The growth of different social platforms today has opened several avenues for companies to scout for talent via social media. However, several companies do not find their footing when it comes to recruiting via social media. Being used to the conventional recruitment method of posting a vacancy and receiving applications, companies use the same strategy for social sites where people come to connect, share and have fun. And clearly this doesn’t work on social platforms which leads businesses to believe social recruitment doesn’t work. But this is not the case since major businesses today have and continue to successfully hire via social platforms through strategies designed for each social platform since it is unique in its own sense. Here are common mistakes companies make when it comes to social recruitment and possible solutions.

• Most companies do not proactively have a plan for social recruitment. Businesses either post a job listing or vacancy when there is a need and expect their audience following them on that social platform to apply. This may work for some big business that already have a reputation, but medium and small businesses will fail to find any candidates successfully this way.

• Companies also rely on their existing audience or following to find talent without much innovation in their social campaign, especially when it comes to hiring. 

Learn how to create Attractive Social Recruitment Campaigns.

• Every social platform has users who are connected to a wider audience who consistently add content that fill up the page feed of the user. This means that your business must compete with other content to show up on a potential candidate’s social feed.

• Companies must develop a strategy to consistently present themselves as a brand to show the work culture, benefits of working with them and the work life. This must be a weekly activity so that when a job vacancy is listed online, more people are incentivized to apply. More people can also be targeted through sponsored ads which can specifically target niche segments.

• Targeting the right audience and having a following that comprises of people who are within your industry is likelier to yield better results when social recruitment campaigns are deployed. 

• SME’s fail to identify pockets of community within the social media sphere where their target audience lies and eventually content released by the company doesn’t relate to their audience.

Businesses should focus on putting more efforts into platforms where their target audience lies to connect with them more effectively. If LinkedIn is the prime platform where the target audience lies, followed by twitter and facebook, then the business must accordingly focus more efforts on LinkedIn followed by other social platforms.

• When it comes to hiring, releasing an ad on social platforms for a sales manager for an automotive company by targeting user accounts with a work title ‘sales and management’ will less likely yield the right talent as compared to targeting ‘Sales and management’, ‘automotive’ or ‘specializing in automotive sales’. 

• Crude job descriptions, current vacancies and annual event conference posts are commonly seen posts by businesses that have no social media etiquette. Not only do these become irrelevant they also project a poor sense of social media understanding.

• Always ensure that job listings do not go up with just a job description like conventional job boards. Instead show what the role feels like on a typical day using videos and images which is possible on most social platforms.

• Having a social presence for a business does not always have to be about hiring. Why not share what your business has done for the community? Also share the fun side of the company where employees go out for the day or celebrate major milestones in the company. These social aspects of the company though subtle have a big effect when shared online as it personalizes your employer brand and makes it relatable to people.

• Companies are prone to apply their job openings everywhere and anywhere on social platforms today due to HR not being socially savvy. 

• HR departments do it to receive as many applications as possible. But each platform has native features which make it unique to others and require a different approach. For example, facebook allows pictures, video and text but twitter restricts characters to 280 and allows a link or image in a single post, which requires smart thinking as to how businesses post content.

• As suggested earlier, targeting the right audience is the first step to hiring the right talent 

• Next, the HR team must consistently learn the nuances of different social media platforms or at least the platforms where the target audience is likely to be active and accordingly craft content and social campaigns to relate to this community.

• As HR departments select social media platforms to engage with, there may be a tendency to focus on social platforms where the HR personnel feels most comfortable and that he/she may relate to. This may not always yield successful results as platforms must be chosen according to target audience density and their engagement in that platform.



Solution

• By ensuring careful groundwork is in put in to identify key platforms and engagement rates of the target audience on these platforms, businesses can have a better idea of areas where efforts can be focused.

Creating an impact on social media today is vital as it becomes one arm of a dynamic company, through which it can tell the world its story and what they can offer. Hence it is vital to understand the features of each of these platforms and strategize accordingly for content creation, hiring as well as connecting with clients.