Good branding could be your agency’s biggest asset – if you get it right. Whether you’re an established agency or building your brand from the ground up, you just can’t afford to have a brand that doesn’t shine in this busy, competitive recruitment market.
Here’s 6 of the most common branding mistakes you could be making and what you can do to fix them.
1. Failing to differentiate
One of the biggest problems in recruitment marketing is that a lot of agencies look and sound the same. When you’re trying to stay visible in an overcrowded market, you need a brand that does some of the hard work for you.
What makes you different from your competitors? Whatever your unique selling points are, they should be woven into your brand, whether that’s through your key messaging, your taglines or your company hashtags.
2. Not having a brand strategy
Creating a solid brand strategy is the only way to have a clear and visible brand that’s aligned with your company goals.
Who is your brand? Why do you exist? What makes you valuable? The answers to these questions will help you define and drive your brand strategy.
With a brand strategy in place, you’ll have something to constantly refer back to that ensures your ‘why’ goes into everything you do.
3. Not sticking to brand guidelines
Consistency is the only way to ensure your brand is visible and sticky with your target market. If you don’t know who you are, neither will anyone else!
No one is going to call you out for using the wrong font or colour in a social media post, but the problem is that lack of consistency will mean you’ll never build a brand that’s recognisable.
If you have clear brand guidelines, these will help everyone in the company stay on brand. They should include everything from your brand colour codes to tone of voice and even logo positioning.
This will be your whole company’s go-to guide to stick to, so save them in a place that’s easy to access. And don’t be shy about being the branding police – if you see someone veer off-brand, let them know!
4. Choosing a logo you don’t love
Your logo will be plastered everywhere from your website to all your merch, so you really need to love it. Go for a clear and distinct design that can become a mascot for your business.
Rushing your logo design just so that you have something to go out with is never a good idea, and will only result in an expensive rebrand later down the line.
And if you can’t afford to work with a graphic design agency, you can always outsource your logo design to Fiverr. You don’t have to have a big marketing budget to get a nice logo these days so there’s really no excuse!
5. Being vague with your messaging
Using flowery or hot-air language might make you sound smart, but it does nothing for your brand.
Your messaging and tagline should clearly tell your target market who you are and why you’re relevant to them. Otherwise, why should they care?
Keep the language you use to an easy reading level and focus on clarity. Rewrite and refine it, and cut out any filler words that don’t add value.
It’s also a good idea to share a copy with others in the company to see if it’s as easy to understand as you think it is. Your candidates and clients will thank you for it!
6. Not maximising brand space
Once you’ve put all your time and effort into creating a recruitment brand that works for you, you need to brand up anything and everything to make it all worthwhile.
A lot of recruitment brands will stick to default settings with their online channels and this is a wasted opportunity – if there’s an option to personalise an online platform to make it your own, brand it up!
Update your social media headers and brand up all your online channels so they’re instantly recognisable as yours. Have a think about the channels you own and hunt for the ‘customize’ button – you’d be surprised how many opportunities you’ll find to add in your brand colours and logos.
With the right brand strategy, you can make your recruitment brand your agency’s biggest asset. Download the eBook below to find out how to build a visible and recognisable recruitment brand.
