- There is a vacancy in your marketing department. You create a job description and put it up on every job portal as well as on the career page of your website. After that, you spend day after day going through resumes and weeks thereafter interviewing candidates! This is how it has been for ages! There has to be a better way to find the right candidate for the job without having to go through the tiresome motions every single time there is a vacancy.
- Well, you can get creative with your hiring. Deploy some unique strategies to attract viable candidates to your company rather than waiting around for them to find you. Here are a few that you can include in your hiring efforts:
Unique Hiring Techniques:
- Mobile Recruitment
Mobile phones are like an additional limb that no one can do without anymore. From young children to well-established business owners, everyone uses mobiles. So, it’s only natural that the candidates you are looking for are easier to reach via mobile phones.
Moreover, candidates expect a certain level of communication and mobiles are the easiest way to meet this expectation. Moreover, there are shocking statistics that show a marked increase in the use of mobile devices when it comes to job searches.
- 45% of candidates apply for a job using their mobile phones.
- 68% of job seekers between the ages of 18 and 25 use their mobiles for job searches.
- 72% of job seekers want to receive career opportunity information on their mobile phones.
These statistics drive home the importance of being accessible on mobile devices and how it affects recruitment. Making your hiring process mobile-friendly simplifies and accelerates it while giving you a better reach. Some things you can do to make recruitment mobile-friendly are:
- Ensure a mobile-friendly website
- Ensure all the links – the ads as well as any links on the career page – work properly and don’t take too long to load
- Keep track of the mobile traffic on the career page of your website
- Use texting to keep the candidates up-to-date and informed
- Use texting to inform candidates of new opportunities and vacancies
- Use newsletter subscriptions and notification updates to keep candidates informed
Page after page of applications and long-drawn processes are no longer enough to attract and keep candidates interested. To find the top candidates, you must keep up with the times and optimise your recruitment process for mobile phones.
Finding & Recruiting Passive Candidates
- Passive candidates in the recruitment industry are the ones who are not actively looking for a change or a new opportunity but are still open to it. These are individuals who are happy and content in their current positions. Finding passive candidates is certainly a challenge but one that pays off very well in the long run. They are highly skilled and the perfect fit for challenging positions which are the hardest to fill.
Popular social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Instagram each boast of billions of users and amongst these are the passive candidates that are perfect for your organisation. However, reaching and connecting with these candidates is a whole other challenge. Some of the things you can do are:
- Connect with them through direct message (DM) or as the millennials call it, “slide into their DMs.”
- Use targeted social media filters to scope out the right candidates. For example, you can use keywords like “content writer” with a location “Bengaluru, India” on LinkedIn if that’s the position you’re looking to hire for.
- Several automated software solutions are available in the market that can help you track the candidates that you have connected with and keep in touch with them for future possibilities.
- Regular emailers and updates can help you become memorable for passive candidates.
Text Messages
Text messages are an extension of mobile recruitment and while it is quite self-explanatory, text messaging is one of the simplest ways to reach and remain connected with passive candidates. Candidates respond to text messages more often than they do emails.
While text messages are not the most conventional method of reaching candidates, it is very effective to maintain communication. After all, people are more accessible on their phones.
Open House Events
Open house events are great to showcase your company culture. Invite candidates to your office and allow them to see how the organisation works. Potential candidates will get an understanding of your company’s work culture, values, mission, vision, employee satisfaction and much more. They will get a first-hand look at the company and see for themselves whether or not they will fit in.
Another way to organise an open house event is at colleges. You can showcase your organisation to the graduating class and help them decide on joining you. It is a great way to scout fresh talent and gather information about the newbies joining the industry. You can then keep track of their career trajectory and invite them to join your organisation as and when the opportunity arises.
Gamification of the Hiring Process
Gone are the days when a recruiter only looked at the candidate’s resume while hiring. It is common to assess a candidate’s skill and put their practical knowledge to the test before hiring. The problem is candidates often lose interest mid-way through. You can very easily keep the candidates engaged and assess their skills at the same time if you gamify the process. It is a creative recruitment process that is very effective. Better yet, there are software tools that help you gamify the recruitment process.
Hiring Happy Hours
Hiring happy hours are quite similar to an open house but they are a lot less formal. While an open house is organised and run by the recruitment team, hiring happy hours can also include employees from different teams. You can show off your office and the company culture as the employees mingle with the candidates.
Your hiring managers can also participate and conduct informal interviews to gauge how well a candidate will fit into the organisation. This strategy works especially well when you are looking to hire for multiple positions and in volumes.
Creative Use of Social Media
Social media platforms have many uses and one of them is for recruitment. It doesn’t exactly come under the category of an unconventional method of recruitment but it can be if you choose to be creative with it.
Companies like Zomato and Swiggy have copywriters who are extremely witty and have made a name for themselves on their personal social media profiles. They share quirky and interesting content on their personal Instagram and Twitter profiles which is loved by many. A candidate who follows these witty employees would love to work alongside them and reach out to the companies. With their permission, you can make them a kind of brand ambassador for the organisation.
We live in an ever-changing world and if you wish to hire the best, the same old recruitment techniques will not always be fruitful. You must think out of the box and get creative with your hiring so as to make sure you don’t get stuck with employees who don’t fit well into the company. Deploy some of these strategies and see how they work for you.
Partner With a Good Recruitment Agency
Forget the “tried and tested” methods – partnering with a good recruitment agency is a strategic advantage in today’s talent war. They bring a fresh perspective and a wider talent pool to the table, leveraging their extensive network and experienced recruiters to source the perfect fit. Additionally, recruitment agencies excel at employer branding, attracting top candidates with a compelling company image. This proves especially valuable for hard-to-fill roles or niche skill sets. Essentially, a good recruitment agency acts as an extension of your in-house team, providing creative strategies, timely execution, and valuable advice throughout the hiring process.
