I know that you spend hours every day surrounded by your employer brand. If asked, you could recite endless stories about all the cool things your company does and how it treats its employees. At the drop of a hat, you could become a proud parent, showing off pictures of their child taking their first steps as you rattle off benefits and examples of employees who have gone on to do amazing things within the company.

So then I go to your career site and it’s as barren as the shovel aisle when a snow storm hits. Where are the stories you know by heart? Where are the examples of amazing employees? Why do I only see stock art and job descriptions?

Take two sites side by side. One is a site stocked with job descriptions and an easy to find apply button next to each one. The other is a series of authentic stories about satisfied and fulfilled employees working together to achieve something together they never could do alone, connected to a link that just says “Interested in joining? Send us your resume by email.”

The first site will probably get more applications, but mostly by people who just like to click buttons and will seemingly apply to anything.

The second has fewer resumes, but the people that send them are very engaged with what you’re doing and are very interested in learning more. Chances are, that simple barrier of not making it easy to apply will mean that the people who do send resumes are far more selective applicants and better candidates than get produced on the application factory on site one.

Content on your carer site is not an accessory. It may be more important than any other part of your career site.

Treating it like an afterthought is asking the best and brightest to respond to you in kind.