The Law of attraction believes that our thoughts impact the circumstances around us - if you positively believe in something, it will come to you. Unfortunately, in recruitment, that's not true when you need to “attract” the right candidate. Recruitment needs planning. Recruitment requires marketing.
But why does the recruitment process require marketing? Isn’t marketing just for promoting a brand or a product? Well, the world of marketing has also extended its importance to attracting the right talent.
Just like brands attract customers, similarly employers use marketing for their companies to attract job seekers. Job seekers need to know whether that company is “the” place for them. And this largely depends on how companies portray themselves in this competitive market.
Let’s find out how recruitment and marketing can go together.
What is Recruitment Marketing?
Recruitment Marketing attracts and creates an interest for the company among the job seekers. It involves building a relationship with them throughout the recruitment process. Recruitment marketing aims to create a compelling employer brand to attract the right talent for the required positions.
Steps of Recruitment Marketing
Step 1: Awareness Creation: Have you come across a brand that advertises its product so well, when you see it, you say to yourself, “I will surely buy this one day!”. You can use the same idea to promote yourself to prospective employers. When the employer brand is strong the number of job applications will be more. Companies need to project themselves as prospective employers. Make sure the company website has mentioned its culture and values. You can win the trust of job seekers if you are open and transparent.
Step 2: Generating Interest
Once people are aware of your brand, make sure they don’t forget you. Post content on social media that resonates with what your company is doing and also with the current market trends. Job seekers always look for content that is useful for their careers. Companies can post content on important interview tips, resume preparation, etc. Have a schedule for posting content on various social media platforms. Workshops and webinars on industry topics can also be conducted.
Step 3: Decision Making
Catching the eye of job seekers is great. But, what next? Will they apply for jobs at your company? Why should they choose you over others? How do we make that happen? It is simple- perks and benefits. When you share a requirement, along with it talk about the benefits, perks, and compensation. This is also known as Employer Value Proposition (EVP). Job seekers need to know these details so that they can make an informed decision.
Step 4: Ease the Process
If you want potential candidates to apply at your company, you need to remove the obstacles that are making the process inconvenient for them. Remove any unnecessary qualification requirements. If the applicants have to manually put the same information that is already there on their resume, then it can reduce their interest in the application process. Even lengthy assessments can make a candidate tired. Remember, a candidate isn’t applying to only one company at a time.
Multiple rounds of interviews also impact the interest of a candidate. Yes, a company wants to hire the best, but if each round of the interview process isn’t giving new insights to the candidate, it will feel repetitive.
Recruiting Marketing Plan
Before you start with the recruitment marketing campaign, decide what you want to accomplish. It could be finding candidates who match the skills needed for a requirement. Keep a tracking system so that you can assess the number of applicants, their skills, the number of hiring, and closed positions.
The recruitment team must have the same understanding when it comes to the requirements of a candidate for an open role. It includes the job responsibilities, educational qualifications, knowledge, skills, years of experience, etc.
Based on your hiring needs you need to decide where the job post should go. For example: Job portals like Naukri, and LinkedIn is beneficial for white color jobs; while, Apna and Job Hai are suitable for blue-collar jobs. Research well before posting, so that you can understand how much value you can get from each channel. Based on your findings, allocate resources like manpower and money.
Prepare a content calendar and have a schedule for sharing content on social media and among subscribers. This also promotes the practice of accountability for accomplishing the recruitment marketing goals.
Recruitment Marketing Plan- A Success or Failure?
How do you know if your recruiting marketing plan has been effective? Here are a few parameters:
If the applications you are receiving match the key skills, qualifications, etc for your hiring requirements, then you are on the right track.
The time taken by your company to hire tells a lot about the efficiency of your recruitment marketing strategy. If it is taking longer to attract, engage, and hire, then the strategy needs an alteration.
Set a budget for each hiring requirement. If you can fulfill the hiring at a lower cost and stay within the budget, your strategy is successful.
Higher retention rates suggest that your strategy is attracting the right talent and the right fit for the company. The pool of talent is large, but everyone is not necessarily a good fit for your company’s culture.
Recruiting Marketing Examples
Goldman Sachs quite smartly targeted the millennial population with the help of a quiz. On Spotify, they posted the quiz with the tagline, “ You majored in something you cared about. Use it to make a major impact.”
The German company shared an interesting approach for people who are stuck in the wrong job and used that as a marketing strategy for recruitment. The company placed vending machines all over the city, with the phrase that said, “Life’s too short for the wrong job”.
When it comes to strategizing, Google is always great. The Tech company posted a riddle and those who solved it correctly landed up for an interview with the company.
Recruitment and marketing are separate concepts, but when it is brought together, it serves the same purpose. Both must understand their audience well, create attractive and convincing content, and use different channels to reach the target audience. The old way of recruiting doesn’t work anymore, which predominantly focuses on filling up the open positions without considering the long-term goals of the organization. Just like how consumers have become conscious and aware of what they buy, similarly, job seekers also have the same approach toward companies when they are looking for a job. Candidates these days don’t want a job just for survival. They need to know if they will have job satisfaction. To ensure that a company can give them job satisfaction, candidates read online reviews, follow the latest updates, and then form an opinion. To have a positive impact on a candidate’s opinion, recruitment marketing is the way to go.
Job Booster Social India has a strong social media presence. From memes to blogs to reels, JBSI works on everything to cater to different age groups. The blogs shared by JBSI have covered topics based on employer branding, the impact of AI on HR, innovative recruiting techniques, supporting employees dealing with grief, etc. Would you like to know more about employer branding and recruitment marketing? Do get in touch with us!
