Zappos, the online shoe and clothing shop, recently made waves in the recruitment world by announcing that they’re not going to post job ads anymore. According to Zappos, they don’t need to advertise positions because they already have a pipeline of talent sitting on their doorstep.

From now on, Zappos plan to use strategic talent acquisition as opposed to direct recruiting in order to hire their new employees; Essentially a mixture of employee referrals, talent communities and the old-style method of relationship-based recruiting.

For many the move begged the question of how? In an era where it’s increasingly difficult to source and hire talent, how is it possible that a large retail firm can give up one of the most classic methods of recruitment?

The answer is, of course, employer branding.

Whereas for many companies employer branding is merely a section of the overall recruitment strategy, Zappos pushed it to the limit and made branding their priority. In the USA, Zappos is now almost synonymous with ‘an employer of choice’.

The Start of a New Wave of Recruitment?

Does this mean that everyone can drop job ads and follow suit? Unfortunately not. As well as placing great emphasis on employer branding, Zappos is also an online business that mainly requires (relatively easy-to-find) customer service and call centre employees.

Therefore, in comparison to other firms of similar scale, Zappos has the advantage of a naturally larger pool of candidates. For them, job ads merely served as a hindrance to an already overloaded hiring system and a more than healthy supply of candidates.

Hence, why Zappos were able to say goodbye to job ads and perhaps also part of the reason why. After all, the announcement that they no longer need to advertise for new employees has undoubtedly given their reputation an impressive boost.

Takeaways

So what can other employer take away from this? Well, first of all there’s no need to fear that job ads are going out of fashion, statistically job boards and career pages are still the number one place for today’s job seekers to search for work.

However, employer branding is becoming more and more vital. A reported 56% of job seekers recently ranked talent brand as the main deciding factor when choosing an employer, and 83% of today’s employers agree that employer branding significantly impacts their ability to hire.

So, if your employer branding strategy has been put on the back burner recently it’s time to give it a well needed polish. Take a look at our recent article Employer Branding Statistics That you Need to Know and feel free to comment below with your thoughts on Zappos’ controversial move.

Image reference: Flickr Iconic Photo Service