What is an employer branding video?
A good film does not simply make an employer look as attractive as possible. It helps the right candidate decide whether that organisation genuinely suits them. That takes more than a list of values accompanied by beautiful images: how are decisions made, what happens when something goes wrong, and how much room do people have to learn?
Below, we explore examples, formats and interview questions. We then consider budget choices, repurposing and ways to assess results carefully. The aim is not to prescribe one ideal film, but to understand which approach fits your organisation and recruitment challenge.
| Format | Purpose | Audience | Typical lifespan | Suitable channel |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Employer branding film | Make workplace culture recognisable | Potential future colleagues | While the employer story remains accurate | Careers website |
| Recruitment video | Explain one vacancy or role | Candidates for that role | During the recruitment period | Vacancy page and targeted campaign |
| Corporate film | Introduce an organisation and its work | Customers, partners and other stakeholders | While positioning and content remain current | Company website and presentations |
| Employee portrait | Show a personal experience | Candidates with similar questions | While the story and role remain relevant | Careers website and LinkedIn |
| Short recruitment video | Highlight one recognisable moment or question | A specific candidate group | Depending on the campaign and its relevance | Social channels |
These forms can complement one another. A corporate film may reveal something about workplace culture, but it does not automatically answer a candidate’s questions. A vacancy video can be very specific without covering the entire employer brand.
What should a good employer branding video achieve?
A candidate should be able to recognise the work, people and expectations associated with an organisation. A credible employer story makes choosing easier, even when someone decides not to apply. That self-selection is not a failure: a film that appeals to everyone often says little that is specific.
Trust grows from details the viewer can understand. Show how colleagues discuss a problem, for example, or how a new employee experiences support. This gives meaning to words such as collaboration and development. The same reality should appear on vacancy pages, during interviews and in the first weeks of work.
Video can support realistic expectations. More applications or stronger candidates are not automatic outcomes, however. The role, employment conditions, awareness of the organisation and the experience of the application process remain at least as relevant.
Why real employees usually work better than actors
Employees know the language and small habits of their work. A brief hesitation, an unexpected example or a specific memory often tells us more than a perfectly delivered key message. That does not mean every spontaneous comment should enter the edit without context.
Feeling safe during the conversation is essential. Explain how the recording will be used, who will review the material and what consent arrangements apply. Give people room to skip a question. An employee does not have to speak for every colleague and should be able to set boundaries without having to justify them.
Actors can suit a conceptual campaign, a reconstructed situation or a privacy-sensitive context. Make clear what has been dramatised. The problem is not acting itself, but pretending an invented story directly represents employees’ everyday experience.
Four examples from real projects
These examples show different ways to portray people and organisations. Not every film is a recruitment campaign. Recognising that distinction helps you choose an appropriate format. The choices described come from existing project stories; no hiring results have been added.
Eatch: the reality of the work
Eatch wanted to show candidates something rather than persuade them with generic employer branding language. The film follows the daily rhythm, with observational scenes in the kitchen and office. Short interviews give team members space to speak in their own words.
This perspective addresses what working there actually feels like. The film connects the team with its craft and mission without separating the workplace from the story. The project description mentions use on the careers page, social channels and during onboarding.
The lesson: show not only the atmosphere, but also the work someone is choosing. Watch the recruitment film for Eatch. The project is categorised as Brand Films, but its stated purpose and use are explicitly recruitment-focused.
Finest People: culture as a conversation
Finest People wanted to avoid the familiar pattern of office shots, smiling faces and generic core values. The film is built around real interactions: observational office scenes and short conversations with team members. Planned scenes were combined with spontaneous moments during the working week.
This gives personalities room to emerge without requiring employees to deliver a rehearsed employer story. The format fits the ambition to show the business from within and appeal to candidates for meaningful reasons.
The lesson: let culture emerge through how people interact. A good conversation is often a stronger starting point than a list of slogans. Work at Finest People is categorised as Employer Branding in the CMS.
Albert Heijn: development over three years
At Albert Heijn, a twenty-minute documentary brought together the experiences of participants in a three-year work-and-learning programme. Personal interviews, archive footage and recorded moments create a story about experiences, relationships and challenges.
The longer form provides space for reflection and development. It is not automatically suited to a first introduction in a short social campaign, but it can offer depth to someone who wants to understand how learning is experienced within a large organisation.
The lesson: development becomes credible through concrete experiences over time, not just a promise of career progression. Watch a documentary about learning and development at Albert Heijn. Its category is Corporate Documentary; the project story also explicitly describes its employer branding relevance.
GARBE: a related company portrait, not a proven recruitment campaign
GARBE’s film Ground Up is listed under Employer Branding in the CMS. Its project description, however, focuses primarily on character, expertise and long-term partnerships. The film combines architecture and people at work with reflective interviews and a measured edit.
This perspective fits the aim of portraying a company rather than simply showcasing property. The stated uses are the website, customer conversations and events, not recruitment. We therefore do not present this film as evidence of a successful hiring campaign.
The useful lesson is narrower: even a large business organisation can be told as a human story without spectacle. For an employer film, you still need to investigate which specific employee experiences candidates should understand.
What types of employer branding video are there?
A main film for the careers website brings coherence to the employer story. An employee portrait focuses on one experience; a team or department film shows how a particular group works. A day-in-the-life video makes rhythms, tasks and environments tangible.
A recruitment campaign can address several roles or candidate groups separately. An onboarding film helps new colleagues understand expectations and ways of working, but it is not necessarily suitable as an initial recruitment message. An internal culture film may instead be intended for existing employees.
