Many organizations are rebranding themselves every five years, and in some cases, more often. But what about employer brands? If you are not delivering interesting, engaging, and candidate and employee-focused messages, then chances are your employer brand is falling short.

1. white paper
Employer Brand: Rebrand or Refresh?
workforce
communications
Introduction
With the power and speed of digital communications,
rebranding has almost become a common event. Many
organizations are rebranding themselves every five years,
and in some cases, more often.
Why would an organization do this? To succeed in
today’s market, organizations must present a compelling
and relevant brand to connect with the people that
matter: their clients or customers and other critical
stakeholders. A brand that connects is one that is
interesting, engaging and focused on the attributes and
needs of the audience.
The unfortunate truth is that the interests and needs
of the audience continually change. Thus, many
organizations are rebranding or, at the very least,
refreshing their brands periodically to keep themselves
marketable to their audiences.
HR’s ad agency.
DavidGroup.com
The David Group Inc. All rights reserved. Ref 15 – 142
A LOOK INSIDE INTRODUCTION
EMPLOYER BRAND
REBRAND OR REFRESH?
EXAMPLES: WHEN TO REBRAND,
REFRESH OR TWEAK YOUR
EMPLOYER BRAND
CONCLUSION
DEFINITIONS
TWEAK?
REBRAND?
REFRESH?

2. HR’s ad agency. Page 2
DavidGroup.com
The David Group Inc. All rights reserved. Ref 15 – 142
Employer Brand
What does this mean for your employer
brand? The same principle applies.
If you are not delivering interesting,
engaging, and candidate and employee-
focused messages, then chances are
your employer brand is falling short.
Competition for talent is fierce. You can’t
afford to have an employer brand that
doesn’t connect with candidates and
employees.
If you find your organization’s
employment messaging isn’t as fresh
and compelling as it needs to be, then
the question becomes: do we need to
completely rebrand or just refresh our
employer brand? Well, it depends.
Rebrand or Refresh?
First, let’s just put it out there: very
few organizations need a full-blown
rebranding of their employer brand.
Some organizations can dramatically
improve their employer brand
performance by simply refreshing
particular employer brand elements.
Others can start with an initial tweak
and then scale up to an enterprise-
wide rebranding to accomplish their
goals. Finally, there are cases where an
employer brand refresh is needed.
Second, let’s acknowledge that
every organization is unique. Every
organization has its own culture, mission,
purpose and each is in its own distinct
place in terms of talent communications.
What is needed for you and your
employer brand isn’t the same as what’s
needed for your competitors’ employer
brands. Our intent here is to provide
broadly-painted scenarios of when you
might consider either fully rebranding,
refreshing or tweaking your employer
brand.
Examples of When
to Rebrand Your
Employer Brand
Since the process of rebranding an
employer brand is the most intensive of
the three, the reasons behind a decision
to rebrand are perhaps the most
dramatic. Here are a couple examples of
when a rebrand might be in order.
Poor Recruitment and Retention
Performance
Organizations that are experiencing
poor recruitment and retention
performance might need a full-blown
employer brand rebranding exercise.
The root cause of the poor performance
might be found in existing employer
brand messages that aren’t authentic
or true to the everyday experiences of
employees.
First, let’s just put
it out there: very
few organizations
need a full-blown
rebranding of their
employer brand.

3. HR’s ad agency.
DavidGroup.com
The David Group Inc. All rights reserved. Ref 15 – 142
You may not be connecting with
candidates (thus making it harder to
attract and close them) or you may
be losing talent too early because
the opportunity was not what they
expected. By rebranding your
employer brand, you’ll rediscover – and
communicate better – the employer
brand promise, employer brand
attributes and your employee value
proposition (EVP) that connects with
candidates and employees.
External Brand Alignment
As noted at the outset, many
organizations undergo corporate
external rebranding. This includes
new external brand messaging, new
logos and colors and new corporate
brand standards that are expressed in
new websites, social media sites and
collateral materials such as brochures,
posters, flyers, and other forms of
marketing communications.
The strongest employer brands are
aligned with their corporate,
or external, brand. If your organization
has undergone external rebranding, it is
essential that your employer brand be
aligned to the new branding. Otherwise,
you are potentially enabling confusion
and disconnection when a candidate
or employee sees the new branding
against the “old” brand that HR is
putting out.
Shifts in Strategic Mission and/or
Culture Change
Similar to external brand alignment,
strong employer brands are aligned to
and reinforce the organization’s culture
and strategic mission. Typically, an
organization that undergoes a culture
change and a shift in strategic direction
will end up with a dramatically different
talent landscape including new talent
requirements and new expectations
related to employee performance and
behavior. A new employer brand would
help current employees make the
transition, and communicate a new set
of attributes to attract a different type
of candidate.
The strongest
employer brands
are aligned with
their corporate,
or external, brand.
Page 3

