Make your Facebook recruitment page a candidate attractor

Competition for top candidates can be intense. That’s why you need to ensure that every recruitment tool you have at your disposal is maximized for best results. A case in point: your Facebook page. Is it living up to its capability? Here are a few tips that will help your Facebook page bolster your recruitment efforts:

Include photos that engage your audience
Posts that include photos are proven to be more effective at drawing the reader in. No need to purchase expensive stock photos. Grab your smart phone and take a photo that relates to your post. Or you can opt to use inexpensive royalty-free photos or no-cost public domain shots.

Mix up your content
If your posts focus solely on job opportunities, you’re missing the boat. You want candidates to know more about your people, culture, learning opportunities, advancement potential and benefits. Help candidates to understand the big picture of what your organization has to offer. Content can include:

• Job postings – No need to include a full position description with complete qualifications; your link can direct the candidate to that information on the job description page of your career site. Hit the highlights of what makes the job attractive, especially any perks that your competitors can’t match.
• Open houses, career fairs and all types of recruitment events – Get the word out more than once: a few weeks before, the week of and a couple of days before the event. Be sure to mention amenities, such as attendance gifts, refreshments, raffles, CEUs or a featured speaker. Also, don’t forget to take pics at the event and post follow-up content.
• Awards – Has your organization or one of your employees been recognized? Be sure to include a post. Awards speak to the quality of your organization and your associates. Everyone wants to be a part of a winning company.
• Social activities – Company picnics, service award luncheons, wellness events, holiday get-togethers and celebrations of all types are worthy of posts. These will provide slice-of-life snapshots of the fun, engaging and friendly aspects of your organization.
• Community and charitable outreach – Most people want to work for an employer that shows character by giving back to the community, supporting those in need, finding ways to nurture youth, and supporting activities that improve the quality of life for everyone. Show candidates how much you care.
• Participation in trade shows, seminars, symposiums and other events – Working for an employer who contributes to its industry ups your credibility, stability and success. Show candidates that you are an industry player, and they will realize that they can have an impact, as well.
• Diversity initiatives – Do you have employee resource groups that will resonate with key candidates? Do you have programs to show that you value diversity and understand that it strengthens your organization? Show how inclusive your organization is by promoting diversity information such as military hiring and retention efforts.
• New benefit offerings – Have you recently revised your benefits package? Are there any particular benefits that are unique to a specific position, such as sign-on bonus, company laptop, flexible schedule, etc.? You can easily make a quick mention of this and include a link to the Benefits page of your career site.
• Expansion and new technology – Are you adding a new wing to you company? Do you have a recent acquisition? Have you implemented leading-edge technology? Your growth and new technology indicate that you are invested in the future and therefore in your people, as well.

Post often
If your most recent post dates back a year or more, what does that tell a candidate about your organization? Possibly, that it’s stagnant, disengaged and/or apathetic. Make a commitment to posting content often – and responding to comments in a timely fashion – to show the vitality of your organization and its people.

Be concise
Few people will take the time to read a large chunk of copy. Get to the point quickly. If you have important information to relay, do it, but convey it in bite-size portions. And if it’s important to include larger amounts of information, link it to a landing page or a relevant career site page.

Our biggest tip: promote your posts
You can’t recruit candidates if they don’t see your posts. That’s why it’s so important to maximize your Facebook reach with paid promotions. Promoted posts distribute items you post on your business or fan page to your fans, their friends or even non-fans by targeting interests or other criteria. There are also residual effects to promoted posts. If you have under 10,000 fans, only 1/5 of them will see your post unless you promote it. The odds are even less, the more fans you have.

For recruitment marketing, promoted posts are incredibly useful for reaching a targeted audience within a limited time frame. You can target potential candidates by job title, education and interests, as well as other key demographics such as age, gender and location. Use these paid promotions to: showcase culture through photos, present testimonial videos and highlight positions for specific job families.

In short, create great content, post often and make sure you promote your posts to expand your audience.

• The Five Rs of Employee Retention
• What we learned at NAHCR 2018