Are you struggling to fill a vacancy and have run out of ideas of how to attract candidates or at least good quality ones?

Video has proven to deliver high audience engagement level over other types of online content whether it be for marketing purposes or entertainment. And stick your dog in it and the number of views will go through the roof but that’s just food for thought!

Video is not easy; will probably take a few shoots to perfect but is worth the investment and should become easier with practice. According to research, videos attract 34% more applications than static posts alone. A good recruitment video can allow you to pitch your organisation and the role in exactly the way you want it to and set it apart from your competitors. You have the opportunity to showcase your organisation’s human side, give an insight into your company culture and what makes it a great place to work.

But how do we create an effective recruitment video that has candidates queuing up outside your front door?

One option is to source a specialist digital marketing agency to support you or there are a few good video making apps that will help you do it in-house. If you don’t have the budget or technical flare, invest in a decent tripod for your mobile and find a space that looks professional, is quiet and non-echoey and shows a bit of the personality of your organisation if possible. Think about asking current job holders to feature in your video to talk about their role and what they love about it. These are touch points that a text-based post cannot accurately capture or portray. By sharing across social media, including your company’s website, you can ask your employees to ‘like and share’ to widen the exposure.

A good recruitment is clear and concise. It should explain the role, organisation and culture without being too long-winded. Your video should last between 2-5 minutes bearing in mind that the average time candidates spend on watching videos is 1 minute 36 seconds.  It is helpful to outline the skills, knowledge and behaviours that you are seeking and the application process (remember this should be quick and painless). Your video should show what makes your organisation different and unique. Anything that helps you stand out is good whether it be your great work/ life balance, family-feel culture or fun staff away days. Involve your people in telling their stories. Employee testimonials are a great way of doing this and act as proof of what you’re saying. Always keep your messaging authentic otherwise new hires will quickly catch on, become disillusioned and leave.

Write a script and rehearse it but avoid reading from it when it comes to shooting your video otherwise it will come across as wooden and amateur. Work alongside your marketing department to polish up your video and add background music and subtitles. Make sure the music doesn’t drown out your commentary though.

Your video doesn’t have to be of movie-star quality as very often a low-budget alternative can come across as authentic and human. The trick is, is to share what makes you different; people like quirky (if possible). As long as it’s genuine, well-rehearsed (without sounding scripted) and warm rather than corporate, you should finally start to see better engagement levels on those hard-to-fill posts.