Let me ask you a question.

How much time and thought (and no doubt money) do you put into advertising your product or service?

The chances are you take a lot of care and attention, making sure the advert appeals to the right market and makes what you are selling look fantastic (which it no doubt is).

Now let me ask you another question. Do you apply the same logic to looking for a new employee?

We all know that hiring at the moment isn’t easy. Unemployment is at its lowest rate for ever, and people are nervous about moving jobs with all the economic turmoil. But you still need to hire.

So why wouldn’t you take the same time and care to market yourself to a potential new hire, as you would to market your product or service?

After all, what you are selling is your whole company! If you take the time to think about marketing your job vacancy with the same attention to detail as you do your products, then you won’t go far wrong.

Think about your brand, and what would make someone proud to work for you. What is it about you that will make that perfect candidate choose your job to apply for over any others? Take a marketing approach to your ad – you are selling someone a great opportunity!

• Think about where you advertise – make sure you cover all the bases, whether that’s via Social Media, a web-based recruitment platform, job centres, recruitment agencies or newspaper adverts. You want to be visible to as wide a range of potential candidates as possible, so think about where they are likely to look. Just make sure that any digital ads are mobile friendly (most people do a lot of searching on their phones).

• Sell your Company culture. Let them know why you are so amazing, and the right choice for them.

• Make sure you have a clear job description, so you can accurately describe what the role will do. Don’t just cut and paste it – remember, it’s a marketing exercise, so it should sound appealing. Oh, but don’t lie. If the role is going to be typing and filing, don’t make it out like they’ll be running the Company.

• Tell them what the salary banding will be – ‘competitive salary’ just doesn’t cut it. If you genuinely think it’s competitive, say what you are paying. If you don’t think it’s genuinely competitive, then you’ll probably need to look at it again.

• Shout about any great perks that you have – whether it’s free tea and coffee, a great holiday scheme or an online discount platform, let them know it’s there

• Offer flexible or homeworking if you can – it doesn’t have to be full time at home, but a lot of people appreciate a day or two at home a week, or the ability to start/ finish a bit earlier or later sometimes.

• Make sure that nothing in the ad is discriminatory – not only is it illegal, but you will narrow down your pool of applicants enormously – both the candidates you are discriminating against and those that want to work for an inclusive company.

If this all sounds like a lot of work, then why not get in touch?