Employer Branding Video Examples: 9 Formats That Work
The best employer branding videos are not the ones with the biggest budget. They are the ones where a candidate can picture themselves on the team after 60 seconds. Below are nine formats that do this, a Swiss campaign worth studying, and a plain method for choosing, shooting and measuring your own.
This guide is written for Swiss HR teams, marketing departments and SMEs who need to recruit and want to know what a good result looks like before they commission one.
TL;DR
Pick one clear message per video (culture, career path, a specific job) rather than trying to say everything about your company.
The most reliable formats use real employees: short interviews, “a day with…”, team introductions and career-path stories.
Humor and concept-driven films can work too, as long as they still show real jobs and real people.
Film once, cut many: one shoot can produce a main film, career-page clips and vertical social cuts.
Decide how you will measure it before filming: applications, quality of applicants, and where candidates say they heard of you.
Table of Contents
What an employer branding video actually has to do
An employer branding video answers one question for a person who is not yet your employee: what would it be like to work there? A product film sells a product. A recruiting ad sells a specific vacancy. An employer branding video sits upstream of both. It builds a reputation so that when a vacancy does appear, the right people already have an impression of you.
That matters in Switzerland, where many sectors compete for the same skilled people: ICT, healthcare, engineering, logistics, hospitality. Candidates compare employers across cantons and languages. A short film that shows your Lausanne workshop, your Geneva office or your Zurich control room is often the first real look they get.
It helps to separate three jobs that are often mixed up:
Employer branding film: long-lived, about culture, values and people. It stays useful for a year or more.
Recruiting video: tied to a vacancy or job family, with a clear call to apply. We cover that in our guide to recruiting videos for Swiss employers.
Social cut-downs: 15 to 30 second vertical clips taken from the same footage for LinkedIn, Instagram and TikTok.
A good plan uses all three, shot in one production.
Nine employer branding video formats, with examples of how they work
These are formats, not case studies of named companies. Each one describes what appears on screen and why it persuades. You can combine two or three in one shoot.
1. Employee interviews
The classic, and still the most dependable. Three or four employees answer the same simple questions: why did you join, what does a normal week look like, what surprised you? Cut together, the repetition of answers shows whether your culture is consistent or whether people tell different stories.
Why it works: candidates trust peers more than a narrator. Watch out for: scripted answers. If the interviewee sounds like a brochure, the film does damage.
2. A day in the life
One employee is followed from arrival to the end of the day. It suits roles that candidates cannot picture: a site engineer, a nurse on a night shift, a data analyst, a chef in a hotel kitchen. Show the unglamorous parts too, such as the commute, the first coffee and the difficult meeting.
Why it works: it answers the practical questions candidates actually have. Watch out for: choosing the most outgoing employee rather than a typical one.
3. Team introductions
A short film per team, or one film that moves through departments. Each person gives their name, role and one thing they like about working there. This format is cheap to extend later: a new team means a new short clip in the same style.
4. Culture and values in action
Instead of reading values aloud (“we value respect”), show a moment that proves them: a team solving a problem together, a manager covering for a colleague, a workshop where juniors present to the leadership. If you cannot film a value happening, it may not be a value yet.
5. Career-path stories
An employee talks through three or four steps from apprentice or junior to their current role. This is strong for companies with apprenticeship programs or internal mobility, since it shows that growth is real and not a slide in a deck. Pair the film with the actual training offer on your careers page.
6. One question, many answers
Ask ten people the same question (“What is the best part of Monday?”, “What would you tell your younger self?”) and cut the answers into a rapid sequence. It is quick to shoot, easy to turn into social clips, and gives a sense of the breadth of your workforce, including different ages, languages and functions.
7. The workplace tour
A walk through the sites candidates will actually work in. For a manufacturer, a laboratory, a construction firm or a clinic, showing the real environment removes uncertainty. Drone footage can help when the site itself is a selling point, for example a campus, a plant or a hillside location; our drone video service page explains how aerial shots fit into a corporate shoot.
8. Event and team-activity footage
Company days, sports events, charity runs, apprentice welcome days. These are best filmed as they happen by a crew that blends in, then used as texture inside larger films. If your company runs large gatherings, corporate event videography can double as employer branding material, so you capture it once and use it twice.
