effective strategies in your campaign, it’s vital to keep in mind the goal of creating an authentic connection. Customers want to feel seen and understood. If you can establish a trusting relationship, you’ll earn their loyalty. Back up your personalization with an empathetic tone and emotionally intelligent messaging. And importantly, let customers know that you value their privacy and their choice. Strategies for this include specific messaging about your commitment to data privacy, including highlights and easy links to your policies, and readily accessible email preferences that customers can easily change. Invite customers to learn more, and to have more say in when and how they are communicated with. You can even add a feature at the end of an email asking customers to quickly rate the relevance of their content, so they can also have a say in shaping the messaging they receive.
Looking for a partner for your email marketing campaign?
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What is social marketing?

What is social marketing?
Social marketing uses the tools and strategies of traditional marketing to change behavior not just for the benefit of the individual, but for society as a whole. A social marketing campaign uses many of same techniques used in selling a product, only in this case, the product being sold is an idea. The key distinction between social and commercial marketing is this: commercial marketing sells a behavior or lifestyle that benefits the marketer, while social marketing sells a behavior or lifestyle that benefits all. This benefit to the public is always the primary focus of a social marketing campaign. It’s not about competing against other products (this running shoe is better than that one), but rather about competing against undesirable ideas and actions (recycling will lead to less waste and a healthier planet).
We see social marketing campaigns around us all the time: conserving water, preventing forest fires, floss your teeth every time you brush, not driving while intoxicated. We just witnessed a wide variety of social marketing in action during the pandemic such as communications telling us to wear masks or get vaccinated. And while ‘marketing’ is part of the term, social marketing is much more than advertising. It also utilizes education and engages community action.
By social marketing, do you mean social media?
Yes and no. Social media is an effective tool that can be utilized in a social marketing campaign, but it’s just one of many. Because social marketing is trying to affect society as a whole, the use of social media will only be part of a fully realized campaign. Other forms of media must be utilized to reach wider demographics. An effective campaign will also use upstream efforts, such as working with policy makers, organizations, and community groups, to get the message out.
What are the goals of social marketing?
Social marketing typically tries to persuade the public to do one of these four things:
Social marketing is about persuasion. The goal is to get a population to change their behavior by telling what’s possible. This can be accomplished by building understanding and empathy in the audience and helping them to become personally motivated by the benefits of the change you are asking them to make.
Using the 4 P’s in Social Marketing
A well-known way of describing marketing is through the “4 P’s”: product, price, place, and promotion. This can be a handy framework for thinking about the goals of social marketing:
- Product: in social marketing, your product is the behavior you are trying to change. In a campaign against smoking, the product you’re targeting isn’t the cigarette, it’s the act of smoking itself, and the outcomes it can lead to.
- Price: this is the price of changing a behavior. In social marketing, we’re not just talking about a monetary cost, but also costs in terms of time, effort, and even mental energy for the consumer. We might make a recycling program free in our city, but the campaign also needs to consider such factors as the time and complexity of the sorting, and whether the pickup is convenient and often enough.
- Place: this refers to the opportunities and access to the product, or in this case, to the resources that will affect change. In social marketing this can also be thought of in terms of removing barriers. In a vaccination campaign, it’s not only important to convey the value of getting the vaccine, but also to make the vaccine easy to find, schedule, and receive. The “place” here won’t just be the physical location, i.e. a wide variety of easy-to-reach locations, it will also be the hours that those sites are available, as well as the ease and ubiquity of the scheduling process. The less that your target audience needs to go out of their way to engage, the more likely they will be to do so.
- Promotion: this is the advertising piece of the campaign, and the part that is most easily associated with traditional marketing. A good campaign will identify ways to engage its audience through all forms of media, but will also go beyond this by finding ways to reach people out in the community. Finding ways to spread your message through word of mouth is an important part of promotion, whether it can be through doctors or other trusted voices in the community, or through community groups. Symbols can be another key messaging tool: think of the red ribbon that has become synonymous with HIV awareness, or how pink has come to symbolize breast cancer awareness.
How do I build a successful social marketing campaign?
One size doesn’t fit all
The first step to any campaign is to figure out what behavior you are trying to change. What is the most effective message? Often, there are two, if not more, sides to a targeted behavior. Is it about using your recycling service more, or throwing out less? And which messages will be most effective with your audience? There may be several different targeted groups within a campaign, and they each may need to be influenced in a different way. Audiences might be delineated by age, education, income, race, and each subset will likely require different and targeted methods of engagement.
Research is an important tool in kicking off a successful social marketing campaign in order to identify and segment key audiences, identify barriers and motivators, and test messages.
Change is hella hard, bro
A good strategy for thinking about these differences is to identify the barriers to change. Your audience is going to need some convincing to make this change, and you need to assess all the variables that will hold them back: what steps can be taken so that your message can be better received? Some of those barriers are physical, as mentioned above in relation to “place,” while others may be social or cultural.
Keep in mind, too, that people will have different beliefs about your topic. In a vaccination campaign, for example, some people might believe that getting a vaccine is good, but that the risks aren’t great enough to bother; others might believe the vaccine itself is dangerous; still others might think the vaccine is a great idea, but they just don’t feel like they have time. An effective campaign will need to address all of these viewpoints.
Time IS on your side
A key component of social marketing is a realistic assessment of the time it will take to change the behavior. Most people don’t change their ways overnight. And even if they come around to the new idea quickly, they may not act on it right away (or may not be able to act on it, due to barriers such as schedules, other household attitudes, etc.). Further, when people do try a different behavior, they will need reinforcement to keep doing it. Therefore, a social marketing strategy has to play the long game.
Join the winning team
A critical way that social marketing can combat the myriad of barriers to change is through inclusion. It’s not just about conveying the benefits to the audience of starting this new behavior, it’s also about showing the audience what you and your partners are already doing to make this change easier for everyone to accomplish. Don’t just tell your audience what they need to do, tell them what you’ve done, and will do. That way they will feel like they are joining the effort, becoming part of team that’s already in action, rather than having to do this on their own.
Need a social marketing partner?
Hey, you. That’s right, you. Want to learn more about social marketing or need a partner to help plan and execute your next social marketing campaign? Give us a shout.
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How to build an awareness campaign and drive traffic to your website

