Most mid-sized employers do not have a marketing team that can produce a steady stream of recruiting content. They do not need one. The people already on your floor, in your office and on your sales team can tell candidates what the job is really like, and candidates tend to believe them.
This matters most when you hire for roles that are hard to fill: skilled trades, plant supervisors, controllers, data people, experienced sellers. Those candidates research an employer before they reply to anyone. What they find decides whether they take the call.
Why a careers page is not enough
A careers page says what you want to be known for. A short post or video from a machinist, a staff accountant or an account executive shows what a week looks like. Candidates want to know a few plain things:
- What does the work involve day to day?
- Who would I report to, and what is that person like?
- Do people stay, and do they grow?
- Is the shop, the office or the sales floor a place I want to be?
A current employee answers those better than a recruiter or a brand statement can. It is also cheap. A phone, 60 seconds and a clear topic will do.
What this looks like by function
Manufacturing and skilled trades. A walk-through of a shift, a new piece of equipment, a safety practice the team is proud of. Tradespeople judge a plant by its housekeeping and its people, and a short clip shows both.
Operations. A supervisor explaining how a production schedule gets planned, or how a warehouse handles peak season. It tells candidates the role has structure.
Finance. A controller describing the month-end close, the systems in use and how the team splits the work. Finance candidates care about tools and workload more than perks.
AI and data. An analyst describing a problem the team solved and the stack they used. Technical candidates want to see real problems, not buzzwords.
Sales. A seller describing how leads arrive, how territories work and what a good quarter looks like. Strong sellers ask about this early.
Contract roles. A contractor or team lead explaining how onboarding works on a short assignment. Contract talent picks the clients that make the first week easy.
Five rules that keep it credible
- Ask, do not assign. People who volunteer sound like themselves. People who are told to post sound like a press release.
- Pick the right voices. The best choice is rarely the most senior person. Look for someone who knows the work, talks about it easily and has the respect of peers.
- Write a one-page guideline. Cover confidentiality, customer names, safety rules, and what not to say about pay or colleagues. In a plant, make sure nobody films anything that breaks a safety or privacy rule. In Canada and the US, check your obligations on employee privacy and any labour rules on speech before you start.
- Give people time. If posting is done after hours with no support, it stops within a month. Set aside paid time or a small amount of help with editing.
- Do not reward only the loudest. If you pay or recognize posting, do it openly and fairly, and keep it separate from performance reviews. Nobody should feel their job depends on being on camera.
Do not overbuild it
Large companies run formal creator programs with platforms, budgets and dedicated staff. A 150-person manufacturer or a regional distributor does not need that. A workable starting point is small:
- Choose one hiring goal, such as filling second-shift roles or attracting mid-level accountants.
- Recruit 3 to 5 willing employees.
- Agree on one topic each per month.
- Have your hiring manager and recruiter reply quickly to anyone who responds.
- Track where applicants say they first heard of you.
That last step is the one most employers skip. If you do not ask applicants how they found you, you cannot tell whether the effort is working.
What it will not fix
Employee content shows candidates what is already true. If turnover is high, pay is below market or supervisors are weak, a cheerful video will not hold up once the candidate talks to your people. Fix the basics first, or at least do not hide them.
For a sense of scale, a food manufacturer in the GTA that worked with Traverse made more than 20 hires in 18 months across production, skilled trades and office roles. What helped was a clear picture of each role and a consistent way of describing the shop floor to candidates. The same honesty is what makes employee posts work.
What to do next
Pick one open role that has been hard to fill. Ask two people who do that job, or work beside it, what they would tell a friend considering it. Turn the answer into a short post or a few lines in the job ad, and see whether the quality of replies changes.
If you want a second opinion on how to describe a role so the right people respond, a Traverse recruiter can help with that.