9. The concept-driven campaign
Sometimes a company stands out with a creative idea rather than a documentary approach. A Swiss example: in January 2025, the energy company CKW extended its existing employer branding campaign with three new films in which aliens interact with employees. The films promote ICT professions, apprenticeships and part-time work options.
The lesson is not “use aliens”. It is that a playful idea can carry very concrete recruiting messages: specific job families, apprenticeships, flexible working. The humor gets attention, and the content gives a reason to apply. Most SMEs will not run a campaign at that scale, but the principle scales down: one odd, memorable idea plus one practical message.
Choosing the right format for your situation
No format is best in general. The right one depends on the problem you are solving.
Your situation | Format to start with | Why |
Candidates do not know who you are | Culture and values in action, workplace tour | Builds a first impression of the company as a whole |
You hire for a role that is hard to picture | A day in the life | Makes the job concrete |
You struggle to keep or attract juniors | Career-path stories, apprenticeship focus | Shows a future inside the company |
Your workforce is diverse and spread over sites | One question, many answers; team introductions | Shows breadth without a long film |
You have a small budget | Employee interviews, shot in one day | Highest credibility per franc |
You need to stand out in a crowded sector | Concept-driven campaign | Memorability, if the concept stays honest |
If you are unsure, begin with interviews and a short workplace tour. Those two give you a main film plus plenty of material for clips.
What makes these videos feel credible
Candidates have seen plenty of polished career films. What they notice is the gap between the film and what they hear in an interview. A few habits close that gap.
Use people who actually work there. Not actors, not only managers. Include someone from the front line, someone who joined recently, and someone who has stayed a long time.
Let people speak in their own words. Give interviewees topics, not scripts. Ask follow-up questions on camera. Keep a few imperfect moments: a pause, a laugh, a correction.
Show the hard parts honestly. A hospital that says nights are demanding but explains the support around them earns more trust than one that claims stress does not exist. Candidates who self-select out because of honest information save you recruiting time.
Match the language to your candidates. In Switzerland this is a real decision. A company hiring in Geneva or Lausanne should film in French first; a Zurich team in Swiss German or standard German; an international team in English. Subtitles in two or three languages let one film serve several regions.
Keep it short. A main film of 90 seconds to two minutes is plenty. Anyone who wants more will watch the clips on your careers page.
Do not promise what you cannot deliver. If the film shows remote work, flexible hours or a training budget, make sure the HR policy supports it.
Storytelling and social media: how the videos reach candidates
A film that sits only on a careers page reaches people who already want to apply. The aim of employer branding is to reach those who have not decided yet, so distribution matters as much as production.
Build the film around one story. A simple structure works: a person, a challenge, a change. For instance, a technician who joined as an apprentice, struggled with the first year, and now trains new apprentices. Stories are remembered; lists of benefits are not.
Plan the cuts at the script stage. Decide before the shoot that you will need a horizontal main film, vertical clips of 15 to 30 seconds, and a few stills. Then the crew frames shots so they work in both formats and records extra answers with this in mind. Our guide to branding videos step by step describes this workflow in detail.
Use the channels your candidates actually use. LinkedIn suits experienced professionals and managers. Instagram and TikTok suit apprentices, graduates and many hospitality and retail roles. Your own careers page and job ads should carry the video as well, since that is where interested candidates compare you with others.
Let employees share it. Clips of colleagues travel further through their own networks than through a company page. Ask first, never pressure.
Refresh regularly. A new team clip each quarter keeps the page alive and the footage relevant. This is where a single large shoot pays off: the raw material supports months of smaller posts. For more ideas on formats that hold attention, see our overview of branding video ideas for Swiss businesses.
Our perspective
We have produced corporate, event and promotional films for Swiss organizations for more than 20 years, and the same pattern shows up in employer branding. The strongest projects start with a conversation, not a camera. Before we plan a shoot, we ask who you are trying to hire, what those people care about, and what is genuinely good about working with you. Often the answer is not what the leadership team expected. It is the team lunch, the apprenticeship program, or the fact that engineers see their work installed in the real world.
