HiBob

Creating an EVP that communicates HiBob's culture and position as an attractive employer for talent in the technology sector.

Background

HiBob was founded to modernize HR tech. HiBob’s intuitive and data-driven platform, bob, is built for the way people work today: globally, remotely, and collaboratively.

Since its launch in late 2015, HiBob has achieved consecutive triple-digit year-over-year growth, and become the HRIS of choice for more than 3000 modern, midsize and multinational companies who understand that a powerful, agile HR tech suite is mission critical and a key driver of organizational success.

Fast-growing companies across the globe such as Monzo, Happy Socks, Gong, Fiverr, and VaynerMedia rely on bob to help HR and managers connect, engage, develop, and retain top talent.

The Challenge

A surge in growth in the tech sector hasn’t been easy to keep up with. It’s made sourcing talent increasingly complex for companies like HiBob. While dealing with the challenge of balancing experience with expertise, HiBob faces three equally unique obstacles when searching for the best talent.

First, Bobbers have created a unique culture, one that new employees must match to add to and continue the brand’s success. Second, HiBob’s growth in new markets is reliant on talent sourced for local offices, a feat that’s proven challenging for any startup. Third, people only knew HiBob’s corporate brand, one not designed to communicate how relatable and human the HRIS provider is to prospective employees.

Goals

Retain talent
Create buzz about the brand
Delivery a new EVP guide with graphics and messaging that position HiBob as an attractive and progressive company to work for
Identify and communicate HiBob’s values clearly
Align web content, including the careers portal, job descriptions, recruitment emails, and social media advocacy posts with HiBob’s values

The Process

Develop a Project Plan

Creating HiBob’s EVP involved managing several complex and integral parts of the brand. To simplify the process, we designed a project plan that leveraged the most critical elements of HiBob’s employee experience. We began by unpacking policies and understanding the voice of its people and how they identified HiBob’s culture. Our project plan also involved identifying key stakeholders across the globe that would be instrumental in communicating HiBob’s vision and mission, and methodically tracking all progress towards project milestones.

Identifying the Right Inspired Marketing Talent to Contribute the Project

Our unique approach to project execution involves using what we affectionately refer to as the ‘expertise accordion’. We leverage the best talent, forming agile teams of experienced specialists that come together to deliver the perfect balance of skills and experience. These teams can easily be disbanded as soon as project outcomes are met.

For HiBob, we immediately created a team of branding specialists, copy and content writers, graphics designers, and an account manager to oversee it all.

Uncovering What Makes Bobbers Unique

HiBob’s culture, like that of many established brands, is a product of its people. It’s developed through interactions at all levels. We began to understand HiBob’s culture by engaging with teams from across the globe. Through guided roundtable discussions we explored team dynamics, interpersonal communication styles, policies, and more, and were able to quickly understand what makes HiBob a great place to work.

‘Be You’ is Born

As the workforce transforms, introducing younger job seekers from different backgrounds, culture in many organizations has been challenged. Today, a typical staff complement is diverse. They include boomers, millennials, and GenZs. And while critical, concepts like diversity, equality, and inclusion are, unfortunately, only buzzwords in many settings.

What makes HiBob different is that its people are diverse and they practice these and other important qualities that make being a part of HiBob such a rewarding experience. We zeroed-in on these qualities, developing a concept that promotes the stuff that makes everyone unique.

The product was the ‘Be You’ concept. It became the foundation and fuel for all EVP content and includes well-thought-out taglines paired with images that communicate how diverse and inclusive HiBob is. We presented ‘Be You’ to HiBob’s stakeholders, and they instantly fell in love with it.

“Getting to know our champion Bobbers all over the world, understanding what is really important to them, getting to know the culture of the bobber, and what characterizes it….they and only they built our concept of ‘Be You’. If you really feel that when you come to work, you can be the most you in the world…no masks, no hiding, you’ve probably come to the right place,” says Cohav Nir, people and culture director at HiBob.

Aligning HiBob’s EVP and Values

Communicating values a brand exudes isn’t always easy. Most businesses are not able to place a finger on the specific elements that translate into experiences which define what make them stand out in a crowded market.

As a startup in a highly competitive market, we found that HiBob didn’t struggle with this problem. Through roundtable discussions, Inspired Marketing and HiBob identified six core values that not only aligned with the brand, but also with the heart of its people and the position HiBob occupies as a fast-growing company.

We helped HiBob articulate each value, connecting them to intrinsic human needs, making them feel more personal and inspiring a sense of ownership for Bobbers and potential Bobbers.

The Results: Re-introducing HiBob to the world

With HiBob’s new EVP ready, our content team produced content to promote it and new positions the startup was looking to fill. We redeveloped messaging on HiBob’s Life and Product and Engineering pages, including the new ‘Be You’ concept to communicate what the HRIS brand stands for.

Employee Advocacy Gets a Boost

HiBob learned early on that referrals help find more people that fit HiBob’s culture. As part of HiBob’s drive to attract the right talent, a new employee referral program was created along with a cash incentive for successful referrals. To help spread the word about open positions, we produced a variety of well-crafted social posts that employees could share with their networks. Posts communicated which positions were open and that becoming a Bobber was the opportunity to work for an employer that wants people to be all of themselves at work.

EVP-related content created greater interest in HiBob, doubling the number of visits to the career page.

Advocacy posts also doubled, with more Bobbers sharing EVP-crafted content about the brand and new positions Hibob was hiring for.

New look & feel on all channels:

Website:

LinkedIn:

Twitter:

Job Posts - Organic & Sponsored

"We love working with Inspired Marketing because of the way they get stuff done. Their breadth of talent and experience is always the perfect complement. Launching an EVP is never an easy task. There are many moving parts, but we’re happy to have partnered with Inspired Marketing on this project."

Cohav Nir People and Culture Operations Director at HiBob

HiBob

Background

The Challenge

Goals