iCIMS Hire Expectations™

What is Recruitment Marketing?

According to good old ERE:

Recruitment marketing used to mean writing job ads and placing them in newspapers. Today, it covers a wide range of disciplines that includes creative, copywriting, SEO, web analytics, pay per click, video, blogging, and social media marketing.

For now, let’s skip to the last part…Social Media, or in HR terms: Social Recruiting. Do you currently have a social recruiting program? If you don’t, maybe you should… In a recent CNN video, these social media sites are said to be “taking the teeth out of job search websites”. Essentially, more money is being pumped into these social media sites, while many of these job search websites are suffering losses. If this is any indication of the way the recruitment industry is going, I’d say social recruiting is here to stay (at least for the next decade).

However, the major problem with social recruiting is the comprehensive nature of these sites. Navigating through Linkedin or Facebook for recruiting purposes can quickly consume a recruiter’s time. So while this recruitment marketing piece is very desirable, it is not easily attainable (manually speaking).

So, the big question is how do you make social recruiting not only desirable but also attainable. Take a step back and ask yourself:

1. What tasks do you need to complete in order to get top talent to submit an application via social recruiting efforts?
   • Choose social media sites to leverage.
   • Post jobs to all social media sites, career sites, etc. 
   • Build branded email campaigns to connect with your social media contacts.
   • Reach out to candidates proactively via email/phone.
   • Analyze source effectiveness of each social media site.
   • What else?
2. Which of those do you feasibly have time for without working outside of the 8-6 work day? – Keep in mind social recruiting is only one aspect of recruitment marketing.
3. Which tasks can you automate?
   • Send mass emails using a communication tool – don’t waste time emailing one person at a time.
   • Post jobs to all social media and career sites at the same time – don’t waste time going to each site to post jobs. 
   • Copy job templates – don’t waste time reinventing the wheel.
   • Store data electronically with an ATS – don’t waste time manually accumulating data to report on. Leverage an applicant tracking system so you can visualize source effectiveness in a matter of seconds.
   • What else?

Choosing Automation

While automation through technology solutions is not meant to replace HR professionals it will facilitate the process and automate essential tasks that recruiters just don’t have time for. For example, recruitment marketing solutions would probably be your best bet as they can help you automate your social recruiting so you don’t have to spend hours navigating your Linkedin account. Now, social recruiting is much more attainable.

P.S. Did you know that Linkedin recently announced their 100 million member mark? Crazy right? And that’s only one piece of social recruiting and recruitment marketing…

What about you? Do you have any other tips to share on improving a social recruiting program?