Goldman Sachs taps Snapchat for recruiting millennials

By Angela Moon and Tariro Mzezewa

NEW YORK (Reuters) - In its latest push to broaden its allure among millennials, Goldman Sachs Group Inc rolled out a series of quick-hit recruiting ads on Snapchat on Friday, becoming the first major Wall Street bank to turn to the instant-but-fleeting messaging app for potential hires.

The ads appear on Snapchat's Campus Story function, a curated platform for user-generated contents such as pictures and videos at college campuses nationwide. Goldman's 10-second recruitment clips appear between user-generated content segments.

In the videos, Goldman says it is seeking a "Campus Environmental Leader," "Youth Sports Coach" or "Crowd Funding Champion," and provides a link to gs.com/campus.

Only Snapchatters whose phones indicate they are in and around a campus, or were there in the last 24 hours, are able to post to and view the Campus Story.

Goldman's efforts to reach out to millennials comes amid mounting indications that careers in banking and finance hold a diminishing appeal among recent graduates. Even at elite business programs like Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Harvard Business School and the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, the percentage of students opting for banking as a career is down by half or more since before the recession.

The move is the latest leg of Goldman's bid to appeal to soon-to-be college grads and push back against the prevalent view of investment banking as an all-work-and-no-play career.

In June, the investment bank told its summer interns they should be out of the office between the hours of midnight and 7 a.m. during the week, seeking to curb excessive hours worked by young employees who see internships and entry-level jobs as a chance for a lucrative investment banking career.

Goldman is also one of the few in the industry adding employees now. During the bank's second-quarter earnings call, Goldman said its workforce grew 8 percent over the last four quarters, and rose 1 percent between March 31 and June 30. At the end of June, the bank had 34,900 employees.

Snapchat, which allows its more than 100 million users to send messages that disappear in seconds, is considered one of Silicon Valley's most highly valued startups. As of May, the messaging app is valued at $16 billion.

(Reporting by Angela Moon; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)