What is the future of employer branding through social media? : a Delphi study among academics

Employer branding has become very popular among Human Resource (HR) professionals because it offers the possibility for them to think strategically on promoting the organization as an Employer. It is defined as a long term oriented strategy of any given company, aimed both at building a unique and desirable employer identity and managing the perceptions of perspective and current employees, in order to gain competitive advantage. Recently, with the increase use and dependency on internet, companies have started to gain more interest in the possibility of using the World Wide Web (WWW) for business purposes. Such is the case for employer branding strategies which have been present on some social media platforms. Social media is defined as “a group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0, and that allow the creation and exchange of User Generated Content” (Kaplan and Haenlein 2010, p.61). Previous research and real life evidence shows that from year to year the numbers are increasing as regards to the usage of social media for branding; still, there is still little research that tackles the future of these issues. The goal of this study aims at understanding if there is future for employer branding through social media. Therefore the research question is: What is the future of employer branding through social media, in the view of Academics?