We also push clients to film more than they think they need. One day on site with a clear plan yields interviews, workplace shots, short clips and portraits that feed a careers page for a year. That is faster and cheaper than ordering a new film every time a vacancy opens.
Our advice on the budget question: spend on the people and the story, not on effects. A well-lit, well-recorded conversation with a real employee beats an expensive animation that could belong to any company.
— Pieter
How much does an employer branding video cost?
The price follows scope: number of shooting days, locations, interviews, languages, drone shots, scripting and editing. Our published packages give a realistic frame for Swiss projects:
Package | Published range |
Forfait Vidéo Essentiel | CHF 600 to 2,000 |
Forfait Vidéo Signature | CHF 2,000 to 10,000 |
Forfait Vidéo Premium | CHF 10,000 to 25,000 |
A single-day interview shoot with a short main film and a few clips typically sits at the lower end of the scale. A multi-site film with several languages, aerial footage and a scripted concept sits higher. You can see what each package covers on our video production pricing page.
Work with a Swiss video team
If you want employer branding footage that serves a careers page, social media and recruiting ads from one shoot, we plan, film, edit and deliver the whole project, with strategy, scripting and fast turnaround available as options. We work with businesses and organizations in Lausanne, Geneva and across Switzerland. Start with a free consultation through our video production services and tell us who you want to hire. We will suggest the formats that fit.
How to tell whether the video is working
A film that gets compliments internally may still do nothing for hiring. Decide on the measures before you shoot, and compare them with a baseline from the months before launch.
Define the goal. More applications for one job family? Better-qualified applicants? More apprenticeship interest? A vague goal gives vague results.
Track views where it matters. Watch completion rates and the point where viewers drop off, not only total views. A strong opening and a poor ending tells you what to re-cut.
Follow the click. Use tracked links from the video to the careers page or job ads, so you can see how many viewers took the next step.
Count applications and their quality. Compare the number of applicants, and how many reach interview stage, before and after launch for the roles the film targets.
Ask candidates. Add one question to your application form or first interview: “How did you hear about us, and did you watch any of our videos?” The answers are often more telling than the analytics.
Listen to employees. If your own team says the film feels true, candidates will too. If they wince, that is data.
Give it time. Employer branding builds reputation, so judge results over several months, not days, and adjust your next clips based on what people actually watched.
Common mistakes to avoid
Saying everything in one film. Culture, benefits, vacancies, history and values in two minutes become noise.
Stock footage and generic music. Candidates sense a template at once.
Only management on camera. The people candidates will work beside should be visible.
No call to action. End with a clear next step: see open roles, meet the team, ask a question.
Ignoring sound. Poor audio ruins interviews faster than imperfect images. Many viewers watch on mobile, often without sound, so add subtitles.
Forgetting consent and privacy. Employees should agree in writing to appear, and be told where the film will be used and for how long.
Letting it age. Offices change, people leave. Review the film once a year and remove what no longer fits.
For wider guidance on making video hold attention, our branding video best practices cover lighting, pacing and structure.
FAQ
How long should an employer branding video be?
Aim for 90 seconds to two minutes for the main film, and 15 to 30 seconds for social clips. Anything longer should be split into chapters, such as one per team or role, so candidates can watch only what matters to them.
Do we need professional equipment, or is a smartphone enough?
A smartphone can work for quick team updates and internal posts. For a main film that represents your company publicly, a professional crew brings controlled lighting, clean sound and consistent editing. Those are the elements that make employees look and sound natural on camera.
Which employees should appear in the video?
Choose a mix: different departments, seniority levels, ages and language groups, including at least one recent hire and one long-standing employee. Pick people who are comfortable speaking honestly, and confirm their consent in writing.
Can one shoot cover employer branding and recruiting?
Yes, and it is usually the most efficient approach. Plan the main film, vacancy-specific clips and vertical social cuts together, and film extra answers and workplace shots on the same day. We explain how in our article on recruiting videos with career and social cuts.
How soon will an employer branding video bring results?
Some effects, such as more clicks to job ads, can appear within weeks. The reputation effect builds over months, so track applications and candidate feedback over a longer period and add new clips regularly.
Sources
Recommended
