It’s happened. Your startup has just been funded. Perhaps your business is set to grow quickly. Now you need to go from a business visionary to an employer, letting new people into your world.
When you begin the hiring process, you’ll be competing with a mass of other businesses sourcing from the same talent pool.
How do you stand out? Here are some ideas:
Get social
Promoting your workplace is a marketing exercise. Think about perks that will grab people’s attention. A web hosting company called UKFast has a steam room, a creche and a ski chalet-style “chill-out” lounge where employees can recuperate.
Another fun example is the Electric Works office complex in Sheffield – a hub for digital and creative businesses – where workers can take turns on a three storey helter skelter.
These quirky benefits could quite easily be tweeted about in a compelling way, or be spread by word-of-mouth.
It’s important to define your target employee, just as you would define your target customer. If, for example, you offer interesting technical challenges and you want to target developers, consider open sourcing your projects and inviting developers to help you solve specific problems. Members of the developer community work on these sorts of project for fun, so it’s a good way of bringing your company to their attention.
Once engaged in your business’s challenges, they could turn into star employees.
Be authentic
Do you have a unique story to share? What’s really important to you? Why should people invest their talents in your business?
Promote a clear message across your marketing materials, social media accounts and press releases, as well as when you interact with potential candidates.
Clarify the deal
What’s the deal when working for you? What unique experiences will you offer employees and what do you expect in return? Spell it out. Like many forward-thinking companies today, Geckoboard, a tech startup in London, offers flexible work hours. The company doesn’t clock watch, but in turn it expects staff to maintain high standards.
These days, employees care about benefits beyond their working life – startups are addressing this in canny ways. For example, 18 Feet & Rising offers an eight week mindfulness training camp to its staff. This signals a commitment to helping staff develop and fulfil their potential.
Driven by values
Spell out the values that are important to your business and the values you look for in the people you hire. Appear Here, a startup that helps entrepreneurs source pop-up locations, gives a clear company mantra as soon as you land on the careers section of its website. It reads: “We don’t do politics, we don’t do excuses and we don’t hide the truth. We care about our work and trust each other to say how it is - even when it’s painful.”
Benefits people care about
Think about inexpensive ways you could reward staff. Songkick, a music startup, offers monthly concert ticket allowances, a fridge full of food and a vintage espresso machine to its staff.
You don’t need to break the bank in order to stand out as a great place to work. The key thing is to ensure you are targeting the right candidates and offering them the things they actually care about.
Natashia Variava is an HR specialist and founder of The People Team.
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