Managing Online Employer Reviews: An Impression Management Perspective for Talent Recruitment

The powerful effects of electronic word of mouth on employer branding and prehire outcomes suggest a need for employers to formulate effective responses to employer reviews on social media. Using machine learning and text-mining techniques, we identified three distinct types of employer responses to negative reviews (i.e., excuses, apologies, prosocial behavior) and two other types of responses to positive reviews (i.e., ingratiation, exemplification) from a Glassdoor data set. Integrating research on organizational impression management and stereotype content, we developed and tested a theoretical model of response types and their effects on talent attraction across two vignette experiments with undergraduate (Study 1) and working adult job seekers (Study 2). Across both studies, not responding to negative reviews resulted in the worst outcomes for employers. Results demonstrate that the effectiveness of responses differed by the target population; prosocial behavior was most effective among job-seeking professionals, whereas excuse and apology were more effective among students. While exemplification had positive effects in the student sample, neither assertive tactic had a significant effect on hypothesized outcomes in sample of job-seeking professionals. Furthermore, warmth and sincerity, but not competence, mediated the effect of responses on key prehire outcomes of employer reputation, organizational attraction, and job pursuit intentions. Taken as a whole, our study suggests that employer reviews represent both a threat and an opportunity.