In the Race for Talent, Financial Services Companies Turn to Content Marketing

financial services recruiting wall street

Until recently, financial services companies had their pick of talent. For top tier college students, ibanking was an iron-clad path to wealth and security. However, new technology, big data, regulations, and cyber-security have changed the landscape – and the type of talent that financial services brands need to attract.

These days, financial services brands like Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, and CITI are now competing with Square, Amazon, Apple, Palantir, Uber, and Google for the talent they need to succeed. Indeed, according to the New York City Comptroller, while wages for financial services professionals in New York rose by 14%, the number of young people working in the financial sector has declined by 11,000. Silicon Valley has replaced Wall Street as the center of the world.

To adapt to the shift in job expectations, financial service brands have stepped it up in the last few years, offering faster promotions, bigger paychecks, more free food, more time off, and more volunteering. They’ve also pledged to make sure their workforces are more diverse – and in some cases, may be doing a better job than the tech sector in practicing what they preach.

To communicate these changes as well as the inherent value of the work they do, these brands have also stepped up their content marketing games significantly, focusing more on the hiring portion of their websites and their social media channels. Here’s some of the great content marketing work these brands are currently doing in this area.

Goldman Sachs

Goldman Sach’s excellent career quiz makes finding your fit at the company interactive. You enter your college and your major. Then, based on what you selected, you receive thoughtful questions that give you options for different career paths. For example, “You are a project manager in an architecture firm that’s designing the world’s largest Ferris Wheel – one that will tower over the Sao Paulo skyline. Which of the following tasks would you most want to handle?” This is a great way to explore the myriad of options Goldman Sachs has in terms of employment. It also helps the recruiters, by ensuring that hires make more educated decisions when applying to open roles.

Morgan Stanley

In general, Morgan Stanley is bringing their “A” game when it comes to owned content. All of the magazine style articles on their website are impeccably written and beautifully structured. In particular, their content aimed at new recruits, does an excellent job at communicating the breadth of their roles. For example, this piece that explains why they look beyond just business school types makes it clear that Morgan Stanley isn’t as traditional as you may think. Morgan Stanley then provides seamless CTAs to register for recruiting and search for jobs below the articles and surfaces additional related content, should a recruit want to read more.

CITI

Anyone who has ever applied for a job at a big company knows how difficult it can be to find the position that is a good fit. CITI’s “Match Your Skills” feature in its job search (which integrates with LinkedIn) makes the painful process of figuring out where you fit a little more seamless. This is an empathetic touch that speaks to the larger care and consideration the brand has for its employees. Additionally, for tech-savvy, young talent this is an experience that better matches what they’d expect from a top tier brand.

Key Takeaways

In the race to compete for new talent, some financial services companies are breaking new ground with the tools and resources they provide for new recruits. For those in content marketing looking to step up their hiring, there’s much to learn from their out-of-the-box thinking.

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