Jobcast Team

It has been established here on Jobcast how Facebook has become an effective platform for recruiters. This is especially true now, with more job seekers turning to Facebook for job postings than ever. Companies that are not active on the popular social media channel are missing out on opportunities to attract the best talent. However, some organizations that do have a presence on Facebook may not be utilizing it the right way. As discussed previously on this site, the ideal content ratio for job postings should only be 25%, while the rest must focus on other relevant topics. These include tips on how to get hired, as well as fun or lifestyle content. With only one-fourth of your material dedicated to job postings, recruiters must make sure that these career-related posts count.

Videos and Images Over Text

When it comes to content, video is king. Facebook statistics from Social Media Today reveal that video posts have 135% greater organic reach than photo posts. If it’s within budget, recruiters should utilize the video format to capture the interests of potential talent. For instance, the video content could use creative motion graphics to show the responsibilities handled by a certain position. If videos are not possible, then opt for photo posts since they are a better alternative than pure text posts. Social media users are generally more visually oriented, so videos and images should take priority in terms of the type of content a company should put out.

Clear and Compelling Messaging

A “We’re Hiring” Facebook post should follow basic advertising fundamentals, as a company may have only one or two seconds to pique the interest of a candidate. This means content with broad messaging won’t be very effective. A good hiring post should be able to clearly convey key points, such as the specific position needed and the exact location of assignment (in case your company has several branches).

Sharing Insider Information

When it comes to attracting job seekers, recruiters are not limited to “We’re hiring” posts. They can explore other types of content, like testimonials from employees. A post could highlight an employee’s experience as well as his or her growth within a company. One could also focus on content about the work environment or behind-the-scenes stories. This information can help job candidates visualize their future in the business, thus increasing the chances of them applying.

Speaking the Language

Consider the audience. If the recruiter is tasked to look for millennial candidates, then the content should include topics that interest them. The Globe and Mail shared some insights on how companies can recruit millennials, stating that they should emphasize mentorship and career development. Millennial job seekers are generally eager to hone their craft, and thus would be interested in companies that can provide them the necessary resources and training. For instance, a marketing company may share information about sponsorships for employees’ continuing education and personal development. This could be a great way to lure talent who are hungry to learn.

Ad Targeting

Utilizing Facebook Ads is perhaps the most efficient way to reach top talent. Facebook has numerous features that make it easier for recruiters to specify the users they want to serve their ads to. However, Facebook has a constantly evolving algorithm, and it may take a while to come up with a definitive strategy that yields the best results. Social media specialists Ayima suggest several key Facebook targeting steps you should consider, such as choosing an audience that’s neither too niche nor too broad. Ideally, recruiters will want to talk to people who are most likely to engage with an ad, and defining a relevant audience can help them achieve that. Once the target user profile is decided, recruiters can leave it to Facebook’s algorithm to reach potentially valuable audiences for your posting.

Keeping these tips in mind can improve the quality and performance of a company’s recruitment posts on Facebook. That said, recruiters who don’t work to maximize this massive platform’s potential are already way behind.

Article composed by Charlotte York
 for jobcast.net

When you want to improve employee communication with stronger communication tools, it's time to look at ways to prioritize communication. 2018 is going to be the year your company grows, and you have to prepare your HR department with the tools necessary to meet the growing demands on their time. When your HR department is able to complete effective communication, time is saved. Employees can ask questions, request time off, or receive their work schedules through text messaging, emails and phone calls. When you want 2018 to be the year your company improves communication, it's time to listen, pay attention, and take advantage of technology.

Make Scheduling Easier

If your HR department is responsible for scheduling a large number of employees into various shifts, you can make scheduling easier. If you have an employee who needs to call out at the last minute, this can be done through text message marketing. When you have a shift that you need to fill at the last minute, a quick blast out to all of your employees will get the shift filled fast. You won't have to waste time calling each employee when you can send out a text message instead.

Make Meetings Run More Smoothly

When your HR department is setting up trainings or open enrollment meetings, preparation can make everything go more smoothly. Text messages are opened 98% of the time, and it is the most efficient way to get information to your employees. To maximize the effectiveness of a training, you can send out material to your employees to review before the meeting occurs. In order to keep your employees focused and make the job of your HR department easier, send out relevant texts before the meeting to keep everyone up to date with information.

Improve the Speed of Onboarding New Employees

Recruiting efforts can be made easier for HR, as well as onboarding new employees in 2018. When your HR department can receive and send text messages to potential recruits, gathering information to complete applications is easy. For new employees, managing new hire paperwork can be done through text messaging to allow for a faster, more efficient onboarding process.

Stay Organized and Keep Employees Safe

If you want to close for the day because of unsafe road conditions, let all of your employees know within minutes through SMS. When you send out a group message, you will keep everyone informed of the news to stay home. You will be organized, and each employee will know to stay at home and remain safe. Text messaging saves time and reaches everyone fast.

