SayHired

Recruiters and staffing professionals should learn from online marketing and public relation professionals on how to leverage social media introductions and build long-term business relationships. During these difficult economic times, it is important to leverage an online strategy and a website should be more of a customer intelligence tool than just simply an informational reference or a black hole in which to submit a resume.

Most internal recruiters and human resources are unaware of how many candidates abandoned the candidate submittal process; what was the real source of the resume submittal; and depend too much on application tracking systems to rate the candidate prospect. The November 2010 Website Magazine article by Darren Guarnaccia stresses how important it is to understand customer behavior for an ecommerce strategy.

The Website Magazine article listed the following critical criteria needed to transform a website into a customer intelligence tool. A similar strategy can be implemented and tracked in order to justify social media strategies.

• Creating different types of Web experience:

According to an article by Todd Raphael of ERE Media, organizations planning the next stages of social media recruiting are planning to use videos (YouTube), career sites, Twitter page (including recruiter Twitter pages), external blogs, and a LinkedIn page. Organizations like Intel are developing social media recruiting strategies along with realistic guidelines. These technology leaders stress the importance of the community aspects of social media and online branding and identifying “social media ambassadors” to do outreach communications and recruiting efforts. Todd’s ERE article also states that Intel is developing these social media recruiting strategies in order to “keep up with competitors like Microsoft, Google, Apple, and Intuit” (Raphael, 2010.)

• Leveraging information about different target customer groups:

In this current economy, it is important to leverage introductions to a specific audience or vertical market into long-term business relationships and eventually convert prospects into customers and possible employees. Recruiting and human resource professionals should be building a recruiting strategy that involves leveraging social media introductions into prospective candidates who will ideally become employees and contributing independent consultants – basically pipeline the human resources, talent, and technical experts the company needs to achieve new business ambitions.

• Tracking and measuring impact

Recruiting and human resource professionals need to be proficient in the principles of search engine optimization, online marketing techniques, campaign management, event planning, and online branding. We need to know about Google and LinkedIn analytics. We need to be knowledgeable of how to optimize the common recruiting tools so that it only occupies fifty percent (50%) of your time, with this amount decreasing over time. We need to be aware of new web analytical tools and how to build triggers in to social media guidelines and strategies in order to legitimately prove the return on investment (ROI) from the social media and recruiting strategy proposed. Web analytics and business intelligence tools can provide a 360-degree view of who’s applying to your company, who’s following your company on Facebook, and who is interested in what your company is doing. These same tools provide information on the number of abandon or incomplete applications, how many views, and what social media channel was responsible for that viewer to review your job posting or company career site.

Recruiting and staffing professionals need to know how to use social media channels to draw interest in what your company is doing; what software languages, tools, technology, associations, and methodologies the company is dedicated to; and what interesting projects and business ambitions the company has planned for its future. Branding the company’s dedication to a particular technology, industry association, or a particular stand can be much more successful than just trying to promote a job posting. Recruiters need to be aware of the same four essential of online customer intelligence mentioned in Darren Guarnacia’s Website Magazine article:

• Identify customer pain points

Track the number of candidate drop-offs and the number of candidates who abandon the candidate submittal process. Use the same pay-per-click and search engine ROI practices to learn more about the people viewing a company’s career portal. Go through the resume submittal process and experience what candidates experience when attempting to submit a resume and get their candidacy some attention. Realize that passive candidates cannot broadcast a desire to find another career prospect. These stable prospects do not make career changes often and definitely do not make uneducated or quick decisions. Once the social media strategy gets their attention, it is important that procedures or technology does not become an obstacle or something that turns-off a prospect.

• Understand when a prospect is ready to engage

Social media recruiting strategies should include a constant reminder that the purpose to this socializing (both online and in-person) is to convert the right type of talent and intellect into the talent pool a company needs to achieve business ambitions. Recruiters should not inundate an online community with job postings or trivial discussion posts that are obvious attempts to solicit a resume. Online resources should be optimized and monitored in order to harvest any prospects attracted by online content, video, or discussions. A social media recruiter or sourcer should not overwhelm an online community, but should not neglect a company’s message to prospective employees and contractual talent. Recruiters need to respect the online community and its members. Recruiters should engage and contribute to relevant online discussions and approach community contributors in a respectful and appropriate manner.

• Weigh and score your leads and resources

Recruiters need to use applicant tracking systems and similar business technologies to track resume generating channels and social media venues. MeetUp groups and networking events need to be evaluated as should job fairs and employment website traffic. Quantitative and qualitative analysis should be done for business intelligences and social media justification. Triggers need to be built into processes and procedures as well as websites and social media channels in order to qualify the contact resource and the quality of the lead generated. Recruiters should not depend solely on applicant tracking systems as the only qualitative and ROI analysis tool used to justify recruiting strategies. Social networking events and physical attendance of conventions, expos, and webinars are just as important to justify as job posting or online marketing. This ROI trigger building and lead/resource evaluation process should be a constant business process so that a recruiting team can eliminate the non-ideal resources and concentrate on success venues while considering new prospects.

• Harness attitudinal data and track success

Harvesting attitudinal data allows recruiting and HR professionals to personalize interactive experiences that build upon a company’s branding and fine-tune the company’s message to prospective employees and talent. Build procedural triggers and track successful placement resources in order to report the benefits the social media recruiting strategies have produced.

The same analytical tools and ROI practices used to justify an online marketing strategy can be used to weigh, score and track the successes of a social media recruiting strategy. Harvesting attitudinal data provides insights into the productivity of social media strategies and website content. This knowledge will allow recruiting and human resources to develop web content, video, discussion questions, and a recruiting strategy that improve online experiences and attract the right target audience. Once armed with the right analytical tools and business intelligence, an organization can build an effective recruiting campaign and stronger candidate relationship.

Reference:

Guarnaccia, D., “Transform Your Website into a Customer Intelligence Tool. ” Website Magazine (November, 2010); pages 36 – 37.

Raphael, T., “Intel Planning Next Steps With Social Media Recruiting.” ERE Media (November 9, 2010); viewed via ERE.net: http://www.ere.net/2010/11/09/intel/