A short employee series makes room for different questions without squeezing everything into one edit. A documentary about learning, change or growth suits a story that needs time and nuance. Choose length and form around the viewer’s question and the channel, not because a particular format is popular.
How do you interview employees without making it feel staged?
Start with conversations without a camera before the shoot day. Look for moments someone has experienced personally. An opinion about culture quickly becomes general; a memory of a difficult first week reveals how that culture works.
Share conversation topics, not complete answers to memorise. Keep the set small and calm. Discuss whether a manager should stay outside the room: their presence can influence answers even without explicit pressure. Agree how personal or sensitive information will be handled.
Rather than asking, “Why is this a great employer?”, try a stronger opening: “When did you first notice this organisation worked differently from your previous employer?” Other useful questions include:
- What was harder than you expected in your first month?
- Can you describe a moment when a colleague really helped you move forward?
- What happens here when someone makes a mistake?
- Which decisions can you make yourself, and when do you consult others?
- Which part of your work do outsiders usually not see?
- What would you tell someone joining your team tomorrow?
Follow up: what happened, who was there and what changed afterwards? Allow uncertainty to remain. Not every employee has the same experience. Those differences do not have to be smoothed away to create a coherent story.
What does an employer branding video cost?
POSITIONE’s existing pricing guide gives an indicative market range of €3,000–€10,000+ for a standalone professional video production. Employer branding is included as a possible production type. Larger brand films or campaigns are described within €10,000–€30,000+, and documentaries or multi-location productions within €20,000–€50,000+.
These are not fixed POSITIONE packages, quotations or universal industry rates. A specific production may fall outside a range. Read what professional content production costs to compare the decisions behind a budget.
A compact production may combine one clear question, a limited number of employees and a manageable location. A more extensive production may involve several teams, more preparation and more edit versions. A larger recruitment campaign may require separate stories, locations and channel versions. These are possible approaches, not included package components.
The budget depends on research and concept development, interview preparation, the number of employees, shoot days and locations, the crew and any travel. Editing complexity, motion graphics, music and usage rights, subtitles, translations and the number of final versions follow. More people or versions also means more planning and review.
Compare proposals on the work involved and the useful deliverables. Ask which rights, revision rounds and channel formats are included. The finished film’s length says little about the amount of work required to make it.
One shoot day does not have to produce just one video
Plan in advance which questions each element needs to answer. Alongside a main film, individual employee portraits, short LinkedIn edits, vertical recruitment clips and quieter website footage may be useful. Interview quotes, subtitled versions and photographs for vacancy pages also require preparation.
Repurposing does not mean cutting random sections from a long film afterwards. A short video needs its own opening and must make sense without the rest. Important actions and faces need to remain clearly framed in a vertical crop.
Do not promise a fixed number of files from one day. What is achievable depends on availability, locations, conversations and the desired level of finish. Reserve time for the most important stories before scheduling extra material.
The most common mistakes
- Starting with company values. First find situations where those values become visible; use the words only when they explain something.
- Making people memorise answers. Prepare employees for a conversation, not for reciting a script.
- Showing only benefits and interiors. Candidates also want to know what the work demands and how collaboration happens.
- Trying to appeal to every candidate. Explain what distinguishes the environment, even if not everyone finds it appealing.
- Letting everyone rewrite the story. Agree in advance who checks facts and who protects the editorial direction.
- Using one film for every recruitment goal. A graduate’s question differs from that of an experienced specialist.
- Forgetting distribution. Decide before production where someone will see the film and what the next step is.
- Treating diversity as a visual concept. Show the actual workplace and avoid involving someone only to create a representative image.
- Editing out every tension. A carefully acknowledged difficulty can be more realistic than exclusively positive statements.
- Measuring views alone. Also consider whether the film answers relevant questions and is used within recruitment.
How do you measure whether an employer branding video works?
Agree before production which decision the film should support. For an initial introduction, completion rates and clicks through to vacancies can be useful. On a vacancy page, the relationship between visits and applications may reveal more. Where possible, compare similar periods, audiences and channels.
Also discuss application quality, candidate feedback and how the recruitment team uses the film. Do people understand the role better? Are different questions coming up during interviews? Do employees share the story themselves?
Time to fill a vacancy and retention after joining can be relevant, but many factors influence them. Employment conditions, selection, support and the labour market change too. Do not automatically attribute an improvement to video. Use measurement to learn, not to construct a desired success claim afterwards.
When should you not make an employer branding video?
Wait when it is unclear what the organisation wants to offer as an employer. Video cannot resolve a contradiction between the recruitment message and everyday experience. If employees cannot speak freely, a camera usually creates a more polished image, not a more reliable story.
Outdated vacancies, an unusable careers website or the absence of a distribution plan are also reasons to improve something else first. A film without a clear destination quickly becomes a file nobody uses.
Does the organisation want only a polished image, without showing recognisable reality? Discuss that before production. Sometimes listening to employees is more valuable at that point than filming them.
How POSITIONE approaches employer branding
POSITIONE starts by listening before the camera rolls. Conversations with employees help uncover specific stories. During filming, a calm environment and recognisable working situations take priority; people are guided without being told what to say.
Concept, production and post-production are approached as one process. The main film and desired platform versions are prepared together, so distribution is not an afterthought. What fits depends on the story and the people who want to contribute.
Want to explore which form suits your organisation? Discover employer branding video production or discuss your question with POSITIONE.
