Recruiting podcasts: the HR trend of the future?

In this article, you will learn how you can use a recruiting podcast to expand your employer branding and use this popular medium to make your recruiting more innovative and targeted.

"All job advertisements always say the same thing...". " At least I get more detailed information about headhunters in advance." Such phrases from applicants should be a thing of the past with an innovative HR strategy. But how do job seekers or potential candidates actually get the important information about their new dream job?

Talents want to get a comprehensive picture of their potential future company. To do this, they surf job boards, compare employers on platforms such as Kununu or search for first-hand information among friends or acquaintances. They may also find out indirectly from a headhunter about an advertised position – but here the company never has 100 percent control over what is said about them. The external appearance of your company and the effect of your employer brand therefore depends on many factors.

People like to listen to people

However, how talents are informed about the company's image and a new job can be positively influenced to an important extent! Active and comprehensive employer branding is not difficult to implement through social media and the right digital tools. 

Use the power of the spoken word for your Applicant Management the power of the spoken word and the direct, digital approach through a credible medium. What better way to convince someone than with a personal, authentic approach? You can't have a phone call or interview with every potential applicant, but you can give interested people an authentic and professionally appealing first impression.

Smart employer branding through podcasts

The podcast industry is booming. One in three Germans now listens to podcasts and has an extremely positive attitude towards this medium – also in terms of advertising messages. Podcasts are easy to implement and listeners appreciate the spoken word of competent people. Talking about a role in person simply conveys more character than a written job advertisement.

In a comprehensive recruiting strategy, employer branding and a positive candidate experience begin long before you sit across from each other in a job interview. For passive and active job seekers, a podcast on vacancies or on "internal" as well as technical topics offers the decisive added value, possibly even a unique selling point. This means that they can provide a personal and authentic insight and shape their employer brand much better than is possible through headhunters or written job advertisements.

Job seekers will appreciate the direct information and authentic insights, and they don't have to pretend, because podcasts thrive on their authenticity! A real added value for applicants is to hear the voice and personality of the direct manager and upcoming teammates.

Videos can also be useful in a personnel marketing mix, but they have the disadvantage that they are more complex to produce and therefore more expensive. In addition, it is often perceived more strongly as direct advertising by recipients. In addition, videos are difficult to watch on the go or on the side. Podcasts, on the other hand, can be listened to everywhere – especially when driving or exercising, they are popular companions.

How do I use podcasts for recruitment marketing?

In a "candidate driven market", you need to go one step further to attract qualified applicants to your company. So turn the tables! It is not the applicant who should have to offer himself to the company, but they should make themselves attractive as an employer through targeted insights into the company through podcasts. These four variants are suitable for this purpose:

1) 'Insights' Marketing

Report on your internal topics, products/services, and work ethic. A good example is Deutsche Bahn's IT@DB podcast with Jan Götze. Here you can gain an exclusive insight into the IT projects and associated IT vacancies at Deutsche Bahn. Through such internal specialist podcasts, applicants gain an insight into technical topics and forms of work and can get an impression of you as an employer and build a positive brand relationship.

2) Target group-related interviews with guests

The best-known example of this is probably the OMR podcast. Behind this is Ramp 106GmbH, which operates under the brand "Online Marketing Rockstars" as an information platform for digital marketing. Founder Philipp Westermeyer interviews experts on the topics of online marketing and digital in the OMR podcast. OMR is thus positioning itself as an important brand and trusted expert in this segment. The conversations are usually prepared in such a way that even laymen and newcomers can find their way around.

3) "Deep Dive"

In this format, in-depth professional and technical knowledge is imparted to a very concentrated target group by our own experts. One example is the podcast "Quality Heroes" by Quality Minds GmbH. Here, content from testing and quality for IT & software is taught, which is specifically aimed at the small niche of experts who are professionally active in this field. In this way, potential candidates are permanently addressed professionally and one or the other potential new customer also becomes aware of the professional qualities of this IT consultancy.

4) Jobcasts

Jobcasts allow you to make your job advertisements audible in a completely new way. In these job advertisements in a casual podcast format, the direct manager and one or two team members address job seekers directly. The role you are looking for is reflected and deepened in audio format. The team can personally convey to the talents what a person can expect when moving to this position. An example of a job cast from Chefkoch GmbH, which is looking for support in software development, can be found at the jobcast provider OHRBEIT.

Through the direct approach via the audio format and the detailed preparation of the position(s), communication can be made via podcast portals such as Spotify, Apple Podcasts or Amazon Music. In addition, the job casts can be integrated into the company's own career page and social media channels. In this way, they increase the range and provide valuable detailed information.

Incorporate podcasts into your HR strategy

A "high potential" who applies via a job advertisement is rare. On the other hand, a "high potential" who educates himself through podcasts and gains a positive image of a potential new employer in advance is more common. In this way, passive searchers can also be addressed and the number of direct applications can increase in the short and long term. 

The more clearly you name the challenges and current difficulties, the more certain you can be that the potential new colleagues will fit into your team in the long term and thus prevent, among other things, that they will drop out during the probationary period.

Inspire candidates even before the personal contact. Through an authentic approach, the transfer of technical knowledge and the credibility of the podcast medium, you can lead the way as a pioneer and open up a completely new (talent) target group through a recruiting channel that is still almost unused.