A career boost for 11,000 people in the Netherlands

For many people, this campaign came at exactly the right time. The program helps people and organisations create a stronger position for themselves in the job market by helping them develop their skill set. Today and tomorrow. Since the Covid crisis brought so many industries to a halt, causing many people to lose their jobs, the program’s relevancy and urgency increased immensely.

The objectives of our approach went further than simply creating attention for the program:

• Create visibility for Randstad Boost;
• Strengthen Randstad Nederland’s position as an opinion leader in the job market;
• Boost the number of applications for the courses and trainings Randstad Boost has to offer;
• Convincing (potential) employers of the fact that Randstad is THE partner for work, that they understand and know the job market like no other, and offer a fitting solution for every situation.

Bijl PR’s advice was to adapt the campaign message and strategy to fit the new situation. Whilst before Covid, the economy was blossoming and unemployment was low, the pandemic completely disabled the economy. Both the tone of voice and the content of the campaign needed to correspond to this.

The new campaign is visible on TV, radio, socials and online. Our PR strategy corresponds to that with a phased approach, a national launch, a regional approach and taking the content to a different, deeper level.

We’re so proud of this case because it demonstrates Randstad Nederland’s will to help people as well as organisations develop and grow. To develop and adapt your skills to a an ever-changing job market was always very important. But when Covid-19 hit, we suddenly had to switch even faster. We succeeded because of our data-driven approach. It’s amazing to see how that led to so much positive publicity, but the most important thing is that we helped educate 11,000 people during the Covid-19 crisis, giving them new perspective on their career trajectory. And that’s ultimately why we do this.

Corien Niezing
Head of Communication & PR Randstad Groep Nederland

We opted for a data-driven approach and made use of the huge bulk of job market data Randstad Nederland has. For the kick-off, we demonstrated where the job openings were and which skill-set they require. At that moment, there were 45,000 job openings and a great demand for warehouse workers, retail workers, as well as staff in the health care, IT and education sectors.

We connected this data to the re-education possibilities Randstad Boost has to offer, so that candidates could get back to work in no-time. At the same time, on behalf of Randstad Nederland’s managing director Dominque Hermans, we called for investments in educational programs to help reduce the impact of scarcity now and in the future. In addition to the data, we shared stories of people that successfully changed careers with the help of the development program in the media.

Regional and local zoom-ins and B2B

In the next phase, we repeated our approach, but especially zoomed in on the regional job market in the Dutch provinces. We engaged Randstad’s regional directors to help explain the situation. And once again, we shared stories of people that found new jobs through the Randstad Boost educational program. We showed companies and organisations what Randstad Boost could mean for their organisation. To do this, we developed a format for client stories on paper and in video as a base for additional content for Randstad Boost.