Law enforcement agencies across the U.S. are facing recruitment challenges. A better labor market and a general negative perception of law enforcement as a career could be two reasons for the challenge. Agencies compete for applicants, with some working to attract lateral officers from other local agencies. Recruiters across the country have been facing an uphill battle.
The New Mexico State Police is one such agency tackling recruitment issues. “If you can’t sell your agency, people go to the highest bidder and that’s problematic if you’re an agency that struggles to attract the right people,” says Captain Jesse Williams of the New Mexico State Police (NMSP). When Williams became the captain in the training and recruiting bureau about two years ago, he noticed the agency was doing traditional advertising, including putting spots on TV and radio. “I just didn’t get the feeling that we were on top of our game when it came to recruiting or marketing ourselves,” he says. “I felt that we weren’t being as modern as we could be.” He didn’t know the fruits of their former advertising strategy, either—they still faced challenges as candidates would apply and then drop out. About a year ago, he was referred to Boomtime, a communications and marketing company in the area that would work to help NMSP tell their story a little differently to attract qualified candidates.
A unique solution to today’s challenges
In today’s environment, the average person is exposed to 5,000 advertisements a day and checks their phone every 10 seconds, on an average, says Justin Butler, Boomtime marketing strategist. Butler says to get people to engage with what you’re promoting, you have to have a conversation with them—to the point that they then go and talk to someone else about it. This, he says, is called word of mouth marketing. “If your friend tells you to check something out, you’re going to believe him more than a billboard tells you to check it out, so that’s the recruitment strategy we created. We’re not selling someone on a product that they purchase. Rather, we are selling them on a lifestyle.”
So how does this happen? The company uses targeted marketing to reach out to potential candidates where they are already having conversations—social media. They show the potential candidate through video, imagery and content what it’s like to work for the NMSP. “We show them, ‘Here is what it’s like to be an officer, here are the places you can go if you join this organization, here is what your life will be like if you decide to take a step in this direction.’ It’s just a window into this world,” says Williams.
When they click on that video, imagery or content, they are taken to a recruitment app, a mobile-driven website, that walks them through the day-to-day of what it’s like to be an officer with the NMSP. “At the end of the day what we want them to do is be excited about that opportunity. If someone is excited enough about an opportunity, they will do anything for it,” says Butler.
Williams agrees and notes that this type of strategy educates a wider variety of candidates. “Our strategy is that just about anybody can be a police officer if they want to,” he says. “The problem is that a lot of them don’t know what it means to be a police officer, so the goal here is to tell a story that connects with people on a lot of different levels so if they’re more interested in one aspect of law enforcement as opposed to another, we are going to try to tell any stories that might resonate.”
The potential recruit is also then driven into a communications stream where the NMSP continues to talk to them and engage them through email and retargeted ads as they go about their day-to-day. “A recruiting effort does not stop until a candidate graduates from our academy,” says Williams. “We used to stop once someone applied and our chief selected them to begin academy, but then there was no engagement throughout the whole process and that’s a mistake. Once you identify a good candidate, you have to continue to recruit them until they graduate. If they leave at any point, we’ve lost them in recruiting.”
The results
Though NMSP and Boomtime have been working together for a little more than a year, their partnership continues to grow. “A year ago we began implementing communications pieces and incorporated a few call-to-action pieces,” says Williams. “We just launched the recruitment app and mobile-focused website about three months ago and we just launched our social media phase at the beginning of September. We are finally getting to a point where we have the multi-pronged approach.” With each piece that is incorporated, Williams says he is seeing more improvement.
“Our interest cards compared to the same timeframe in our last recruitment cycle is up 45 percent and the applications are up 44 percent,” he says. “We’ll see if this trend continues. I can’t say it’s totally because of what we’re doing here from a marketing standpoint, but it’s a factor for sure.”
Williams says that this type of marketing is just part of the larger goal to gain better candidates in the NMSP. “We’re not saying we’ve solved the recruitment puzzle, but everybody is looking for something to do to change,” he notes. “We didn’t want to keep doing the same thing again and again so we tried different tactics and this is where we are.”
The benefit Williams already sees is that the campaigns are recruiting the right kind of candidates. “Our academy is para-military, so it’s difficult and a lot of people drop out,” he says. “We want to solidify those numbers, but in general we can make most people into a good state police officer if they just give us the time. I think a candidate who is better educated about the process is more likely to stick around.”
There may be a correlation between decreasing recruitment numbers and an inability to sell the law enforcement career—something Williams believes every agency can work on. “We in law enforcement can do a better job highlighting the many positive things about police work,” he says. “You really need to sell your agency.” He also recommends recruiters look outside the box of traditional techniques. “Everything is on the table at this point because of the competitive nature of recruiting for law enforcement so I would say, look outside of traditional practices and shop around. See what other options and professionals are out there to help you sell your agency to boost your recruiting efforts.”
