For businesses that are struggling to hire the workers they need, recruitment and workforce attraction are initiatives that are garnering a lot of attention. But there’s an important difference between the two, and I’m often asked to help people understand what that is.

Recruitment marketing is probably familiar to all of us. It’s utilizing marketing channels to let potential employees know that you’re hiring, and why they might be interested in working for you. In its simplest form, it’s the signs outside businesses that announce “We’re Hiring! $XX per hour!” 

Hookd is a provider of recruitment digital marketing services that are highly targeted campaigns that reach potential employees through digital channels – Google, YouTube, Facebook, etc. We’re proactively presenting recruitment messages, not only to active job seekers, but more importantly, to qualified candidates not currently looking for a different job. In today’s job environment, these are most often the best prospects.

The results we’re able to generate with these campaigns are significant. One client, over the last quarter of 2021, had over 300,000 impressions each month, and averaged more than 2,000 monthly visitors to their careers page as a result of their campaign. 

So what’s workforce attraction, then? And how is it different from recruitment marketing? 

Workforce Attraction marketing is the utilization of marketing channels to inform the workforce outside of our region about this beautiful place we call home, and why they might want to do the same. 

In today’s reality, it’s important to understand that the overall workforce pool is shrinking due to many factors, and that it is not expected to increase anytime soon. The only way to grow our workforce in the short term (the next 20 years or so) is to attract talent who would want to live and work in our region.

So workforce attraction marketing is making that introduction, if you will, of the Chippewa Valley, to people who are looking for a different way of life. Maybe they want to leave a large city and find work in an affordable place that’s great for raising a family. Believe it or not, there are a lot of people searching for exactly that on Google. Every day.

So Hookd is making sure that Chippewa Falls shows up in response to Google Searches, as well as proactively on the world wide web, and that interested individuals can access information about living and working in this area. Check out the Chippewa Falls Workforce Attraction Landing Page to see more.

In 2021, the Chippewa Falls Workforce Attraction campaigns generated more than 3.7 Million impressions and more than 60,000 people visited that landing page to learn more about living and working here in our region.

So both Recruitment and Workforce Attraction campaigns are powerful tools that provide significant value. Recruitment marketing is directed at finding specific talent for open positions right now. And Workforce Attraction plays the long game – finding the right people to want to move to our region to be part of our way of life, thereby growing our economy.

If you’re interested in learning more, or exploring options for your organization, Sarah Gordee always enjoys having those conversations. Feel free to reach out anytime [email protected] 715-396-1661.