Home : Newsletters : 2002 : October
The National Air Traffic Control Services (NATS) recently apologised unreservedly to all their staff for a sexist recruitment advertisement that appeared in ‘Loaded’ magazine. The advertisement featured two men leering at an unseen object under the headline “Bird Watching”. The premise of the advertisement was that the two lads could be watching a very big bird, possibly a Jumbo Jet, if they worked for NATS and that this would be as much fun as the bird they were currently watching. The ad ran in the classified section of the magazine, where NATS appeared next to companies offering cannabis seeds and sex services.
NATS were right to apologise, the content of the ad was potentially offensive. However, the effort they made to effectively target candidates of a particular demographic should be applauded. NATS had clearly identified a specific type of candidate they wanted to target. They also selected the media they thought would achieve the best penetration within this audience and had even tailored their message to maximise the effectiveness of their advertisement.
Recruitment advertising can often be perceived as dull and the creative used unimaginative. Too often print based recruitment advertisements rely on a classic ‘four-paragraph’ formula. Paragraph one provides background information about the employer; “we are a successful multinational company offering…” Paragraph two focuses on the department within which there is a vacancy; “Our marketing department is responsible for…”. Paragraph three details the actual vacancy; “We require a marketing manager who…” while paragraph four merrily completes the exercise by describing the characteristics of the desired recruit; “the successful candidate will…” It is well worth looking through the pages of the Guardian or Sunday Times and adding up the number of advertisements that follow this format.
The internet offers recruitment advertisers the chance to be more creative. Unfortunately recruitment advertisers too often ignore the flexibility and technology offered by the internet. That’s not to say that every site needs to offer flash animations and video clips, but where there is a case for their use then they should be used.
An excellent example of creative thinking and execution can be found at the BAE systems recruitment site http://www.jobsatbaesystems.co.uk/air/main.htm
The site uses animation and music in order to engage potential candidates. There’s no doubt that the site will no be to everyone’s taste, however the creativity should be admired. The need for differentiating online offerings will increase over time in the same way that colour print based advertising developed from the original lineage based recruitment advertisements. If recruitment advertisers do not take advantage of opportunities offered by new technology then recruitment industry runs the risk of not fully enjoying the benefits of the internet.
The internet also offers recruiters the chance to target key audiences in much the same way NATS attempted to target a young male audience through their ad in Loaded. Ad serving software can allow banners to be served to different audiences at different times and to different extents – and this technology should be taken advantage of in order to increase the efficiency of advertising spend.
NATS may not have got it right, but at least they tried to stand out from the average print based recruitment advertisement. In order to be successful online recruitment advertisers will increasingly need to attempt to stand out from the average online recruitment execution, whether it is a corporate site, a banner or even a job listing.