How to Improve Your Company Branding

Team members giving input on company branding.

Company branding isn’t something you source from the outside. It’s more like starting a fire inside, and then letting the light shine through to the outside. That kind of illumination comes from your workers. As a hiring manager, it’s your job to figure out what it is about your company that attracts and retains good employees and use that information to create the brand statement you push out into the world. Here are a few tips on how to do it.

Explain the Company Culture

A brand statement isn’t a slogan, catchphrase, or press release. It’s a statement that says, in essence, what you do and why you do it. Company branding is intrinsically linked to its company culture. And a company’s culture is its people.

In Finding Keepers: The Monster Guide to Hiring and Holding the World’s Best Employees, authors Steve Pogorzelski, Jesse Harriott, and Doug Hardy note that employees are in the best position to define their workplace culture. Because of this, they suggest employers should ask their workers for “candid input.”

“Your current employees are the experts. If you start anywhere other than their experience, you are writing fiction,” the authors say. To get an honest picture of your company brand, ask your employees to answer questions that focus on culture and values such as:

  • Why are you here?
  • What is unique about this company?
  • What kind of person succeeds here?
  • What do we as an organization believe?
  • How does this company treat its customers?
  • What do we want people who work here to feel for this place?

Showcase Your Employee Benefits and Perks

The next step in creating your company branding is to loop in your HR department for a detailed list of employee perks and benefits that your company offers.

  • Compensation (salary and hourly pay, bonuses, profit sharing)
  • Benefits (medical, retirement, pension plans)
  • Opportunities for advancement (career development plans, trainings, mentorship programs, fast-track for promotions)
  • Work-life balance (tuition reimbursement, onsite childcare, generous time off)
  • Socially conscious (community outreach, volunteer opportunities, eco-friendly office)
  • Industry status (cutting-edge products, industry awards)

This list shouldn’t take center stage when advertising your company branding—lists in and of themselves aren’t as effective or compelling as a statement—although these factors will likely help you close on a job offer with a candidate or sway a candidate to choose your company over a competitor.

For a more effective ways of spreading the message of your company culture, try these strategies:

  • Use positive employee quotes for endorsements in marketing
  • Feature good employee stories in a newsletter or group email
  • Rotate team photos on the company website and on social media

When composing your brand statement, remember that you will likely go through a few iterations before landing on the one that sticks. Ask yourself the following questions to determine whether or not your statement is on the right track:

  • Is it truthful? Does the statement reflect your employees’ reality at your company?
  • Is it unique? Does it seem interchangeable with a competitor’s statement?
  • Is it riveting? Does it make people want to be a part of what you’ve got going on?
  • Is it relevant? Will it resonate with your target audience?

Continue to Improve Your Company Branding

These tips will help you develop your employer branding so you can recruit and retain top talent. Keep up the momentum with Monster’s Employer Branding Guide.

Team members giving input on company branding.