In recent years, we have seen a shift in employees’ expectations around employee benefits. GWI data states that over 50% of Brits now expect benefits/rewards from employers, a 20% increase from the previous year. Recent data has also revealed that 91% of UK businesses are facing significant challenges with both recruiting and retaining employees. This has led to significant growth for the employee benefits industry which has an increasingly important role to play helping businesses attract and keep talent.
The increased demand for this sector has also led to heightened competition. This means that organisations operating in the space must work harder than ever to successfully market their unique value proposition and clarity of messaging is key. It can be tempting to focus on buzzwords and marketing jargon. Instead, firms should prioritise developing insightful and practical content that provides solutions to problems and consequently builds trust.
Here are some ways businesses can overcome this challenge and stand out from competitors through better employee benefits marketing.
Building trust through advice-led content
A recent report published in The Guardian revealed that UK work absences have hit a 10-year high, with stress being one of the biggest contributors. Naturally, staff absences will present challenges for employers, but it is crucial that any business commenting in this discussion does not lose sight of the difficulties facing the employees themselves.
For organisations that either specialise in workplace wellbeing or have qualified experts internally, news stories like these present an opportunity to share advice and tips with an audience of both employees and employer audiences on how to navigate these issues. It is important to remain mindful within these communications and focus on sharing relevant insights and best practice, rather than promoting your platform or business.
Promoting thought leadership on trends
Within a highly competitive market, trust is one of the key foundations for success. Thought leadership can be a successful tool to build trust with prospects and potential partners. Particularly when shared via the conduit of highly respected and credible national or trade media outlets. There is a vast array of content being distributed daily by firms in the sector so an effective way for firms to stand out and truly establish themselves as leading authorities is through sharing proprietary research and data-led stories.
An example of this is a study conducted by Reward Gateway that was published in HR Director. Rather than supporting its services, the data provided evidence around the emerging trend of disconnect and loneliness in the workplace. In addition to this data, the Chief People Officer at Reward Gateway provided commentary on what workplaces can be doing to overcome this obstacle. This is an effective employee benefits marketing strategy as it is data-led. Here Reward Gateway has positioned itself as a leader in the workplace wellbeing sector through relevant insights on emerging trends and best practices through supportive data.
Building credibility through LinkedIn
LinkedIn has long been a hub for business leaders to enter corporate discourse in a meaningful way, but its shift to mainstream social media platform means that there are huge audiences and communities to engage and influence. Just as there would be on the likes of Instagram and X. Audiences primarily browse LinkedIn with a professional mindset. By staying close to the thoughts of business leaders and their mission, users are better positioned to feel an affinity with them.
Alongside profile slots in national and trade media outlets, LinkedIn can be just as powerful when it comes to longer-form communication. It can be a place where founders and C-suite executives can present themselves as sector leaders, imparting their opinions, commentary, and key company messages. Either through their own personal profiles or via company pages, which can in turn deliver significant benefits for the wider business.
Company pages, too, can do their part to amplify the employee benefits marketing strategy. LinkedIn as a platform supports an array of post formats and asset types in which to distil key messaging. Video is just as impactful on the platform. It is on the more consumer-orientated channels, but what sets LinkedIn apart are the more bespoke features. Other types of content can be document sharing through PPT and PDF formats. This can be sharing credentials, brochures and programmes natively on the platform. One benefit of this is removing the hurdle of persuading users to click away from LinkedIn. It also ticks a big box for LinkedIn as well in the form of user-retention. Which will reward you with greater content visibility.
Driving traffic through SEO
According to SEMrush, searches around ‘employee benefits’ have risen by 24% since December last year. This is motivated by the rising demand for the sector. And this heightened search volume presents a significant growth opportunity for the sector.
Ranking highly for keywords in Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) has massive potential for providers. To do this, businesses must focus on keywords, content marketing and technical SEO. These are key components of an effective employee benefits marketing strategy.
Keywords are one of the most important elements of Search Engine Optimisation (SEO). They help you understand what users are searching for and the strategy you need to provide to meet their needs. This feeds into both the technical SEO and content strategy.
Technical SEO refers to the behind-the-scenes elements that power your organic growth engine. With 68% of online experiences beginning with a search engine, it’s an essential building block of any successful website. As it is complex with the factors contributing to it, we have written a blog discussing the importance of it more in-depth along with the elements to consider.
Content is an important part of SEO because it’s a way to reach and engage audiences if done correctly. It’s vital to know your angle and create content that fits. This content should be educational, relevant, and shareable. A great example of this is a whitepaper published by Headspace about employee mental health, a current challenge facing businesses. Other types of content can be videos, blogs, how-to guides and infographics. What’s important is that it is quality content and posted consistently with target keywords. As this will boost organic search rankings.
Effective PR, social media and digital can support employee benefits firms with realising brand and commercial objectives. Get in touch to see how our experts can help your business today.
