5 Tips for Recruiting Candidates from Social Media.

Social media today is considered to be an integral part of everyone’s life. To reach out to the current generation, it is important to be present where most people spend most of their time. Outdated recruiting methods will not work in this environment and companies need to keep up with the latest techniques to get the best candidates for themselves.

79% of job seekers are using social media to find jobs, and as they regularly update their interests and work experience on their social media profiles, it makes it easier for employers to find exactly what they are looking for in a candidate.

Social media recruiting is a much more interactive way of hiring, compared to the traditional methods. Recruiters actively look for hiring the best candidates by reviewing their profiles online and try to get the best possible match they can find.

Pretty much everyone has an online presence today, and thus it has become a lot easier to reach out to a larger audience. With so much firsthand information available in a matter of seconds, it makes way for so many opportunities for both recruiters and job seekers.

Not just that, with the ease of communication where each party can respond to one another almost instantly, it makes the process that much quicker and hassle-free.

Tips to recruit candidates from social media

It can get a little tricky while navigating around social media platforms for recruitment but, when done right, the results prove to be fruitful. Here are 5 tips to keep in mind when searching for the right candidate:

1. Plan out what kind of candidate you want
   Have a clear idea of what kind of candidate you’re looking for and the ideal profile that you require for the desired role. Go beyond work experience and skills, and look for individual personality traits as well to be able to get the best of both worlds.
   This is where social media recruiting provides a unique advantage. Recruiters can access more than just the on-paper experience of a candidate and can get a glimpse into their personalities as well. After having an ideal candidate in mind, the filter options of the platforms help in getting you closer to the candidate you’re searching for. You can also use Webbtree’s Search Toolbox to gain access to candidate profiles on multiple platforms simultaneously.
   
2. Showcase your company’s culture and work environment
   Give your potential employees a reason why they would want to work in your company. Showcase the best of what your company has to provide, and give candidates tangible ways in which they can benefit from being an employee.
   One way to accomplish this is to keep up with the latest trends and post frequently with relevant hashtags related to your company. This helps your brand to stay in the limelight and draw traffic towards your company.
   This could attract passive candidates as well as they might find your company’s environment more interesting and desirable. In fact, 65% of employees say respectful treatment of all employees at all levels is a very important contributor to their job satisfaction.
   
3. Choose the right platform
   Some social media platforms are a little more specific than others when it comes to professional networking. Because of its easy navigation, LinkedIn remains the most popular platform for recruiting with 93% of companies using the same.
   However, there are platforms like Behance, Stack Overflow, and many others that cater to a more specific audience. You can use this helpful table to aid in your search for candidates from a particular domain.
   
4. Personalize your approach
   When reaching out to potential candidates, make sure to send them a personalized message and not use a generic mass email. A properly crafted message catered towards the particular individual is very important, as it sends a good impression and shows that you are genuinely interested in having them on board and that you’ve taken the time to reach out to your specific audience.
   Never stop at just sending one message though. Continuing to keep in touch with the candidate by reaching out to them regularly is a good way to go, as candidates tend to prefer companies that are in touch with them regularly.
   Webbtree’s Chrome extension helps you obtain the contact information of any candidate with a single click, helping you to reach out to them instantly. This, consequently, increases your company’s candidate conversion rate.
   
5. Keep a check on your competitors
   The competition for attaining the right candidate is always fierce and today’s market has companies chasing top talent instead of the other way around. Make sure you don’t lose candidates to your competitors by keeping a regular check on which platforms they are using and what they are offering, as candidates could prefer to side with whichever company gives them the best offer. You could potentially attract passive candidates as well by promoting what your company does better than others. Spreading this awareness could give you a 66% chance of converting those passive candidates into hires.

More and more companies are turning to social media for hiring. 70% of managers said they have had success hiring candidates through social media – this makes perfect sense, as that is where a majority of millennial candidates can be found.

Strategize, plan and act accordingly to get successful results through this progressing method. If it gets a little too overwhelming, you can always use Webbtree’s tools and specialized services like Webbtree Talent Source that helps you find your ideal candidate and provides access to candidates across various social media platforms, and Webbtree ATS which helps in managing your entire recruiting process. Contact us today to go from sourcing to nurturing candidates in fifteen seconds!