Wow. It’s the 4th July again. Independence Day. And Tonic’s birthday (expecting presents from you later).

We’re two today and, just like a wobbly toddler, we’ve learned a lot; thought new thoughts, found fresh ways of mastering age old problems and worked in more than 30 countries since July 2012, picking up ideas and new perspectives along the way – here are some of the things we’ve learned along the journey so far.

Push marketing died. RIP. Life and all the things that make it special; births, deaths, love, war, peace: life in all it’s wonderful, glorious breadth just gets in the way. You won’t beat the noise because recruitment marketing is incidental. Someone you don’t know, trying to hire you, right now, is just another marketing message to ignore. To be heard you have to listen first.

Human branding is showing its power. Our concept that the future of brand was human is in use more and more frequently by recruitment advertising agencies and employers alike. It’s great that our thinking is being listened to, and that the way we saw the world back then has helped build better conversations from Adelaide to Aberdeen. Not so good that for some people the Human Brand is just a phrase, a hook that looks good on a PowerPoint deck. To be truly Human, you need an entirely new philosophy – this is not just more comm’s, more media, more spend wrapped up under a different banner.

Community is where you’ll find the talent you need. That’s been part of our mantra since day one. But like human branding if you’re reading community but thinking about talent pools, talent pipelines and passive, one way communication flow – you’re barking up the wrong tree. Community means mutual support, give and take, becoming a utility. There’s that philosophical change again.

One conversation is not enough. We all have different priorities, different perspectives. As marketers we need to understand the preferences of the people we need to communicate with and segment, divide and personalise what we say to match. This is harder to do, but much more effective. It’s up to you whether you spend your time communicating well, or your money with an RPO screening bad candidates.

As we work into our third year we’re looking forward to learning, sharing, collaborating and celebrating with the people we work with. We’d love you to be part of that. Join our TonicOn community to get involved.

Independence. It’s an amazing thing.