It’s no surprise that a large proportion of today’s workforce is made up of young professionals looking to advance up the career ladder. In fact, out of LinkedIn’s members in the UK who have identified their education on their profiles, one fifth is a recent graduate.
And when it comes to graduate recruitment, our data shows that recent graduates are very much proactive when it comes to job seeking. In fact 65% viewed a job on LinkedIn in the last 3 months while 77% are already researching people and companies on the platform.
So it’s safe to say now is the time to start attracting and recruiting for your new pool of graduate talent. But with such rife competition, fears of Brexit affecting jobs and access to more information via social media than ever before – how can your company stand out from the crowd?
The key here is to get creative and build a graduate ‘talent brand’ that’s specifically geared towards this segment of the market. Here are a couple of recruitment campaigns that have caught my eye recently:
E.On – “Room of the future”
E.On developed a fully immersive on-campus experience for university students. Labelled as “The Room of the Future”, it featured a living room showing what life could be like in 2020, complete with flickering electrics caused by an erratic energy supply, and a TV news bulletin running news on the havoc caused by climate change.
The clever thing about this campaign is that it focused on the value of the work being done by E.On – and shows that they’re aware of what motivates potential candidates. Research by LinkedIn last year found that employees are highly motivated by purpose, and working for a cause whose values match their own. This is especially true among millennials, with more than half (56 per cent) of those aged 16-34 saying that aligning with a company’s values is a deal breaker when it came to accepting a job offer.
Jaguar Land Rover – Gorillaz app
In an unlikely alliance, Jaguar Land Rover announced earlier this month that they were joining forces with the band Gorillaz in order to help recruit more than a thousand electronic and software engineers.
To do this, they have created an app which is full of coding puzzles. Cracking these puzzles comes with a big prize – those who are successful will be entered into a fast track to employment. One of the great things about this app is that it’s compelling to use, and invites people to show off their talent to a prospective employer. The company also promoted this campaign heavily on LinkedIn, where they have a strong following of more than 270,000 users.
So don’t let the class of 2017 pass you by! Now is the time to get creative and modernise your graduate recruitment campaigns to ensure your organisation is stealing a march on the competition when it comes to recruiting top graduate talent.
* Recent Graduate Definition: A Linkedin member who graduated in the last 3 years.
