A little background

“Today, more than ever, job seekers are choosing new roles based not on the job, but the employer itself. And whether they believe it is an employer that can help them achieve their personal aspirations and goals.

Knowing this, we set out to develop a careers website that not only manages applications and delivers compelling content, but also builds an emotional connection with the visitor.

One that showcases our position as a leading European private bank, with over 430 years of experience and deep rooted history. A leader in investment banking, asset and wealth management, with 18 offices across Europe and the US. That articulates our diversity and helps visitors picture themselves thriving here. And one that, of course, attracts great talent to the business.”

Head of Talent Acquisition
Berenberg

The guiding principles

To deliver a website that will engage a wide audience of finance, professional services and technology professionals – from Investment Managers to Interns, Asset Managers to Apprentices, Specialists to Software Engineers.

  • Brings the Berenberg employer proposition to life – Our future is where you take us
  • Gets the right people straight to the right jobs.
  • Integrates seamlessly with their Applicant Tracking System, Avature.
  • Is accessible across all devices.
  • Is ready to be indexed by Google, Google for Jobs and Indeed.

A site where all content is available within a single click. One that uses storytelling, imagery, video and social media as a way of articulating our culture. And is distinctly and unmistakably Berenberg.

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A prestige look and feel

Whether consciously or not, people are naturally drawn to good design. According to Google, it only takes 50 milliseconds for a visitor to form a first impression of a website. There’s no denying every page of our website is slick in its design, contains highly crafted copy and tailored content that allows the visitor to immerse themselves in the Berenberg culture.

We made sure that the minute a visitor lands on the website they are greeted by the unique people who make up Berenberg. Working hard to ‘show’ the visitor – and not ‘tell’ them – why they should come and work for them. We’re sparing in the use of blocks of copy. Brief but focused. Concise but clear. We use photography to help visitors ‘picture’ themselves working for us. And after making a strong first impression, we continue this all the way through the website.

An excellent candidate experience

It’s very difficult to build a website that caters for everyone. After all, someone looking for a Corporate Banking role will be interested in different things to someone looking for a Software Engineering one. So instead of thinking of the website as a single entity, we treat it as a collection of landing pages aimed at different key employment groups. The content of which is determined by the page that they’re viewing.

Currently, there are 13 unique candidate journeys, each designed to talk to, engage and convert specifically skilled individuals into applicants. But these can be added to as and when new teams or areas of expertise are launched.

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Story-driven content

Berenberg has a fantastic story to tell. And nobody tells it better than their colleagues. The new careers website offers the resourcing and communications teams a much better platform on which to tell the employer story. And an important part of this is the ‘Spotlight on…’ blog. A platform to showcase their expertise in Corporate and Investment Banking, Asset Management and Technology.

The blog is a central part of a ‘social media for employer branding’ strategy. And in many cases a blog article is the landing page of a new visitor to the Berenberg careers website. A visitor who is attracted as much by the Berenberg story as by the Berenberg brand.

Two languages are better than one

Historically, Berenberg is a German-based Investment Banking firm. Although recently they’ve experienced significant growth in their Asset Management and Capital Markets business. Which is why the careers website is dual language with the ability to switch between English and German throughout the website.

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A mobile-first experience

Having worked with the Avature ATS before, we knew the capabilities of the platform. And by pulling a data feed from the ATS into the Berenberg careers website it became possible to develop a truly  ‘mobile-first’ application process.

Experience (and data) tells us that in many cases the jobs details page will be the only page that the user will visit. So, we’ve enhanced these pages to not only carry the job information drawn from the ATS, but also relevant content around the rewards and benefits specific to that geographical location, profiles of colleagues who work in that team and details around the recruitment process

The application form powered by Avature ATS is designed to be completed on a smartphone. It doesn’t don’t require documents to be uploaded but instead they can import data from information stored on LinkedIn, Google Docs or Dropbox. And the application process itself can be saved on one device and picked up on another if required.

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The results (so far)

The Berenberg careers website launched in September 2023 and we have some fantastic results to talk about. All insight is an average of almost two years of data taken from Google Analytics, Avature ATS and directly from the Berenberg resourcing team.

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218%

increase in average page views (per month)

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45%

increase in average time spent on website (per month)

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237%

increase in applications (per month)

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74%

increase in hires (per month)

The final word

The biggest success of the new Berenberg careers website is its ability to articulate the personality of our business. The culture, the expertise, the diversity and the excitement that I experience every day in this organisation. That’s no mean feat.

The positive impact that it has had on our ability to attract and engage talented people is clear in the numbers we’ve seen. But even more those people who apply for a role here already understand what Berenberg is all about. What we do, how we do it and how we add value to our brand.

Head of Talent Acquisition
Berenberg