The Rise of the Recruitment Video

Contrary to belief, recruitment videos aren’t one of the hottest new trends in the industry. In fact they’ve been around for over a half a decade, ever since Youtube exploded and some bright cookie put two and two together and made a corporate video.

The initial trend led to interesting results such as Ernst & Young’s excruciating footage of their employees singing ‘Oh Happy Day’ in a kind of team-building exercise that went wrong.

I particularly like the bit at 1:50 where she yells ‘break it down’ and they jazz up the song repeat-o style.

Moving on

Fortunately, things change. Boosted by the surge of social channels and online networking, recruitment videos have made the transition from a pointless waste of budget to one of the most popular hiring tools of the 21st century.

For those of you who are thinking about making one, here’s a roundup of some of the best and most popular recruitment videos on the Net today. Plus, we’ve included a list of hints and tips on how to make your own (it doesn’t involve singing ‘Oh Happy Day’).

The ‘Sincere’ recruitment video

Filmed on campus with some great testimonials, Apple’s four minute long recruitment video comes across as both genuine and inspiring.

In my view, the best thing about this recruitment video is that it gives you an insight across the whole company from Engineering to Sales, Design to HR. So, despite being four and a half minutes long it remains pretty engaging (most video’s are around 2 mins).

The ‘Tongue in Cheek’ recruitment video

The folks over at Twitter decided to take on a different tune. In their 3 minute long spoof recruitment video they manage to cover pretty much everything you need to know about the company, in the most cringe-inducing way possible.

I particularly liked the bit about benefits. Can anyone confirm that Twitter actually give their employees a bottle of wine as well as a T-shirt?

The ‘Irresistible’ recruitment video

Hubspot – Note the mouthwatering shots of the food pantry, the communal Xbox, the foosball table and the fact that there is NO LIMIT on vacations.

Where do I apply?

The ‘Dramatic’ recruitment video

Barclays, for those who aspire to a hair-raising career in finance.

Stay calm, it’s just a HR team in balaclavas.

The ‘Poetic’ recruitment video

I love this one.

Salesforce mixed together staff testimonials, awesome shots of the company environment, loads of information about how they function and produced this 2 minute collaborative poem to great effect.

How much do you want to work in downtown San Francisco right now?

Making your own recruitment video

I think we can all agree that each and every one of the above videos are pretty varied, they don’t seem to have much in common apart from one thing – they are all tailored to their target audience.

Apple want to recruit innovative, smart professionals, Twitter do too but they want their candidates have a wicked sense of humour. I’m not sure about Barclays, maybe they’re just looking to add some spice to an otherwise boring industry.

Either way, Rule No. 1 – Work out who you’re talking to.

Think about your target audience, what makes them tick and what will inspire them. Tailor your video to the kind of people you want at your company.

You want funny, be funny. You want serious, be serious etc.

Rule No.2 – Make it informative

Think about your company values, goals and ethos and try to summarize this in a few sentences. Salesforce is a great example of the kind of concise and informative dialogue that works well in recruitment videos.

Rule No.3 – Sell yourself

One word: Hubspot

Rule No.4 – Let your staff do the talking

Get your best speakers and put them in front of the camera. Apple, whose team are apparently also pro TV presenters, are the ideal example. Least of all make sure to catch inspiring shots of your team looking happy and engaged at work.

Rule No.5 – Use your imagination

These days, it doesn’t take much for a great video to go viral. Get the balance right, make something truly unique, engaging and/or humorous and your recruitment video could be getting 1000+ hits a day in no time.

Any suggestions? leave your hints, tips and links to your favorite videos below! Also stay tuned for next weeks article on How to Make Your First Recruitment Video…