More than 70% of the World’s Most Attractive Employers (WMAE) believe that employer branding should be one of the top priorities of the companies. And there is a reason behind this– your reputation as an employer determines the sort of candidates that apply to get jobs in your company. If you have a bad name in the market, a major portion of the good and highly-skilled candidates will keep searching for a better option than you.
However, it is your job to convince the new candidates that your company offers a great workplace environment and has a valuable internal culture. In order to convince them, you can turn to your employees to become the mouthpiece for your company. New candidates find employee testimonials to be highly-relatable which helps them build an emotional connection as well.
In this blog, we’ll see what employee testimonials are and why are they important? Moreover, we’ll also take a look at some ways to collect impactful testimonials and some examples too. Without any further ado, let’s jump right into it.
What is an Employee Testimonial?
Employee testimonials are official statements from employees that explain their overall experience with your firm. It describes what they like about their job in your company, how they feel to work here, what a typical day looks like at the workplace, how they developed personally and professionally, and much more. Employees might also suggest why eligible clients should prefer working here.
Employee testimonials have the power to paint your firm in a great light. However, if you amalgamate it with employee stories, it’ll be much more effective. A story elevates an ordinary employee testimonial. You can put an example/story of something that the firm did for the specific employee to show your company’s culture and values in action.
These testimonials can be shared in many forms: photos, video, interviews, articles, social media posts, etc.
Why Are Employee Testimonials So Important?
When 84% of the job seekers are saying that the reputation of a firm as an employer is one of the biggest factors that affect their decision to apply for a position, you should take it seriously without any second thoughts. The job seeker today only wants to work for companies that value innovation and inspire purpose. They want to work for a company that offers surety regarding professional growth. And to get a coveted position, these candidates don’t mind doing a little extra research.
Customer testimonials are important and there’s no doubt about that. Candidates prefer to hear the lockdown directly from the horse’s mouth. It is mainly because normal employees are more relatable to these candidates than the CEOs of the company. You need to give more importance to these testimonials to gain control of the narrative.
Collect Impactful Employee Testimonials
We know how crucial employee testimonials are, but it can be challenging to begin with collecting these testimonials. You can make this process easier for yourself by following these tips listed below:
Do not script
One of the first things that an employee testimonial needs to be is sound natural. You don’t want your staff to ramble, the testimonials that they come up with should be crisp and consequential. If you are presenting these testimonials in the form of an interview, give them a basic idea of its structure and topic to talk about.
But it is also essential to ensure that the video you post is not scripted. A scripted video will only ruin things for your firm as it would look like the employee(s) is forced to say positive things about the brand.
Answer their questions
Even if you employees have a story to tell, it can be difficult for them to reel out a speech. You can give your questions to the employees beforehand, so they at least know what to answer. It will make things natural for them and their flow look natural. Asking questions out loud and giving them a few minutes to frame an answer is also a good option, you can always edit the video in post-production.
Capture emotions
People don’t want to see robots in the videos. You want your employees to be as relatable with your potential candidates as they can be. You can ask your employees to talk about their personal connection with the brand. If the candidates like their experience, they’ll be more than eager to join your firm.
Do not overdo
You need to keep your testimonials as short and sweet as you can. Candidates are not likely to see long videos just for the testimonials. All they want is a snapshot of your firm’s culture. Try to stick to a single topic in one video. When your videos are short, they can be shared on social media platforms too.
3 Great Employee Testimonials Example
Here are three of the great employee testimonial examples that we gathered from different industries and in distinct formats. You can take inspiration from these companies and then work with your employees to put out a consequential testimonial.
Capgemini
Format: A combination of short videos and text interviews
Capgemini offers a good collection of testimonials of their employees across the company. These employee testimonials are in the form of short videos, and some key excerpts are presented in a question-answer format.
This combination is quite effective for Capgemini as it allows the audience to skim through the content if they are short on time, and can see the whole video if they want to know deeply about the experience.
Nike
Format: Montage video and employee journeys
In their employee testimonial segment, Nike has done what Nike does best– creating short montage videos of employees and moments at Nike. The infectious music that they put in the video hooks the candidates to see what’s coming.
In the video, some selected employees share their joining process and how they felt after it. There are some behind the scenes and inspiring words too that allure candidates towards Nike’s mission.
P&G
Format: “Day 1” employee video stories
P&G is a global company, reinforced by quality employees present across the world. They have shared testimonials of employees from all over the world (US, Brazil, Singapore, etc.) When candidates see the video of individuals from all over the world, they see an opportunity to relocate, and this is exactly what P&G seeks in their potential candidates.
The videos shared by P&G are engaging because you get to see both the personal and professional lives of the employees, and how they are in harmony with each other.
Final Words
As we have mentioned in the article, employee testimonials are a great way to attract top talents. You get to show the benefits you provide as a brand and also build an emotional connection so that when the candidates become your employee they already feel connected to the firm. You can take the best practices into consideration to easily form impactful employee testimonials.