AMA: I’m new to this whole “social recruiting” thing. The team just started our company Facebook page and we’re not really sure what to do next. Any tips on where to go from here?
Welcome to the club!
There’s no doubt an increasing number of recruiters are looking to the interwebs to find qualified candidates for their open opportunities.
Whether it’s the speed and convenience (no, this ain’t an infomercial) of sourcing a high volume of talent pools all at once, or the ease in discovering who’s who in your network and unearthing your very own six degrees of separation, social recruiting/modern recruiting/social sourcing — whatever you want to call it — is the way to go to get connected with candidates and to nurture a relationship with them.
With public online data (big data/predictive analytics, so they call it), recruiters can hone their message and personalize the way they approach candidates.
“Hi! I met Brian at a networking event last week, and he mentioned you’d be a great fit for our UI/UX engineer role. I checked out your website and got hooked on your design for the eBook on how to build a successful email campaign. Do you have time to chat Wednesday afternoon?”
The addition of a company’s online profile also makes it easy to add the much-needed employer brand, which allows teams to share their employee experience to communicate, “I could be your next coworker, and these are the reasons I love working here. If this sounds like something you’d enjoy, you’ll probably love working here, too.”
In any case, it sounds like you’ve got the ball rolling on building your company’s online presence. Here are some basic tips on how to create a robust profile.
1. Identify and introduce yourself.
Keep in mind these two questions: Who are you? What do you do?
It’s likely that when candidates hear about your company for the first time, they’ll run a search for the company name, then head over to Facebook to check out their activity on the network.
- Make sure you have a profile pic that clearly marks your company and is consistent with your branding. Logos are easily recognizable across multiple channels and are a distinct marking of the company. Repetition and consistency is key.
- Use your cover photo as a chance to cross-promote company events, content, websites, or blog. After all, it’s one of the first parts of your profile users see when they land on your page.
In the example, Google’s cover photo rings in true and timely to this year’s World Cup series, and it provides a link for users to check out a separate website they created to track the games.
Your About section should give an overview about the industry you’re in, what the company does, where you’re located, and how people can get in contact with someone on the team.
2. Build your audience.
Also known as the “Like”.
Gain traction to your site by letting others know it exists. To start, share the link with coworkers and encourage them to share the link with their network. At this point, you are the primary spokesperson for your business’ profile. If you really want to up the ante, try getting together a company competition to see who can refer the most Likes.
- Be sure to include links and social network logos on your site, too.
- Take advantage of prime opportunities to share the page with your external network: Email campaigns, email footers, newsletters, ads, blog posts, and through your personal social sites.
3. Create and share good content.
Fair warning: The company profile is not a job posting board. That’s about as effective as mass messaging candidates. The beauty of the online profile is the ability to share content with a targeted audience. Social recruiting isn’t posting and praying.
- Try sharing a variety of posts — status updates, links, photos, videos.
- Find out what your audience engages with most, and using Page Insights, learn what generates the most interactions. If followers are sharing your content with their network? Even better!
You’ll quickly learn trends in which content types perform best and the demographics of the audience you’re best connecting with, which can help the team figure out if they’re giving the people what they want and if they’re appealing to the right audience. Adjust the content accordingly and don’t be afraid to experiment different strategies for a period of time.
- Share good content frequently and consistently (at least once a day). A page with sporadic posts looks abandoned and loses sight among the other sites users follow.
Your Facebook profile page can be a force to reckon with, and given the right tweaks, will send healthy traffic to your company page and into your talent funnel.
If you want more tips on how to get started on your social recruiting strategy, check out the webinar series we just launched, “How to Recruit Candidates Using Social Media”! We’ll be discussing techniques and best practices for attracting and engaging talent on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and LinkedIn along with social recruiting pro Katrina Collier of Winning Impression. Want to join us? Register here!
