2. The recruitment landscape is changing. As new
technologies emerge and develop, the industry today
exists in an entirely different world than it did twenty
years ago. The relationship many recruiters and
candidates have with technology has meant that the
balance of power has shifted. Today job seekers have an
increasing number of options, thus relying less on
headhunters and clients. Recruiters are under more
pressure as they deal with attracting, engaging, retaining
and qualifying candidates - especially if they are slow to
adopt emerging technologies. And while stats show
we’re spending increasing proportions of our budget on
talent marketing software, technology and marketing,
few people seem to truly ‘get’ it. In fact, as recruitment,
technology and marketing become more symbiotic,
getting the candidate experience right is more important
than ever before.
Introduction
This paper is designed to demystify what candidates now
expect from the recruitment process. It aims to help guide
recruiters through the confusion of embracing influences
and techniques from technology and marketing to form a
coherent and functionally useful way of thinking about
building candidate relationships.
3. CANDIDATES
E X P E C T A T I O N O F
The internet has had a transformative effect on
candidates, the recruitment industry - and
therefore marketing. The pace of business is
faster, the internet boom providing hordes of
competition in the same space, and, as a result,
recruiters need to network and retain lasting
relationships with clients and candidates quicker
- and less intrusively - than ever before.
Candidates spend more time online across
numerous devices. At their fingertips, they have
access to more information than they could ever
consume. What’s more, there is a widespread
expectation that candidates will be able to apply
for jobs, as and when they want, without
disturbance.
If the recruitment hiring process isn’t aligned
with the candidate’s expectations, talent will
drop off during the hiring cycle. Because online,
the balance of power between candidates and
recruiters is weighted in favour of the candidate.
Despite this, candidates have become
pessimistic, feeling that as the relationship
between society and advertising is renegotiated,
content specific ads and hard sales are pushed
on them. Consequently, they won’t tolerate
being on the receiving end of anything deemed
inauthentic.
This poses a conundrum for recruiters: if
candidates expect recruiters to build-long term
authentic relationships, while having the agility
and flexibility to fit their technology-driven
culture, how can they bridge the gap from
culture to hire?
The logical solution is that recruiters can no
longer afford to get in the way
of candidate culture. Instead they need to be a
central, contributing part of it. Recruiters need to
stop interrupting their candidates and work with
them. This belief is central to marketing.
"IFTHERECRUITMENTHIRING
PROCESSISN’TALIGNEDWITH
THECANDIDATE’SEXPECTATIONS,
TALENTWILLDROPOFFDURING
THEHIRINGCYCLE."
5. If effective, this content will not only increase
click through and conversion, but will create a
positive brand perception with the candidate.
At this stage everything across the brand’s
owned platforms needs to be consistent. If
they drop off the website to validate your
company values elsewhere, this branding
needs to function as a complete suite across
all stages of the candidate journey no matter
where they reach it.
While 94% of candidates say the website is
the first thing they look at when researching a
company for the first time, it should also be
noted that candidates will arrive at your
website through ‘side-doors’ such as search,
social platforms or campaign content like
advertising and paid media. This means any
publishing platform should become a
manifestation of the brand, its personality and
its values. This enables the brand to curate
content for that candidate audience,
comment on and even cultivate a company
culture that meets its audiences interests. The
more time candidates spend with a brand, the
more likely they are to use it as a desired
destination or point from which to share
‘trusted’ content. This can help bridge the
gap between a candidate culture and a hire.
So recruiters need to see that a constant and
permanent online relationship with
consumers through the company brand is
essential.
When it’s done well, marketing should offer
a seamless candidate experience that
supports the recruitment hiring process and
helps to deliver leads.
In marketing terms, having a consistent
online brand presence and engaged
audience will result in better conversion
rates. Recruitment companies that
successfully martial these elements will
enjoy better search ranking positions and
brand awareness. This in turn, helps
recruiters establish their own online identity
within an existing digital infrastructure.
While most candidates will not in their day-
to-day lives care about the recruitment
brand, there will be occasions when they
are genuinely more interested in it than
their own cultures. When they leave a job
and finding a new one becomes a priority,
for example. They will inevitably look to a
range of recruitment company websites
and company pages as part of their
research stage. And when they are looking
at this, what they want is conversion
content.
Conversion content is designed to help
candidates, clients – or the casual browser –
discover more about your company values
and services, with the ultimate goal of
guiding them to do something. This might
be to submit a CV, apply for a job, download
your app or request a call back from a
recruitment consultant.
6. 94%
HowRecruitersCan
UseBrandingTO
EngageCandidates
As the company brand is building credibility
online, so too can recruiters via a long-running
association with a company culture and shared
values and beliefs. It might sound simple, but
initiating a conversation with one of your
candidates on one of your own company posts
is a simple means of showing you’re engaging
with your talent pool, driving traffic to your
company and aligning yourself with brand
content. This shows that you – personally - are
part of a wider conversation. The more active
you are, the more your own online brand will
grow by extension.
Creating your own online personal brand is bold and
the reality is most recruiters still fail to realise the
importance of this. However, those that do will reap
the benefits. The content produced online has a
valuable function for the candidates as they spend
time with the company brand, connecting with
shared values, relevant industry specific updates
and points of view. Furthermore, the blending of
functions doesn’t make candidates feel like they are
being given the hard sell. All these actions are
profitable for the recruiter and ultimately, the
boundaries between marketing and recruitment
should merge - and 94% of candidates agree with
that.
7. MOBILE-DRIVEN
The average person checks their phone 150 times a
day, equating in about five hours of screen time.
Gone are the days of companies viewing mobile
technology as a cultural inertia, now, mobiles are
viewed as the agile marketplace, enabling us to use
all available technologies from one source. The rise
in digital has made it easier than ever for people to
quickly find experts to share their skill sets.
Connecting with people - full stop - has never been
simpler. What consumer’s value today is community-
based innovation which has seen the growth in ‘soft
assets.’ Take for example peer-to-peer innovations
Glassdoor and kununu - business models based on
an online rating system.
Back in 2013 the collaborative economy was being
cited as the third major development in the digital
economy. It was heavily linked with social media as
an eCommerce feedback platform, perfect for
discussing brands in an open arena. In three years,
huge gains in this area have been made. Behavioral
metrics are now being evaluated alongside
exposure, reputation and emotional connection.
Long-term, recruitment companies will look to join
the connected, collaborative economy. With
smartphones overtaking sales of PCs and with
mobility being a clear gateway to the web,
integration and collaboration with a single swipe or
press of a smartphone is the future. That's why job-
seeking apps for mobile simplify the process for
candidates, much like semantic search technologies
do in getting round the pitfalls of general-purpose
search engines.
Recruiting software like applicant tracking systems
to manage the hiring process, video chat, fully
mobile-optimised websites with candidate specific
areas and career sites built into platforms like
LinkedIn are key touchstones for recruiters to
connect with their talent pool. But so too are new
initiatives like mobile remarketing. Here visitors to a
website, or applicants to a job that have dropped off
during the application process can be tracked. New
technologies are becoming readily available to
understand and leverage technologies relevant to
mobile channels. The better recruiters are at
dissecting data, the better insights they can deliver.
"THE BETTER RECRUITERS
ARE AT DISSECTING DATA,
THE BETTER INSIGHTS THEY
CAN DELIVER."
8. Marketing for recruiters is a simple way to incorporate content that reflects the reality of today’s
candidates. It’s one that respects them, finding out what interests them and then promoting
brand credibility to answer their interest without disrupting them. Recruiters who have
embraced the technological renaissance and are using data-led precision to develop insights
into their candidates and how best to engage with them already know this. Understanding
candidate needs and expectations and then creating branded content around that is key,
because the days of disruptive marketing and recruitment are over. Now more than ever,
recruiters need to employ a multichannel approach to inform their work and help marketing by
sharing the online culture created if they expect candidates to bridge back to hiring.
CONCLUSION
