Recruiting using social media isn’t exactly new, as Jobvite reports that 94% of recruiters either use or plan to use social media as part of their recruitment campaigns. Social media recruiting can be amazingly effective, and it’s not all about paid advertising – there are many ways that you can utilise the reach of social media for free.

Posting engaging content is a great way of getting candidates to visit your careers site via your social media channels. You can then show off your brand and when candidates are on your careers site, they are more likely to check out your job opportunities.

Why you can’t afford to miss social media off of your recruiting checklist

Social media offers you access to a limitless network of the best and brightest people from around the globe. It offers you a way of accessing volumes of candidates that would not be possible by just using job boards.

• 29% of job seekers use social media as their primary tool of searching.
• Facebook has 1.8 billion active monthly users – we can’t think how else you’d reach this number of potential candidates as easily, can you?
• Video capabilities on social channels are high and improving all the time, and video content has higher engagement than any other content.

How to attract the best talent without using ads

• Ensure that your social profiles are optimised – Ensure that your logo, cover photo, and description are on brand across your social profiles and link back to your website. Use the same keywords across your channels to get a high search result ranking, as you are sure to be noticed by the best candidates if you follow these tips.
• Produce fantastic content – Offer unique and valuable content, something that members won’t easily be able to find elsewhere. By posting helpful content you are likely to gain more interactions, making readers buy into your brand and the potential of working for you.

• Provide excellent customer service – Monitor your social channels on a regular basis – providing exemplary customer service will build trust in your brand. Who wouldn’t want to work for a business that is willing to not only help their own employees, but also potential employees?

• Encourage sharing by candidates – Increase your reach by prompting sharing of job posts and add social sharing buttons to all of your content. Encourage candidates to tag your brand in these shared posts as this is sure to increase your following.
•  Track engagement and target successful channels – Monitor interaction with your social channels, by doing this you will know which candidates are interacting with you and where to target your efforts.

• Hold a weekly Q&A to engage passive candidates – Use channels such as Facebook to hold a regular question and answer session – snaring passive candidates will be more likely by providing useful information. A potential applicant may well be encouraged by your personal approach.

Why you should go social without the spend

We hope that we’ve achieved our goal of showing you that it is possible to fully utilise the reach of social media without having to spend a fortune. Being aware of where potential candidates are in the social media landscape and tracking their interactions, along with engaging them in unique ways, will stand you in good stead for attracting excellent talent for less spend.