You're either in or you're out.
With the rapid release of new recruiting tools and technology, staying ahead of the competition is an arms race. And it doesn't matter if your team's got the best tricks of the trade — are your marketing skills up to par?
"Great company culture," "free lunch," and "opportunity for advancement" just doesn't cut it anymore to sell talent on your open req. These days, most qualified candidates have heard it all, and they can probably guess the next perk that'll come out of that predictable pitch you've lined up.
This is where your company's marketing department comes into play. Building a relationship with a candidate is a lot like nurturing a potential customer. Engaging talent is a process of building the appeal, personalizing the process, and negotiating a commitment (translated: employment) that benefits your company while meeting a candidate's needs and goals.
For the past few weeks, we've been promoting our webinar, "The 3-Step Marketing Formula for Better Recruiting," with Red Branch Media CEO Maren Hogan, and it was a hit! Bummer if you weren't able to join us, but subscribe to our blog so you don't miss the party next time.
Download the webinar recording here.
These were our three favorite highlights from Maren's discussion:
- It's okay to exclude candidates. Think of the job description and requirements on your company careers page as a filter for talent who are either unqualified or unfit for the job. Likewise, don't underestimate the use of videos and pictures to depict company culture. The last thing you want is to hire a three-piece suit kinda guy for your t-shirt and jeans kinda company. Know what we mean?
- Sell the experience, not the job! Would you rather work for a company that lets you "sit at a desk for eight hours a day selling stuff to customers" or a company that's "hiring the best and brightest to disrupt a $44 billion industry?" You decide.
- Give talent a chance to envision themselves in your open opportunity. Impress your candidates from the getgo and let your opportunity delve deep into the career path you can take them on five years before they even know where they're going. Allow talent to imagine themselves working for your company by getting creative with your social networks and current employees, and show them a day in the life of working with your team.
Can you share examples of successful position descriptions?
Sure, there are some excellent examples of great job descriptions. AirBnB takes you on a long tour of what it's like to work for them before you can even get to their job description, so you don't have to cram everything in the requirement.
Meetup is another killer example of doing something different. They double down on their own technology in the hopes that people who come to work for them also believe in their mission. It's very attractive and similar to their interface. I'd guess they're doing well on cultural fit.
What do you think was the turning point of events that made recruiters realize that they needed to start merging their marketing and sourcing strategies?
I really do believe it was the advent of social. Before recruiters needed IT permission to do darn near anything, now they are more autonomous and if they can prove social recruiting success, they are usually allowed to continue. This forced recruiters to get better at marketing, essentially raising their own watermark. On the other side of the question, candidates also have more of a voice since social and this has affected both marketing and recruiting (customers also have a voice, disgruntled or otherwise).
How do you respond to critics of social recruiting who say that messaging candidates on Facebook or Twitter is a little too personal?
I just point them to the stats. I strongly feel, and this is a personal opinion, that candidates are over robotic, duplicative systems, 60-90 day response times, same old benefits packages and company's more in love with their own image than who they want to fill a role there. People looking for jobs are people, and should be treated as such.
Tips for optimizing a careers page like a landing page?
Yeah! There are some landing page 101 tips to take away from marketing. Let's start with the headline: Is it compelling? Do you even have one? (Hint: It's not the job title!) Landing page headlines tend to tell people what the product or company does, so follow suit like a software engineer could be: "Want to build software that changes lives/saves money/helps kids learn?" Then you need to give a simple form for them to fill out.
If possible, name, email, link to resume or profile. Save the 42 field form for....never. At the end, have a solid CTA so the seeker knows what to do next and if possible, customize the post-click information to speak to what they can expect from your recruiting process. Who will contact them? When? Through what medium? How long does it take for people to become part of your organization?
Is it wrong to recruit my customers or someone trying to sell their product to me? Poaching, basically. What's up with that?
Nope, that is smart.
Thanks, Maren!
To get even more savy marketing-recruiting tips from the webinar, download the recording here:
