Recruitment Marketing campaigns are where strategy, creativity and execution come together to connect your employer brand with the right candidates. The most effective Recruitment Marketing campaigns deepen employer brand equity, create authentic connections with targeted talent pools and drive measurable impact on your hiring pipeline.
That’s why the 2025 Rally® Awards™ include the Best Recruitment Marketing Campaign category, celebrating the campaigns that broke through the noise to attract, engage and convert talent in meaningful ways. This year, our panel of peer judges recognized four outstanding winners:
- First Place (Large Team): Kruidvat – for their creative and highly engaging “Apply with Your Bestie” campaign targeting Gen Z.
- Second Place (Large Team): UBS – for their “Recruiting at Speed” campaign to recruit 300 bilingual professionals during the Credit Suisse migration.
- Third Place (Large Team): UBS – for their “More than an Apprenticeship” campaign reinforcing their commitment to vocational training.
- Winner (Small Team): Ingredion – for their EVP-based campaign “Create the Future with People Who Care”, proving a small but mighty team can deliver a big impact.
In this blog post, we’ll explore what made these campaigns stand out, look at the strategies and creative tactics they had in common and share actionable tips you can use to elevate your own Recruitment Marketing campaigns. Let’s go!
2025 Rally Award Winner for Best Recruitment Marketing Campaign (Small Team)
Ingredion: Create the Future with People Who Care (Winner)
Ingredion’s two-person team showed that even small teams can deliver a big impact. In 2024, they launched their new Employee Value Proposition, “Create the future with people who care,” as the foundation for a Recruitment Marketing strategy that elevated the company’s employer brand and candidate engagement. By embedding EVP messaging across all channels and collaborating with internal partners, Ingredion transformed how they attract and convert talent.
Key highlights include:
- Launched EVP messaging as the core of all recruitment campaigns
- Updated careers pages, job descriptions and branding to align with EVP
- Executed LinkedIn campaigns achieving a 15% engagement rate and 1,525% growth in engagements
- Revitalized their talent community with a new newsletter and clearer calls to action
- Integrated EVP into Workday landing pages and referral programs
Ingredion: Why They Won
Judges applauded Ingredion’s ability to deliver impressive awareness and conversion results with a small but mighty team. They praised the clear alignment between EVP and campaign execution and noted the significant growth across LinkedIn metrics and applications.
- Strategy: Ingredion grounded its campaign in a clearly defined EVP and executed a multi-channel approach to boost awareness, engagement and conversions
- Quality: Strong collaboration across internal communications and marketing ensured consistency and polish across every touchpoint
- Innovation: Leveraged data from Rally Inside and Gartner benchmarks, refined Workday landing pages and optimized Glassdoor and Indeed management for conversions
- Results: Careers page traffic increased 32%, Indeed applications grew 650%, and TA/HR-tagged LinkedIn posts saw 1,525% growth in engagements
Judges’ Comments:
“This campaign was incredibly well thought out and yielded significant results for the team and the company. I’m impressed at the thoughtfulness of this campaign and how many different channels were used to bring this to life. With such a small team the work here is very well done.”
2025 Rally Award Winner for Best Recruitment Marketing Campaign (Large Team)
Kruidvat: Apply with Your Bestie (First Place)
Attracting and retaining Gen Z talent had become a pressing challenge for Kruidvat, where over 75% of the workforce is Gen Z. To reverse a sharp drop in applications, Kruidvat launched Apply with Your Bestie, a creative campaign that turned the job application process into a social, engaging experience. Building on insights from employee listening, social trends and media analysis, the campaign removed barriers to applying, increased job satisfaction and boosted retention by leveraging Gen Z’s love for fun, friendship and authenticity.
