If you haven’t seen these TV commercials for GE (they also have a ton of radio ads in the same genre) you’re missing out on one of the best employment branding campaigns that have come out in years! “What’s the matter with Owen?” is the series and they’re very funny!
The ads show that GE knows who they are and what the perception is about them in the technology industry. They also know, like many other giant established primarily manufacturing companies (see Big 3 Autos, Boeing, Lockheed, General Dynamics, etc.), that they need engineering and IT talent, just as bad as those companies in Silicon Valley.
Here are a couple of the ads:
We talk constantly about how important employment branding is to organizations to attract talent. We also say that small companies have an advantage in employment branding because they can be more creative. I think GE just gave big orgs a roadmap to how they can flip the script when it comes to be creative and having fun with their employment branding!
Want to have a better understanding at how bad the labor market, truly, is for STEM talent? GE, one of the most established brands in the world for decades and one of the most conservative with their branding, is making fun of itself and it’s perceived culture! I can’t even explain at what a huge shift this is within the industry!
I am glad to see the intersection of consumer and employer brand. I’d love to know more: how the ads came about — was it their EB team and/or consumer marketing team? Was it workforce research that led to this or just an agency’s creative idea? I personally don’t love the creative but I am not their target demographic so that doesn’t matter 🙂
The only caution I have is that marketing works with HR when we do co-branding like this because each can learn so much from the other.
yup