You may have heard, or even used, the term " employer brand " without being absolutely sure what it means, or how it differs from the concept of "Talent Brand ".

If so (this will remain between us), let me clear things up for you!

Today we can define the employer-branding as the attractiveness of a company aiming to foster the talent acquisition or in other words external employer image.  

The most common definition of Talent Brand comes from LinkedIn:

" Your Talent Brand is the social media-oriented, fully public version of your employer brand. It incorporates what talent thinks, feels and shares about your company as a working organization. " - what we can refer to as the internal employer image.

How to make your employer brand and Talent Brand consistent

The limits of employer brand communication

Your employer branding strategy encompasses everything you put in place to build your image and communicate a specific message about your organization - including relying on effective storytelling.

However, despite very laudable intentions, it is possible (see common) to develop a vision of your company that is completely out of sync with the reality of the employee experience.

When it comes to talent acquisition and employee retention, trying to develop an employer brand next to reality, without authenticity, can cost you dearly, both in the short and long term.

It is possible, with the right strategy, to have control over your employer brand, but what about your Talent Brand ?

A Talent Brand to Monitor 

To put it simply, your Talent Brand is the employee experience told by employees (implied: not by you).

While you can build and refine your employer brand, your Talent Brand comes directly from the people who know your company intimately. It comes so first and foremost from your employees - but also from your former applicants, interns, former employees, etc.

How do you ensure that your idea of your employer brand aligns with the reality of what your employees are saying 

In effect, your Talent Brand is not what you say on your career site, but rather everything that is said about you: posts on social networks, reviews on review sites like Glassdoor, conversations with a personal network, recommendations (or warnings !), etc.

On Indeed, for example, you can see what is being said about your company  culture, management, compensation, stability, growth opportunities, etc.

This feedback from employees allows you to self-assess and ensure that your employer brand accurately reflects the employee experience.

This Canadian company, for example, has major Talent Brand concerns - judging by an overall score of 1.4. No doubt it has some difficulty attracting candidates!

An example of a very harsh assessment on Indeed

There are many other sources for your Talent Brand such as Advantage-Enterprise.

Know how to identify the ones where you are being talked about to find out where you stand.

A necessary alignment between employer brand and Talent Brand 

Employer Brandand Talent Brand are more valuable when combined. Both give you an overall, holistic view of your reputation.

Employer Brand and Talent Brand are more valuable when they are consistent

If the example of a company working intensely on its employer brand but having poor "feedback" from employees is common, be aware that there are many cases where the situation is reversed: talents speak positively about a company that does nothing to exploit this gold mine!" 

For the latter, working on employer branding, or, for targeted profiles, implementing an Inbound Recruiting strategy, can bring a lot.