Key highlights include:
- Framed applications as a shared experience through the “bestie” concept
- Created the playful duo-shirt visual that resonated with Gen Z audiences
- Maximized reach through organic and paid social, WhatsApp applications and a thriving TikTok channel
- Achieved national and international media attention, sparking conversations about Gen Z and work culture
- Delivered measurable improvements in applications, bounce rates and employer brand rankings
Kruidvat: Why They Won
Judges praised the campaign’s creativity and its deep understanding of Gen Z motivations. They noted the impressive increase in applications, the strategic use of TikTok and WhatsApp, and the widespread media coverage that amplified Kruidvat’s employer brand.
Winning Reasons:
- Strategy: Based on extensive research into Gen Z values and behaviors, aligning content and channels with candidate insights
- Quality: Engaging visuals, authentic messaging and a consistent multi-channel rollout strengthened Kruidvat’s reputation as a top employer
- Innovation: Introduced duo-shirt visuals, WhatsApp applications and entertaining TikTok content to connect with candidates in unexpected ways
- Results: Applications rose 52%, duo applications jumped 83%, bounce rate dropped 8.25% and Kruidvat climbed from #10 to #3 as a favorite employer among young workers
Judges’ Comments:
“Unique in so many ways! The overall strategy was well thought out – from target audience, to objectives, to approach – it met the talent where they were. It felt very interactive and engaging.”
UBS: Recruiting at Speed for a Historic Banking Merger (Second Place)
Following the acquisition of Credit Suisse in 2023, UBS faced an urgent challenge: hire 300 bilingual professionals to ensure a seamless client migration. With the timeline compressed between June and December 2024, the stakes were high — any delay risked operational disruption and reputational damage. UBS executed a fast-tracked Recruitment Marketing campaign that combined data-driven targeting, strong internal collaboration and authentic storytelling to deliver qualified talent on time.
Key highlights include:
- Targeted three distinct audiences: students, career changers and workforce reentrants
- Featured a senior leader as the face of the campaign, leveraging their LinkedIn network for reach and credibility
- Deployed multi-lingual content across LinkedIn, Instagram, email and virtual events
- Collaborated with universities and hosted internal and external events to expand reach
- Surpassed goals with 1,684 applications, 300 hires and balanced gender representation
UBS: Why They Won
Judges admired UBS’s ability to move quickly while maintaining brand integrity and candidate experience. They highlighted the thoughtful audience segmentation, use of a senior leader as a social ambassador and the campaign’s impressive results under tight deadlines.
Winning Reasons:
- Strategy: Aligned campaign objectives with business-critical needs, leveraging data and competitive analysis to inform targeting and messaging
- Quality: Multi-lingual content, cross-channel consistency and strong event participation reinforced UBS’s reputation as an inclusive employer
- Innovation: Featured a senior leader’s personal brand to boost visibility and credibility while blending virtual events with social campaigns
- Results: Generated 1,684 applications, filled 300 roles and achieved 50% gender balance among hires
Judges’ Comments:
“Great work! UBS did a great job articulating the problem they were faced with and what their goal was. They showcased how they segmented the audiences, tailored messaging, developed a campaign strategy and what the outcomes were. There were many complexities they had to overcome and I liked their approach to leverage advocacy, specifically a senior leader with a strong following.”
UBS: More than an Apprenticeship (Third Place)
UBS is one of Switzerland’s largest employers of trainees and apprentices, with over 1,900 participants in its programs. Following the Credit Suisse acquisition, concerns arose among parents and candidates about the future of UBS’s apprenticeship program and job stability in the financial sector. To reinforce confidence and attract young talent, UBS launched More than an Apprenticeship, a multi-channel campaign highlighting UBS’s commitment to vocational training and long-term career opportunities.
Key highlights include:
- Positioned UBS as a reliable partner for vocational training through engaging in-person and virtual info sessions for parents and candidates
- Created multi-lingual Snapchat lenses, Instagram reels and TikTok videos tailored to Gen Z preferences
- Ran “myth busting” social content to address concerns and showcase opportunities in finance
- Partnered with Yousty.ch and used search advertising to expand reach
- Achieved high-quality applications exceeding targets, strong engagement metrics and balanced gender representation
UBS: Why They Won
Judges applauded UBS’s thoughtful response to market concerns and its ability to adapt messaging for multiple audiences. They highlighted the creative Snapchat lens, engaging reels and robust event participation as standout tactics.
