Employer branding through crowdsourcing: understanding the sentiments of employees

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore the role of social media in creating an attractive employer brand for any organization. It investigates one of the social media Glassdoor, which is an online employer branding platform, where employees put their reviews which are both positive and negative. Analysis of these reviews can generate a lot of insights into employer branding. Design/methodology/approach The data was collected as 1,243 reviews from Glassdoor, an online crowdsourced employer branding platform for 40 top-rated employers across four different sectors, namely, Pharma, IT, retail and FMCG. Text and sentimental analyses were done using SAS visual analytical for these reviews. Findings Ten themes were generated from the text analytics which is nothing but the employer value propositions (EVPs), and they were social, interest, development and economic value as given by Berthon et al. (2005) and also others, such as work–life, management and brand value emerged. Social value came as a significant EVP followed by interest value and work–life values. Research limitations/implications This research is providing only ways to show that crowdsourced data can also be used to understand the mindset of employees regarding an employer’s image but is not providing any idea regarding how to generate the right employee value proposition. Originality/value The research has shown that employers can use crowdsourced employer branding insights to see where they stand in the employer's attractiveness spectrum. They can use innovative data analytics techniques, such as visualization for text and sentimental analysis to create employer branding intelligence strategies.

Employer Ratings through Crowdsourcing on Social Media: An Examination of U.S. Fortune 500 Companies

“…According to marketing research, positive e-WOM generates a positive attitude and recommendation for purchase, whereas negative e-WOM has the opposite effect [33]. Empirical human resources (HR) studies also found that employee experience leads to both positive and negative e-WOM [3], and positive (negative) e-WOM leads (or not) to recommendations of employers as employers of choice [8]. Glassdoor provides different employer rating scales and invites participants to paint a whole picture of what it is like to work for an employer [34], and these scales represent different EVP promises fulfilled by an employer, including overall rating, culture and values, work-life balance, senior management, compensation and benefits, and career opportunity based on a five-point (star) scale.…”

“…To better understand an employer brand, conducting text mining from crowdsourced data on social media, such as Glassdoor, would be a good way, beyond quantitative ratings [3], which is called employer brand intelligence [13]. Even having higher employer ratings on Glassdoor, conducting text mining from posted comments (pros and cons) can identify important insights regarding whether employees are satisfied or dissatisfied.…”

“…Employer branding is "the functional, economic, and psychological benefits that are provided by employment and identified with the employing company" [1], and currently, the benefits are also called employee value proposition (EVP) [2], which enables an employer to differentiate and promote itself from the other competitors to potential and current employees [3]. Effective employer branding can reduce talent acquisition costs, improve labor relationships, and increase employees' engagement with employers [4].…”

“…As the popularity of social media enables users to create and share content through virtual networks or communities [14], an increasing number of internal employees are anonymously sharing their experience (including satisfactory and dissatisfactory employment stories) online, and an increasing number of external job candidates read these stories and understand prospective employers before applying for jobs or accepting job offers [3,13]. Dabirian et al [13] adopted revised "crowdsourcing"-use of large groups of individuals towards the completion of a specific task [15]-and defined this type of social media as a crowdsourced employer branding platform that enables job applicants to transparently research employer brands according to anonymous ratings and comments from their internal employees, which are perceived to be more credible information sources without self-interest in promoting employers [16], such as Glassdoor [8].…”

Research on impact of employer brand dimensions on competitiveness in hotel industry

“…Kucherov and Zavyalova (2012) conclude, based on the research results, on significant differences in economic indicators, HRD practices and talent management in companies with a built-in employer brand and companies that do not have this type of asset developed. Kashive, Khanna and Bharthi (2020) conclude that social value is important for the employer brand value assumptions and interest value and work-life value. Maurya and Agarwal (2018) found that organizational talent management is strongly and positively related to the perception of employer branding.…”