So I noticed a blog over on Head2Head’s RecruitSmart site about what looks like a great recruiting video which also functions as a good little branding piece:
Now, I agree that it’s a great little video – having done a lot of work in recruitment marketing over the years, including the odd video, I know that videos like this can be great for the brand, great for attracting potential employees, great for building employee morale (“Look at the cool stuff we do!”) and can become a great calling card when talking to clients about how you (and the people who work for you) really are different and better.
However.
StepChange then goes on to explain their video with what looks to be a media release:
“Every major industry’s saddled with stereotypes: lawyers are heartless, bankers are money-hungry and clowns are downright terrifying. So it’s no surprise the advertising world is just as riddled with clichés and hackneyed typecasting…except of course that with every stereotype comes an element of truth. That’s the thinking behind the cheeky recruitment drive of growing start-up consultancy firm ‘Step Change Marketing’ and their ‘Wankers That Don’t Work Here’ campaign…”[that’s just the first of several paragraphs explaining why they did the video and how ‘edgy’ it is].
This is where they lose points.
First of all, the target audience for this video (i.e. people who work in advertising) already knows all about these stereotypes and clichés – they don’t need them explained.
Second of all, an explanation like this is sort of like someone telling you a joke, hearing you laugh, and then saying, “But, see, the frog put the hat on – get it? And then the duck took it off again! Did you get it?
The best work speaks for itself – it doesn’t need defending or explaining, and if there are a handful of people who don’t ‘get it’, well, they weren’t the target anyway, were they?