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A recent study found 79% of job applicants use social media in their job search. Don’t miss these candidates. Keep reading for best practices in social media for recruitment and staffing in 2022.
Social media recruiting is nothing new, but the speed at which social media is becoming a popular choice among candidates to find their next position is growing exponentially.
And it makes sense. Social media has been around long enough now for everyone to grasp on and find their preferred platforms. While younger generations, those coming into the workforce now, were early adopters and have completely grown up with social media, older generations have also joined and are now engaging at record numbers.
79% of job seekers use social media when conducting their job search, Zippia
And 92% of companies use social media for sourcing and hiring.
Not using social media as a mechanism in your recruitment process and to build brand recognition and networking opportunities for your firm and your recruiters, is a missed opportunity to say the least. While most firms are using social media, you’ll also want to consider how your team is posting, engaging, and benefiting from social media.
Social Media for Recruiters
From the perspective of recruitment and staffing agencies, social media is a gold mine to be able to target specific audiences and get a feel for candidate engagement.
When people are logging into their social platform’s multiple times a day, it should be your strategy to meet them where they are already at. And that’s social media. So which platforms should you pay attention to?
While 90% of recruiters have used LinkedIn to hire candidates, it’s not the only platform to pay attention to. In fact, you should be paying attention to ALL the platforms that hold your audience’s attention.
Let’s break down where that might be and share some stats from SproutSocial.
LinkedIn: We all know the importance of being present on LinkedIn. From both a recruiter and company standpoint, this is a no-brainer and should already be a part of your social media strategy. Millennials are the top audience with a little more than half of their users being between the ages of 25-34. Another reason LinkedIn is so vital is for its international reach. Only 25% of LinkedIn users are within the U.S. As we see more jobs offering remote work, this opens even more opportunities up to find the best talent anywhere in the world.
Did you know that our cloud-based ATS has a LinkedIn integration that allows you to take advantage of two crucial timesavers? Our first is the X-Ray search, allowing your team to receive unfettered access to the entire LinkedIn database, regardless of network. Our second integration allows you to connect directly to LinkedIn with our Chrome extension, meaning you never have to log in or keep multiple tabs open!
Facebook: As of now, Facebook still reigns king of social media for users at 2.91 billion per SproutSocial’s 2022 Stats. With the smallest growth margin, we’re not sure how long it can stay on top with new platforms like TikTok. But for now, it’s still an optimal source with the majority of users also in that key 25-34 age group.
Instagram: With two-thirds of Instagram’s audience made up of Millennials and Gen Z, Instagram has slowly built up its following to 2 billion and has marked its territory by continuing to add new features to stay competitive.
TikTok and Snapchat: While TikTok has had incredible growth and Snapchat has seen steady growth, much of its audience is younger (teens and young adults). While TikTok does seem to have more influence over Gen Z users, it’s not (yet) maybe the best fit for recruitment, but could be viable for brand development.
YouTube: While both a powerful search engine and social site, YouTube is tricky as it’s still seen from an entertainment lens. But when seeking candidates, it can be a powerhouse for advertising open positions or client branding opportunities. Similar to Facebook and LinkedIn, the biggest audience they reach is between ages 15-35 and 62% of their users log in daily.
Twitter: While Twitter has seen some growth, it’s not expected to stay. The advantage of Twitter for consideration in recruitment is that a third of its users are higher-educated. This makes sense with Twitter being a resource for most breaking news and relevant content discussion.
Pro Tip: Tracker integrates with Paiger for automated and dynamic posting to all of your social platforms. Want more info? Schedule a quick discovery call here.
Posting Jobs on Social Media
Posting jobs is likely going to be top priority for your recruiters, and for good reason. Just be sure that your social feeds do not become job boards or it will just read as noise to your audience.
Target job postings accordingly by putting money towards the posting and scheduling it to an ad group targeted specifically to that specialty/job type.
