What are they buying? 💵🪙💳
And what are you selling them?
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When someone is buying a Ferrari, what are they buying?
A car? A fast car? An expensive fast car? A car built by an F1 company? A gorgeous car? A car with Italian heritage? A car that specific shade of red?
While Ferrari makes cars, that’s not what they sell.
What Ferrari actually sells is the feeling that people see you, that they are impressed, that they are jealous. They sell attention. They sell smugness. They sell (perceived) sex appeal. They sell satisfaction.
Not cars.
Cars have four wheels and are designed to get you from place to place. A Ferrari might be worth the price even if you never back it out of the driveway (provided people can see it from the street).
So what does this have to do with recruiting and hiring?
Because you think you’re “selling” jobs.
You’re not.
Not by a long shot.
One of the biggest challenges businesses face is that they don’t REALLY understand what they are selling. Are they selling a website tool, or a tool that lets people feel they they truly own their career site (rather than leasing it from an agency)? Are they selling an easy way to make cake, or the feeling that even you (with your minimal time and lack of baking skills, perhaps) can “bake” a cake? Are they selling low-cost furniture, or furniture appreciate because they put it together themselves?
Coke knows what they are selling: Happiness. Hence we have commercials with Santa, polar bears, and first dates. You will never see a Coke commercial that says, “I’m sorry you got dumped. Have a Coke and you’ll feel better…” Why? It’s not about happiness.
Nike sells the idea that anyone (even me! even you!) has an athlete inside them waiting to be let out. That’s why their commercials are really about empowerment: from women’s soccer to Kaepernick, they sell the idea that you can be who you want.
This is the heart of branding: What are you really selling?
So look at your jobs. Is it clear that you’re selling something more than the ability to pay rent/mortgage?
Before you answer that, I need to clarify something. I’m not specifically talking about your company’s mission.
I know when I talk about the big ideas of branding, lots of people think that means they need to double down on their company’s mission, that that is what you’re selling.
And that’s probably only true about 5-10% of the time.
Most companies do not have missions worth getting out of bed for. For every SpaceX and OpenAI, there are dozens of companies offering reasonable prices on plumbing fixtures or resolving accounting issues. Not exactly a flag most people would salute.
So if you can’t lean on your mission (sorry: making a stable telecom network people can rely on does NOT count as a strong mission to anyone but your shareholders), you need to figure out what you are selling.
That starts by understanding what everyone else sells and how you fit in the bigger picture.
If there were no Hondas, Fords, Toyotas, or GM cars, and the world of cars was comprised solely of McLarens, Bugattis and Rolls-Royces, then Ferrari wouldn’t be able to sell smugness and attention. They’d be the reasonably-priced option.
Your context determines what you’re really selling.
So are you selling a law job? Or are you selling the chance to be in the friendly law practice?
Are you selling a nursing job, or are you selling camaraderie and an organization that wants to hear what you have to say?
Are you selling a project manager job, or are you selling the chance to be “the voice driving things forward?”
That’s why saying “We’re hiring!” puts you in a position of trying to sell a car in a world of people selling satisfaction, smugness and attention. No wonder that ad doesn’t do much.
What are you really selling?
Answer that, and you’ll find that your recruiting work might get a bit easier.
🎏 You become what you measure »
🎏 The Cost of Ignoring Talent Strategy: A CFO and COO’s Wake-Up Call »
🎏 Is your organization biased toward yesterday or tomorrow? »
🎏 I used to be an employer brand enthusiast »
🎏 The new rules of influence »
🎏 Micro-influencer or mega star: What should you be investing in? »
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