PPP: Innovative Job Ads

The 10 Most Innovative Job Ads

by Lexie Forman-Ortiz

There are millions of metaphors we can apply to hiring, but one of my favorites is comparing dating to finding a job or hiring. With that comparison in mind – let’s all take a second to ask ourselves how do we court a mate? There are lots of answers but one thing companies need to keep in mind is they have to make themselves attractive to candidates. When you’re courting a candidate you need to pull out all the stops, including awesome job ads. These companies got extra creative, and extra clever – and I bet they met the person of their dreams (in hiring terms of course)… 

Providing a challenge is a great way to filter serious candidates in a job ad. Microsoft United Kingdom is not the only company to create crazy developer job ads, but they absolutely know how to target the high-demand group. If you provide a challenge only serious candidates will take the initiative. That means your job ad has already done some of the filtering and selection group for you. Ta-Da!

Use your companies main source of traffic to advertise open positions. I can see why it would be easy to get stuck in a rut, and only post jobs on careers’ pages. The reality is you’ll get a lot more traction if you diversify your advertising channels. Refinery29 published an entire blog on their open position. This is brilliant because their readers are already invested in the company, and are expecting exciting news. Imagine their excitement when they come across an article stating they could be the next hire at one of their favorite companies?

Demonstrate the potential for growth. How many times has a candidate asked you, “How can I grow in this position?” I bet you can’t even count. Growth is a hugely important factor in a career decision. The US Navy does an excellent job showing interested candidates limitless opportunity within the Navy. It’s clear their jobs surpass the traditional ideas of what it means to serve.

Having a sense of humor in your job ads is a great way to attract candidates that have one also. This is a particularly important skill set if you’re looking to hire a customer facing position. Dallas Restaurant and Bar wanted a bartender, and bartenders have to deal with all sorts of nonsense (I know, I was one), and with that in mind they made what I like to think is an oxymoron of a job ad. It makes no sense and perfect sense all at once.

Being social is no longer an option. Everyone is online now, which means you need to make sure your recruiting efforts make it there as well. And I am not just talking about a stream of tweets with job descriptions, I’m talking for the web advertisements. Bey2Ollak knows a good quote goes a long way, and has major sharing power.

 

Take advantage of the season. Part of having a creative job ad is using external influences to be successful. When it came time for GAP United Kingdom to hire extra employees for the holiday hiring boom they took what I call the “right on time approach.” Your job ads should always be evolving. No one is going to be interested in something that looks the same over and over again. You don’t have to necessarily be hiring seasonal workers to use different months to your advantage; all you need to do is think about how to make your open job the “right job, for right now.”

Make it easy for candidates to see themselves in your job ad. I love Hydro’s job ad because of the feelings of nostalgia it brings up. I was never a little boy, who spent a lot of time engineering paper airplanes, but I know a lot of people who were. I know they’d say to themselves “that was me once.”Imagine a job ad so good; the candidate visualizes himself or herself literally being born for you open jobs. This is exactly what Hydro has accomplished.

Honesty is the best policy. This job ad from the Peace Corps is from 1961. Which is proof they’ve been attracting talent the right way for a long time. Not all jobs are glamorous all the time. If this is the case for your company – find the positive in the “negative” and advertise it. Yes, you need to have a “strong stomach,” but you’re doing something really great for the world. Fair trade? I think so.

Location. Location. Location. You need candidates? Then advertise to them exactly where your ideal candidates are. Lyft shared their job ad for drivers right over a San Francisco Highway. It makes perfect sense doesn’t it? Think about “where the fish are” and cast a wide net in that location. The right location ensures lots of eyes on your job ad, which means a wider talent pool. Plus, in Lyft’s case not everyone who sees it will apply to be a driver, but I bet they’ll get a lot of new passengers as well.

Hyper-Target your job ad, but do it extra creatively. British Advertising Agency, Propaganda, set out to find an advertising writer by using a job ad that references well known advertising copy from multiple famous campaigns. This is clever for lots of obvious reasons. It’s industry specific, meaning a well-trained professional will pick up on all the hints, and of course appreciate the route Propaganda took.

Now, not every company – in fact most companies – won’t have a huge budget and design team to devote to creating extra appealing job ads. But just because you can not create amazing images doesn’t mean the job ad copy itself cannot be eye-catching. The first step is to stop thinking of job ads as job descriptions. Once you’ve done that, treat them with the same oomph as you would a full-fledged marketing campaign. What could be more important than attracting and retaining the talent you need to keep your company going? Nothing. Take your cues from these companies and start courting candidates the right way from the very beginning.

http://www.smartrecruiters.com/blog/the-10-most-innovative-job-ads/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=the-10-most-innovative-job-ads

Placement: Section D

I have a close family friend who owns the company Section D. I sent him the chicken casserole before christmas (personal family joke) and then followed up with an email to see if he had any feedback on my portfolio and bring up the prospect of a placement.

He replied in his usual funny self but business wise he said this:

I replied therefore with this:

Following this he told me that he'd put the word out about me which was very lovely.

Hopefully i'll hear something back soon and will get some extra feedback off him in relation to my portfolio!

Placement: The Hunt

In terms of placement this year I feel that the more local the better due to finance and accommodation. Therefore I looked at Manchester and Leeds for studios. I asked my family friend, Bruce, who went to Leeds Met and is now in London doing design wether he had any contacts he could pass or studios he would recommend. He suggested Music in Manchester as his friend went there and has done really well from it. He also looked at my site and said I had some good stuff which was reassuring. I mentioned San Fran to him as the dream and he said he knew a friend who worked in the EU for a year in Sweden and Paris and got given money to do it through a scheme which he's going to enquire about and get back to me.

