Reading, Pa. – The Greater Reading Chamber Alliance (GRCA) is pleased to announce it was recognized by the Pennsylvania Economic Development Association (PEDA) as the winner of the Economic Development Marketing Innovation Award for its talent attraction marketing campaign. The award was formally announced last week during the 2024 PEDA Fall Conference.
Leah Fassnacht, GRCA’s Director of Communications & Marketing, and Audrey Krupiak, GRCA’s Assistant Director of Communications & Marketing, are managing the ongoing campaign with funding from the County of Berks and in collaboration with RoleCall, a national talent attraction consulting agency. Aaron Gantz, GRCA’s Vice President of Economic Development & Strategy, and Keith Stamm, GRCA’s Director of Workforce Development, are providing support for the overall Meet Greater Reading brand.
The campaign was developed to address a top pain point of local companies—talent attraction.
“It is an honor to receive this recognition from our economic development peers at PEDA, which reinforces our commitment to a people-focused approach in our work,” said Gantz, who accepted the award at the conference on behalf of the GRCA team.
The Greater Reading area continues to attract new residents with its low cost of living, outdoor amenities, safety rankings and great schools. These main selling points and others are continually highlighted through a paid and organic, digital marketing campaign targeting boomerangs (a person who previously lived in the area and has since moved away), recent college graduates, those open to relocation and those working in priority industries. A special emphasis is placed on nine key industries, some of which include education, healthcare, engineering, manufacturing and skilled trades.
Those who click on the organic and paid digital ads are brought to a landing page where they are asked to fill out a basic form as well as note their desired industry, personal interests and provide a resume and/or LinkedIn profile. These potential candidates are then aggregated into the new Candidate Marketplace platform with access being provided to local employers. Employers who sign up to participate receive regular updates when new candidates are entered into the marketplace. Employers can sort candidates from newest to oldest and filter them by industry, timeline to move, experience and education—making it user-friendly.
To keep prospective candidates engaged and learn about the Greater Reading area, they receive regular emails with curated information relevant to their industry and interests on a regular basis.
So far, the campaign has produced impressive results with 6.1 million impressions, 1.6 million in reach and more than 21,000 link clicks.
According to PEDA, the Economic Marketing Innovation of the Year Award, “recognizes outstanding visual marketing and promotion, branding of an economic development organization or outstanding content on an economic development topic.”
Fassnacht and Krupiak previously won the same award in 2021 for the Rebuild Berks campaign. Organizations are eligible to win this award every three years.
To sign up to join the Candidate Marketplace, Berks County employers must visit talent.meetgreaterreading.org/talent-roster-employer-access-request. Job seekers may visit talent.meetgreaterreading.org/live-here to fill out the form.