Winning Reasons:
- Strategy: Reinforced UBS’s employer value proposition while addressing reputational challenges and reassuring stakeholders
- Quality: Delivered polished, multi-lingual content tailored to Gen Z and parents, ensuring relevance across touchpoints
- Innovation: Leveraged playful Snapchat lenses, myth-busting reels and a microsite to engage and educate prospective apprentices
- Results: Generated 2,980 applications, hosted 504 participants at events and achieved 85% quality visits on the campaign microsite
Judges’ Comments:
“Loved this campaign’s creative idea and the targeted approach for the specific audiences. Utilizing the platforms and creatives to align with how the groups consume social media content was an extremely strong point, which also translated well in the results data.”
What Makes an Award-Winning Recruitment Marketing Campaign? Lessons You Can Use
Looking across Kruidvat, UBS and Ingredion, several key practices emerge that separate an average campaign from one that delivers measurable impact on talent acquisition:
- Align campaigns with business priorities and EVP
Each winner tied their Recruitment Marketing strategy to critical business needs and their Employer Value Proposition. UBS linked campaigns to the Credit Suisse migration and apprenticeship continuity, while Ingredion and Kruidvat anchored theirs in a clear EVP and Gen Z insights. The takeaway: connect your campaign objectives directly to your company’s priorities and employer brand to create meaningful relevance. - Use audience insights to shape creative and channel mix
These campaigns were guided by real data—pulse surveys, competitor analysis, heatmaps and social listening—not assumptions. Kruidvat learned about Gen Z’s application anxiety, UBS segmented audiences by career stage and Ingredion analyzed channel performance benchmarks. Experienced practitioners know that tailoring content and channels to the audience drives conversion and engagement. - Blend creativity with performance measurement
From Kruidvat’s duo-shirt and WhatsApp applications to UBS’s Snapchat lens and Ingredion’s multi-channel EVP rollout, innovation was matched with rigorous measurement. All winners reported clear KPIs—applications, engagement rates, bounce rates, quality visits—showing their creative risks translated into results. - Leverage collaboration to scale impact
Whether it was Ingredion’s small team partnering across internal communications and marketing or UBS mobilizing senior leaders as social ambassadors, collaboration multiplied their reach and influence. Even the most innovative idea gains power when backed by cross-functional support.
Together these elements reflect the evolution of Recruitment Marketing campaigns into strategic levers that influence brand perception, candidate experience and business outcomes.
💡 Pro Tip: Before launching your next campaign, validate your creative concept with a small audience segment or internal ambassador group. Early feedback can refine messaging and formats before you invest in a full-scale rollout.
Best Recruitment Marketing Campaigns: Key Takeaways for Your Next Strategy
The 2025 Rally Award winners in the Best Recruitment Marketing Campaign category show that great campaigns are more than eye-catching visuals or clever slogans. Kruidvat, UBS and Ingredion demonstrated how research-driven insights, authentic storytelling, innovative tactics and measurable outcomes create campaigns that stand out and deliver real hiring impact. Congratulations again to these winners and a big thank you to our peer judges for evaluating this year’s exceptional entries!
For practitioners planning their next campaign, the lesson is clear: start with business priorities, use data to guide your creative approach and measure results to prove value. Collaborate across teams, involve leaders and keep the candidate experience front and center. Campaigns that combine strategy, creativity and analytics will strengthen your employer brand and hiring pipeline.
With entries for the 2026 Rally® Awards™ opening on November 1, now is the moment to start capturing your campaign results and creative assets. The strongest submissions don’t just recap tactics or metrics—they show how Recruitment Marketing shapes business outcomes and elevates your employer brand in a crowded talent market. If your next campaign pushes boundaries or proves the value of your strategy, share it with us! Your work could set the benchmark for innovation and inspire the entire Recruitment Marketing community.