How to build an awareness campaign and drive traffic to your website
Most advertising campaigns boil down to three objectives: build awareness, drive traffic to a website, blog, or landing page; and maximize conversion rates. We recently led a client through the process of launching a campaign that does it all.
Situation
The Washington State Department of Revenue (DOR) returns missing money to Washingtonians every day through its Unclaimed Property program. Companies that have lost contact with the owner of the assets turn the money over to the DOR–and it’s up to them to reunite this lost and forgotten money with its rightful owners. Common types of unclaimed property include:
- Bank accounts
- Insurance proceeds
- Stocks, bonds, and mutual funds
- Utility and phone company deposits
- Customer credits
- Uncashed checks–such as payroll, insurance payments, or traveler’s checks
- Safe deposit box contents
The Unclaimed Property division has returned $1.2 billion to Washingtonians, as well as Washington businesses, non-profit organizations, and municipalities. But new assets are turned over every year, which means the state currently holds over $1.4 billion waiting to be claimed. That’s where we came in.
The Department of Revenue has made it easy for people to see if they have missing funds. You just have to go to ClaimYourCash.org to search.
Our job was to help get the word out and supplement their internal efforts including postcards and locator outreach. Our advertising campaign goals were to increase awareness about the program and drive traffic to the website. We know that one in seven Washingtonians has unclaimed property, so our target audience was statewide. We led the Department of Revenue through the process of building a broad awareness and traffic-driving campaign and they increased staffing to support it. Here’s how:
Step 1: Outline your media strategy
Our recommendation for an integrated media strategy included a mix of traditional, digital, and social media working together to grow awareness, increase traffic to the website, and boost conversions through remarketing.
- Awareness and prospecting tactics, like radio, efficiently reach the greatest population across the state.
- Traffic-driving tactics, including digital ads and social media ads, point people to the website with an easy click-through format.
- Remarketing tactics are implemented as first-party data metrics build, to drive users who have shown interest in the claim-submission process.
Step 2: Develop effective creative
The creative developed for this campaign took a vibrant, fun, alliterative approach and includes:
- Broadcast television and radio: Using theater of the mind, we created awareness, inspired action, and urged actions online. Radio partnerships included a mix of paid ads as well as on-air DJ interviews, including testimonials about how much money they had found themselves.
- Digital media: Using a mix of digital display ads, also known as banner ads, as well as native ads that encourage people to click through to check for unclaimed property of their own. The four unique creative units were then created in all the standard seven digital ad sizes.
- Social media: Use a mix of image and other format ads to educate and create engagement.
Step 3: Measure and optimize the campaign
By setting up a real-time dashboard that pulls in metrics from the programmatic platform, Meta, and Google Analytics, we can see the performance of the campaign—and continually optimize to improve results. We employ A/B testing as part of every campaign to identify the best performing creative units and media tactics.
In just the first three months of the campaign:
- 226,958 new users to the site – up 39% from the previous 90 days
- 30,131 claims processed – up 28% from previous year
- $26.2 million refunded – up 58% from previous year

The campaign earned Gold from the international Davey Awards, placing it in the top 10 percent of entries.
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