4. HR’s ad agency.
If you are not
delivering
interesting,
engaging, and
candidate and
employee-focused
messages, then
chances are your
employer brand is
falling short.
DavidGroup.com
The David Group Inc. All rights reserved. Ref 15 – 142
Examples of When
to Refresh Your
Employer Brand
Targeted Talent Communications
Intervention
Refreshing the employer brand can help
an organization strategically address
a particular talent communications
problem or issue. For example, one
might decide its campus recruitment
program needs a targeted intervention
if the messages and materials are out
of date and aren’t connecting with the
fresh talent needed.
The process employed to refresh
campus recruitment materials might
include focus groups and student
surveys resulting in refreshed materials
that use the new insights but weaves
them into the existing employer brand
tapestry.
To Solve a Specific Talent Problem
An employer brand refresh may also be
required should an organization need to
confront a specific talent problem. One
instance we’ve seen relates to refreshing
on-boarding communications to reduce
short-term turnover. In this case, the
organization would consider refreshing
the branding elements found in both
recruitment promises and new hire
orientation. The targeted data gathering
would include pre-hire and post-hire
interviews and surveys as well as formal
exit interviews.
Change Management Initiatives
Initiatives that are designed to change
employee perceptions, beliefs and
behaviors—such as wellness or safety
programs, healthcare and retirement
benefit redesigns, training or leadership
development programs—can gain more
traction when accompanied by a
brand refresh.
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5. The key here is to look at the findings
of the change management initiative
to see if they align to employer brand
attributes and EVP. In this instance,
refreshing employer brand elements
to align to the change management
outcomes strengthens both the
initiative and the employer brand.
Examples of When
to Tweak Your Employer
Brand
Simple Instances of Miscommunication
We all have instances when our
communications just aren’t hitting the
right chords. In talent communications
this may happen anywhere from
recruitment ads to exit interviews
and all points in between. With the
growing use of social media and mobile
communications, there are more
opportunities to inadvertently send the
wrong message than ever before.
If this happens, it’s smart to tweak your
employer brand to improve reception.
This is best accomplished by leveraging
the talents of your HR communications
professionals so that there is minimal
disruption to your on-going employer
brand communications.
A Need for Something Different
There are times when we just need to
see or experience something different.
In today’s fast paced communications
world, it’s almost become second
nature to “try” new approaches to
satisfy this need. While making minor
changes to brand messages or delivery
may make some a little uncomfortable,
others see it as an opportunity to
improve the way your brand connects.
HR’s ad agency.
DavidGroup.com
The David Group Inc. All rights reserved. Ref 15 – 142
The David Group is HR’s ad agency. We are experts in recruitment, retention
and workforce communications focused on helping employers find, attract,
engage and retain talent. Our promise: an unrelenting focus on improving
talent acquisition, talent communications and candidate quality.
Conclusion
Every organization is different. Whether your employer brand needs to be tweaked,
refreshed or rebranded depends on your distinct set of circumstances. The need,
however, to continually think about, monitor and improve your employer brand is
something that we all need to consider.
TWEAK?
REBRAND?
REFRESH?
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6. HR’s ad agency.
Defining Rebranding, Refreshing and Tweaking
It might be helpful for us to define what we mean when referring to employer brand
rebranding, refreshing and tweaking.
Rebranding
When we talk about rebranding, we are talking about a comprehensive overhaul
of an employer brand. This is a process that includes a full examination of an
organization’s employer brand promise, attributes and “HR selling” statements.
It also includes updating (or in some cases creating) an employee value
proposition (EVP). We call this Discovery. Specific tasks used in Discovery
might consist of focus groups, employee engagement surveys, executive and
stakeholder interviews, communication audits and so forth. It’s a full-court press
to determine an organization’s authentic work experience from the employees’
perspective.
Rebranding also includes creating and executing a comprehensive, enterprise-
wide employer brand communications strategy and plan. Often this means a total
reworking of how the organization talks about itself as a place to work; new and
updated visual and creative elements used in such applications as recruitment
advertising, on-boarding materials, employee communications, social media
pages and the like; and the introduction of new marketing and communications
tactics and strategies. This covers what we would consider the Invent and Deliver
phases of rebranding an employer brand.
Refreshing
Perhaps the best way to conceptualize an employer brand refresh is to think about
it as an employer brand rebrand-light. There is still a need for a certain level of
examination but it’s not as deep as a full rebranding.
Organizations that choose to undertake a brand refresh are typically those that
believe there is a sufficient need to have a thought-out, organized and evidence-
based refreshing of key employer brand elements. We see an employer brand
refresh in the context of identifying an issue that needs to be corrected, devoting
a limited amount of time and resources to understanding the underlying factors
and then setting forth a corrective course of action. That correction would be well
within the existing employer brand statements and guidelines.
Tweaking
Simply put, employer brand tweaking is just improving an organization’s employer
brand by making fine adjustments to existing brand elements. Maybe you’ve
received feedback that candidates don’t really “get” your recruitment ads and
you’ve decided to make them more straightforward. Or, that the training and
learning initiative that you launched lacks the punch to engage and attract
employees. We see tweaking as the process of making an employer brand
better based mostly on observation and gut-feel.
DavidGroup.com
The David Group Inc. All rights reserved. Ref 15 – 142
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