4 ways to attract the right candidates to your job

by in Digital Marketing, Recruitment Marketing

Attracting candidates to the right job can be extremely hard. Online advertising, in general, has become such a saturated place, let alone the number of job adverts that are posted online daily. However, with the candidate pool having a mixture of people with different skill sets, there are always potential candidates out there. The problem is getting yours seen by the right people to gain quality applications. With that being said, here are 4 ways to attract the right candidates:

Job Advert Copy

The content quality of a job advert is just as important as advertising for the job position itself. You wouldn’t want someone to view the job and be disinterested by the content of the job description. The job needs to stand out and gain interest immediately.

The first 100 words in your job advert count. The top part of the advert is often read first and often determines whether a reader will continue to read until the end, so you should make it compelling and interesting with information which appeals to the candidate.

When you write a job advert and post it on to the various job boards, it’s important to think about which fields you fill out. For example, you need to make sure you use a relevant job industry in your job advert to be searchable on the job site.

90% of Job Seekers Use Mobile in Their Job Search

90% of Job Seekers Use Mobile in Their Job Search (UnderCoverRecruiter) which means people are increasingly turning to online to search for jobs. It’s important to apply an SEO strategy in any job advert that you write. Keyword research is key to optimise your job description to make it searchable on job boards and search engines. Once you’ve pinpointed the necessary skills and qualifications and also add relevant keywords, your job will be able to reach the right potential candidates.

Increase Your Employer Brand

Employer brand can make the difference between someone accepting the job with your company or not. According to Glassdoor, a weak employer brand can cost you job applicants and also according to Upwork, 40% of Millennials take employer brand into consideration before applying to a job. Therefore, owning your brand can be vitally important in securing candidates.

Fortunately, promoting your brand has never been easier with the internet. Whatever your brand model may be, highlighting your culture and work ethics will attract candidates. Some businesses identify as a quirky personal brand, showcasing this with their company website and images. Other companies show off their corporate business with official images and simple professional website design.

Here are some of the things you could consider:

  •  Social Media – Social media can reach broad audiences allowing you to send out posts that reflect the business culture, objectives and services.
  • Company Pitch – This can be displayed on your website easily but a company pitch allows the potential candidate to see what the company values and ambitions are.
  •  Reviews – Reviews from past and present employees and can really help to provide insight into what the company is like.

Consequently, own your employer brand and really promote it in everything you do. This could potentially be the selling point to attract the right candidate.

Invest In Your Recruitment Advertising

Investing time, effort and money into your recruitment advertising will help you target the quality candidates you seek. If you are hiring for a certain job role which requires particular skills and qualifications, you should focus on advertising the job in places that are of interest to that type of person. If the location is key for the job role, then focusing your advertising in that geographical location would be best to attract the right candidates.

Investing in alternative ways to recruit people will create an innovative hiring process. Displaying your job advert in a unique way rather than just putting an advert on a job board will go a long way toward attracting more potential candidates.

An example would be using Facebook Advert Manager to create a campaign in which you can target people by interests, demographics and location. Adverts can be different with the use of videos, images and canvas to creatively engage your audience.

Only 20% of companies have mobile-optimized career sites

Mobile is one of the main technologies we use today. Interestingly, only 20% of companies have mobile-optimised career sites (UnderCoverRecruiter). There are many different ways you can target candidates but it’s important to make sure that when you advertise on a website its optimised for all users on all devices.

When it comes to your job advertising on job boards, investing more may improve your hires. Alternative advertising on job sites can also get your jobs seen by the best candidates. Sponsored job adverts and featured employers are some of the ways to get your job seen. The placement of these ads makes your job easily seen in search results.

Allow Employees To Recruit For You

The people that you already have in your workplace could have great connections and networks. Use this to its full advantage and gain interest in your job from quality candidates referred by your employees. If your workers like their working environment and work benefits provided by you, they are more likely to share this with their friends and family. Happy employees are also typically more likely to encourage spreading good word-of-mouth about the company and encourage people they may know to apply for open jobs within the company.

If your company participates in trade shows or exhibitions, these can be a great opportunity to meet not only potential clients but also to meet potential candidates. Encourage current employees to develop relationships with potential employees and invite your team to tap into their social networks and academic connections to search for candidates.

With all this being said, one of the best ways to encourage employees to help recruit for a position within the company is to set up an incentive. In most companies, employee referrals are rewarded with cash bonuses or vouchers.

Finding the right candidates for your jobs can, therefore, be very difficult, time-consuming and expensive. Investing in your job advert exposure, the context of the job advert, referrals or highlighting your employer brand can all help towards targeting a more relevant audience and therefore better quality candidates.