Personalization: The Marketing Mantra Which Needs to be Co-opted by HR

Authored by Debkanya Dhar VP Marketing, Tydy

The coronavirus pandemic delivered much more than just a contagious disease. A substantial portion of the global workforce saw severe shifts on a never-before-seen scale. Workplaces needed to rethink how they worked, where they worked, and how they used technology. Companies were forced to opt for remote working without a specific deadline as to when things will go back to normal. A lot has changed since the pandemic began, and some changes are here to stay permanently. Virtual onboarding and digital employee experience (EX) are some of the big changes that will affect the way we work, probably forever.

Digital transformation within HR was not as much of a priority before the pandemic. While companies have had an eye on the digitization of recruitment and onboarding processes for some time now, 2020 was the catalyst that spurred them to action. Before the pandemic, there was a slow but rising demand for digital solutions for query resolution, attendance, payroll management, onboarding, and offboarding. But once people realized that Covid-19 was here to stay, we witnessed a 200% month-on-month growth in digital onboarding numbers alone.

Human Resource teams are heavily relying on intelligent process automation and data analytics to manage their people processes. Presently, no business can recruit top talent without the help of technology. With the consumer experience reaching new levels of personalization and digitization, HR processes and methodologies to attract and hire the best talent are evolving too.

Marketing to Candidates

Today, HR teams need to have a knack for both technology and marketing. Rapid digital transformation has added additional responsibilities and required skills for HR professionals. They just have to look beyond the traditional ways of attracting and retaining talent.

During the hiring stage, the biggest challenge facing companies is being able to convert prospective candidates into employees. A company's offer drop rate depends almost entirely on HRs ability to match their requirement to the candidate's expectations. A high offer-to-acceptance ratio can be achieved through a combination of competitive offers, effective communication, and good candidate experience.

This is when digitization and automation start coming in handy - from using data analytics to assess potential candidates, segmenting them based on specific criteria, designing a personalized experience based on this segmentation, and using automation to create workflows.

Marketing methods can transform employee-enterprise relationships in the same way they built customer-enterprise relationships. Just like businesses reach and speak directly to their customers online, HR must use similar methods of customizing content for specific target groups.

So right from employee value proposition (what's in it for the candidate - financial, professional growth, etc.) to what the company stands for (purpose, vision, values), HR should ideally be able to personalize communications campaigns based on the individual candidate's preferences and interests. This is especially important when speaking to Millennials and GenZ that are looking to work for more than just a paycheck at the end of the month. Companies that have digital recruitment strategies in place have a significant edge in the labor market. And those who do not have to adapt quickly to survive the disruption.

Personalized Onboarding

Digitally onboarding new employees is the only way companies can ensure business continuity through the pandemic. Not only is it the safest way, but it is also the most efficient and effective way of rolling out a standardized onboarding experience for a remote workforce.

Today, thanks to technology we can connect with our employees no matter where they are in the world. The practicalities of new hire onboarding such as background checks, compliance, documentation, etc. can be taken care of through automation and digitalization. Manual work and coordination between multiple departments, vendors, HRBPs are all part of automated workflows.

Again, through segmentation and targeted communication, every hire can experience their new company in a standardized yet unique way. This includes receiving information about company benefits that are most relevant to him or her, e.g., highlighting daycare facilities for young parents or sharing information about Flexi hours for caregivers. A customized and personalized onboarding journey has been proven to ensure higher productivity, motivation, and happiness. We know this for a fact, having seen an 80% increase in employee engagement after the deployment of a personalized and digitized onboarding process.

HR in the post-Covid era

As businesses bounce back, and the demand for quality talent grows, personalization at every level of the employee experience will be the one thing that will help an employer stand out amongst its competitors. To do this, they need to make use of marketing know-how and tactics to up their game.

HR teams, especially in large enterprises, must quickly find and adopt solutions that bring IT and marketing tools onto one single platform. They need access to an easy-to-use, low code platform with a single dashboard that will integrate different data points, bring together collaborators, and provide intelligent insights that will help them make the right decisions at the right time.

Just as digital skills are no longer a nice-to-have across industries and job roles, HR is one role that has had to go digital faster than most. With amazing new technology and solutions available, and with everything we know now about the importance of EX, it's up to companies to adapt and adopt new ways of thinking not just to survive, but also to thrive.