Checklist for Posting Jobs on Social Media:
- Keyword focused Title / Headline
- Link to Job Posting Landing Page
- Use Engaging Imagery (Ad, Location Pic, Gif)
- Make Sure Your Link Populates a Card
- Amplify thru Engagement
- Boost with Targeted Ad
- Track Source of Applications with ATS and Google Analytics
Also, when possible vary up your imagery for job postings with location or specialty unique photos, infographics, and more. There are tons of templates on shutterstock.com, and Paiger offers dynamically created, branded templates.
Social Media for Companies & Brands
For staffing and recruitment firms, brand awareness and likability are pretty important. We pride ourselves in our commitment to the industry, but we most show that through every step of our candidate (and client) engagement.
Social media is a great tool for building this brand identity and the very important likability, especially as we are a global industry go more digital.
According to one study, 62% of job seekers reportedly used social media as a way to evaluate the employer brand of a company.
Now, this can obviously mean different things for different types of firms. However, almost all firms (except RPO companies) are promoting their own brand in lieu of their clients’ brands. You are promoting all of the reasons a candidate would want to work with your recruiters, and in most staffing firms, this relationship will extend beyond the start date.
All this to say, if you’re not talking about your company, culture, brand, and open positions on social media, you’re missing out!
Just as recruiters need to select the right social media platforms, so do companies. You can approach social media a few ways. Choose one platform and get that going well or select all the ones that make sense for who you’re trying to attract. Just make sure you can manage what you take on! And, have a bit of budget to boost your posts. Company posts have far less organic reach than individual posts, so boosting is highly recommended.
Decide how you want to approach your talent acquisition from a social media perspective. Will you sprinkle it in with your other content? Or do you opt to create a separate, specific profile for those interested in careers and new job opportunities? Whichever you decide to do, remember that your brand needs to be a part of all that you do. Be consistent in your tone and approach, which should be tailored to your audience segments.
4 Ways to Optimize Social Media for Recruitment
Whether you are an executive search recruiter, a staffing sourcer, an in-house recruiter, or anyone else needing to find and attract candidates… consider these five ways to include social media in your sourcing strategies.
A CareerProfiles report found that 73% of millennials found their last position through a social media platform.
#1: Referrals and Networking
Referrals are often listed as the number one and most qualified source for candidates. And there’s hardly any mechanism that doesn’t allow for referrals. Social media is a great one. People trust who they know. We pay more attention to what friends, college classmates, previous coworkers, and other network connections post.
According to G2, 48% of businesses say their top quality hires come from employee referrals.
Consider an incentive program or referral program where candidates can earn when they share about your company and positions. Here are some tips on how to do that from Indeed.
#2: Post Boosting and Paid Ads
On those platforms where you may be seeing more traction with engagement and sourcing, consider testing paid ads for open jobs. You can get highly targeted on many platforms, such as Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and YouTube. If your audiences are there, do some A/B testing.
#3: Engage
When developing your social media recruitment strategies, you need to account for engagement. How often are you engaging? This doesn’t only mean answering questions and DMs. It means commenting and posting on relevant issues, participating in industry group chat, and finding opportunities to thoughtfully introduce yourself. Post and engage with what your audience cares about.
For firms, you need to give them a picture of your company through social media and engage in a multi-layered approach. Post blogs and tips for candidates, talk up your events and charitable contributions, and give them a behind-the-scenes look at what they could experience.
#4: Measure
How do you know you’re doing well? Measure! Set your goals for what you want to accomplish with social media and measure frequently to watch for trends. Are you looking to increase awareness, gain leads, and more engagement? Put in a system for tracking your goals so you can measure accurately and know when and where to shift if necessary.
When it comes to recruitment and selecting the right channels to include in your sourcing strategies, don’t phone in your social media strategy.
In Summary
Tracker’s industry-leading ATS and CRM not only supports your processes, it enhances them to find you more qualified candidates faster. From creating optimized job descriptions to distributing on social media and 1000s of job boards, Tracker is your partner in your recruitment process from sourcing to onboarding to retention needs – all housed in one easy-to-use platform.
“I like that Tracker was integrated with our email systems, integrated with LinkedIn and offered a texting solution. In addition, the system was easy to use and learn and the support has been great.” – Jeff J., Tracker User