When looking at Manchester studios I found studio 'Love' which had this request about placements. 

The Dream: San Fran

THE DREAM: To go and work in San Fran for a period of time.

ACTION: So I wanted to go to San Fran but financially I couldn't afford to just go there and live so I thought what better than to go and work there. However it's easily said than done with Americas really strict visa rules etc. I've looked online at internships and graduate schemes as I thought this might be the best possible way of approaching working there:

However it was still difficult to figure it out. I also contacted Max Gregory who graduated last year as him and Niall went for about a month and visited studios. He gave us some great advice and said although they didn't have any response to there emails they just went to the studios and people were generally friendly and helpful. They visited different ones the entire time they were there so there appears to be plenty to see! I also went to speak to STA travel about working abroad and possible help with sorting it. They explained that Australia is a lot easier and cheaper to go work in but usually in other fields of work such as farming and hospitality. There visas only last a year though but you could try look for design jobs whilst there doing another job. America they explained was a lot more complicated when it came to visas.

I decided to look at studios in San Francisco myself to see if there were any in particular that I could target. I also tried to find ones which also had UK based studios so that I could try and take the path from working here originally and transferring. I found quite a few that I liked the look of.

When looking at the sites I did look to see if they had any internship programmes. A lot said to pop in with your portfolio and they'll try look at it, not really practical for me being thousands of miles away however. I found this internship on one of there sites which is paid! It would have to be a paid internship if I was able to do it due it being financially impossible to live there without it being.

Leeds Print Festival Talks

Creative Review
Patrick Burgoyne

I really enjoyed this talk and found a lot of what he said really powerful.

I thought this video was beautiful. He spoke about how instead of generating this quickly by doing it digitally they did a process that meant making a story. I found this really interesting and exciting.





This was another example he gave, by generating it in a longer and special technique it created a story. Although it may not be obvious when watching the advert on the tv that this is how they produced it even none creatives where fascinated and interested in the making of it when seeing this video. Which you can't blame them because it's beautifully crafted and this shows in the end result.

Leeds Print Festival

I wanted to create some prints which would be functional and beautiful so I created different geometric patterns for postcards. I wanted them to be simple but striking.

I then applied colour to see how the pattern would look if I screen printed them in bright colours.

I also tried overlaying the two colours so I could create one colour prints and two colour prints which overlay the patterns to create new ones.

Another idea I had was to create a gradient with two colours so I also mock up how this could look.

Another functional piece I wanted to print for the festival was these envelopes where you can write on one side and fold it up, lick and stick it together and post it.

I tried out similar colour schemes and ideas as the postcards as it would make the process cheaper to stick to a few colours.

I decided to make a few alterations to make the detail nicer such as curved corners and dotted lines.

Also to make the envelopes more interesting I added a simple spotted pattern which is where the stock colour could act as a second colour to a one colour print. I felt this was simple and effective

To mix up the postcards slightly I chose a second format so I could create two different ranges. I then expanded the patterns as I realised I had more room on the screen.

As Steph was unable to host the stall at Leeds Print Festival me and Katie stepped in and took her place. We collected the classes prints and brought them to the event. We had to lay them out strategically as it was only a small table and we had quite a few prints to sell.

I attempted to screen print but due to being really ill with an infection and bad back I had to leave and  sadly was unable to create my prints in time for the event. I did however bring the marble prints that me and Sam generated in creating the flag for the Dr.Me brief.

We struggled with the pricing of our work and a lot of people said we were underselling our work and people wouldn't buy it if it appeared cheap from its price. We did act upon on this and raise the price slightly early on in the day which didn't seem to hinder our sales which was good. Overall we raised £97 as a stall and it was interesting to see peoples reactions to work and what sold. A very useful experience and I would now feel more confident in going to print fair and would be more prepared.

PPP: Involve Studio

I got linked to this on Facebook and therefore I thought i'd it give it ago and email them my portfolio.

I was pleasantly surprised to get a response off them:

After a few exchanges of emails I rang them up to speak to Vickki in person as I didn't really no much about the details of the internship and wether it would even be possible so not to waste anyones time.

I wrote down a few questions before hand so that I got all the information I wanted:

When?
How long?
Paid?
What it involves?

I had a very nice chat in which she responded to my questions. It usually is for 3 months and although they would have someone start now as summer isn't a very busy period they would also be looking for the future properly around August as September is when it gets really busy and they wouldn't have the time to mentor.

The internship is working and mentoring in the design team. It can lead to potential job position at the end of it. They pay for travel expenses but nothing else. They provide content and exercises for sessions/conferences for businesses to make it a more engaging experience than just a powerpoint presentation. For example they bind empty books which people would then fill during the conference as cascade tools. They recently did a festival which meant creating signage and lanyards. Also Ladbrookes did one recently which was casino themed so the exercises where all around the concept of casino games and they created playing cards and got green felt tables made. 

It isn't exactly the kind of work that I want to go into but it could be an interesting experience however the fact that it is in London for 3 months and unpaid pretty much makes it impossible for me to do. I was glad I rang and spoke to them about it before travelling to London for the chat as I'm now aware of the unpracticalities.