When you’re looking to hire talent, the last thing you want to do is waste time or money. In an ideal situation, you find the qualified candidate, they apply for your open position, your time-to-fill is practically nonexistent, and your new hire lives happily ever after with your company.
Related: #1 Secret To Being A Savvy Recruiter
No matter how great of a recruiter you are, these situations are few and far between. Your target candidates are becoming sophisticated job seekers and to adjust for changes in their job seeking behavior, you need to become sophisticated, too.
With the increasing development of the digital age, job seekers - particularly passive ones, who you know don’t actively look for job postings - are doing their research about companies and their cultures.
Don’t believe me? Consider this:
Before making a purchase, we all research brands and products to find what piques our interest. When something is compelling, we do a little more digging to find out if it’s worth our time or money. Relying on the testimonies of other buyers, reading articles about what the companies do and how their products work, and following brands on social media, we make decisions based on the information we find. Sometimes we engage by making comments or sharing links on social networking sites, while other times, we just talk about brands in passing to our friends.
In fact, 71% of consumers are more likely to make a purchase when referred by a fellow consumer on social media. Moreover, specific brands are casually discussed by consumers an average of 90 times per week. Research shows that consumers are persuaded by what they find while searching online and by what they’re told by other consumers.
As a company, it’s crucial to use marketing tactics that make it easier for your products or services to be found by these discerning consumers and to develop relationships with them. As soon as consumers go online, they’re making judgments about what they see - or
don’t see - about your company. Hence, why companies are developing inbound marketing strategies that focus on connecting with their target audiences, instead of blasting out messages to the entire market.
Based on this understanding of how consumers are making buying choices, it should be no surprise that job seekers are mirroring the same behaviors. You don’t need to be a marketing professional to recognize that consumers and job seekers are the
same people. They’re just individuals solving different problems.
What does this mean for recruiters?
Now more than ever, recruiting is about creating relationships with candidates and earning the attention of the talent you actually need. Instead of blasting out a message to an entire workforce, which will likely be ignored by the candidates you need most, inbound recruiting is about providing resources and connecting with the talent who will fill your positions over time.
To be frank, professionals won’t even have an employer on their radar who doesn’t have
at least a careers page, and
98% don’t consider you without a LinkedIn company page. As behaviors of job seekers change, the tactics of recruiters must adapt. If you’re not becoming a sophisticated recruiter, you’re going to be left behind as your prospects look elsewhere.
3 Reasons You Need Inbound Recruiting
As talent gains power in its ability to be more selective, inbound recruiting will be
the strategy that restores your competitive edge in hiring. If you recognize these steps, you won’t fall behind:
1. Creates Awareness
Through inbound recruiting, companies make themselves and their positions easier to find by drawing prospective candidates to their websites and other media. This is done by creating content that the target candidates find valuable and personally relevant.
As a result of effective inbound recruiting strategies, companies publish content that their target candidates are searching for, so that they will discover the company, content, and information, and perceive the employer as a valuable resource. Because the digital age offers so many varied ways to engage job seekers, blasting a message out using traditional recruiting tactics is no longer effective.
Inbound recruiting lets companies engage target candidates as
employers by strategically polarizing and targeting the talent the company wants.
The short version:
Inbound recruiting makes it simpler for the candidates you want to hire to find you!
2. Drives Consideration
Just because you have the attention of your target candidates doesn’t mean that they’re going to consider applying. Inbound recruiting strategies ensure you don’t take for granted the candidates’ time and focus. While you have their attention, it’s important to turn their awareness into action. Inbound recruiting requires that you create content that helps drive job seekers’ consideration. To do this, a company should write stories, engage candidates on social media, and develop content that showcases why the company is a worthy employer.
To be considered as an employer, companies must reveal that talent brand that truly exists there. Examples of inbound recruiting strategies that accomplish this include employee spotlights, company blogs, social media posts and newsletters. These help you develop relationships with candidates so that they will think of you when they decide to look for and apply to a position. By giving an inside look at the experience of an employee at your company, you allow candidates to consider how well their career could align with your culture.
The short version:
Inbound recruiting helps candidates envision themselves in a position with your company!
3. Simplifies Decision
Once a candidate considers you as an employer, it’s up to you to foster that relationship. A positive candidate experience refers to the simplicity with which job seekers can become applicants and guides the perception they have of the company culture and hiring process. Even if a potential candidate doesn’t apply right away, by guiding them through the job seeking process and making it a positive experience, you’re increasing the chances that they will apply in the future.
Because inbound recruiting has allowed your target audience to get to know you as an employer, it simplifies the decision making process by
helping them determine if their values are aligned with your company’s and if your positions would be a good fit for them. Sophisticated job seekers no longer want to work for your company- they want to work
with your company. Inbound recruiting ensures that you create an environment that welcomes the best-fitting candidates from the start.
The short version:
Inbound recruiting makes the decision simple because it lets candidates know when they are the right fit for your job
and your culture!
Join The Conversation!
Want to learn more about Inbound Recruiting? Need tips and tricks to get your strategy started?
Join us for the #InboundRecruiting Twitter chat by following @CAREEREALISM and the hashtag every Wednesday at 12pm EST! We love to hear your insight and happily answer your questions.
P.S. Free resources here for the savvy recruiter!Related Posts
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