Open Up Lines of Communication

A company can only be as strong as the employees it hires. The leaders in your company need to have various ways to listen to employees. When two-way communication is allowed between workers, HR and administration, the lines of communication get stronger. Employees are able to voice concerns, while the HR department can send out surveys to ask for feedback. When in person meetings aren't possible, phone calls, SMS, video conferencing and emails will all increase communication. When you are ready to revolutionize how your HR department communicates in 2018, consider the technology available. Your employees are already using text messaging for their personal communications, and the ability to text with work is the next logical step. Phone calls are easier on mobile devices, and employees with mobile email can answer questions even when out in the field.

About the Author

Ken Rhie is the CEO of Trumpia, which earned a reputation as the most complete SMS solution including user-friendly user interface and API for mobile engagement, Smart Targeting, advanced automation, enterprise, and cross-channel features for both mass texting and landline texting use cases. Mr. Rhie holds an MBA degree from Harvard Business School. He has over 30 years of experience in the software, internet, and mobile communications industries.

In a world consumed by social media, where much of our lives are spent online, human resources departments need to ensure that they make the most of social media for a variety of duties that they need to fulfil.

Social media is incredibly popular, with platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram reaching milestone after milestone and still growing, while professional social media sites such as LinkedIn also continue to experience a successful growth story.

Facebook recently surpassed two billion monthly users, with almost a third of the world’s population using the site, while LinkedIn has around 467 million members who showcase their professional profiles or online CVs, and companies all over the globe are given a platform to interact with these users.

With those tremendous numbers in mind, it makes sense that human resources departments would be able to leverage social media in fundamental ways.

Talent acquisition

Any HR professional will attest to the difficulties they face when trying to find candidates with the skills and experience needed to fill a specific position within their company. Social media can play a key role in making this process more efficient, making it a proficient and convenient talent acquisition tool.

Employers need to embrace the advantages that social media affords their HR departments, specifically with reference to recruiting, as this can be accomplished on a much wider scale than traditional methods through the use of professional social networking platforms such as LinkedIn.

Cost effective and incredibly intuitive as a recruitment tool, social media allows a company’s human resources team to engage with a wider audience, target a quality pool of candidates and improve on the effectiveness of their recruitment efforts.

The simple truth is that a company wanting to be found by a large pool of talented candidates, or wanting access to that same pool of individuals, cannot ignore social media.

LinkedIn – Heaven-sent for HR professionals

While traditional recruitment methods often only target individuals who are actively looking for a new job, social media sites such as LinkedIn give the recruiter access to connect and communicate with a far larger, more diverse set of people who potentially fit the description of the ideal candidate.

With LinkedIn, for example, company pages can be used to post available jobs and users can apply directly to the company through the platform, with the process running seamlessly once a few simple details are made known about the position in question. This can be particularly valuable for positions that are hard to fill, as the way in which LinkedIn works ensures that the best candidates for any particular job are made aware of the position and its suitability to the person based on their skills, experience and ability within a chosen industry.

Job opportunities listed on LinkedIn can easily attract numerous applications from excellent candidates, based on the profile of the company and the details about the specific job. LinkedIn members also have a ‘Jobs’ tab at the top of the page to easily search through available work opportunities, ensuring that the best candidates are only a click away from finding out about a great position that some HR department has posted on the site.

This system is incredibly intuitive, and helps HR professionals to complete one of their most important tasks with robotic efficiency and very little effort. Even people who are not actively looking for something new in the job market can’t help but be informed about interesting available positions in their industry through newsletters from the site or their LinkedIn newsfeed, and that can end up being a win-win for both recruiter and the person who may decide to apply and set up their next career move.

Vetting candidates

While job seekers are monitoring company profiles on social networks in order to assist their decision-making, HR professionals should be doing the same to prospective candidates who they are considering for a position at their company.

Social media provides HR with a modern way to vet potential candidates. Screening applicants through their social profiles speeds up the hiring process and provides a better idea about who the candidate is. This assists in determining that the candidate will be the best fit for the position and the culture of the business.

Used well, social media as an HR tool can provide an excellent return on investment, thanks to lower costs and higher productivity associated with using social media to effectively recruit people.

Not just about using social media as a direct recruiting tool

In addition to the obvious assistance that social media provides in talent acquisition, human resources professionals can use the popular communication and business tool for other purposes that positively impact their companies in terms of reputation and corporate communication, indirectly assisting with recruitment strategies.

While some companies initially considered social media to be little more than a distraction for employees, many are now realising the power that lies within a system that is so closely intertwined into the fabric of our modern digital society, to the point where we carry these networks around with us all day on our indispensable mobile devices.

The realisation of this kind of power has meant that companies are increasingly appreciating the need to have an active and engaging corporate presence on social media in order to attract top professionals for open roles.

Reputation, culture and communication

One of the ways in which firms can attract top talent is by using social media to display the kind of corporate culture that will encourage top candidates to consider working at the company.

An organisation’s culture plays an important role in attracting and retaining quality talent. People looking for jobs aim to understand the culture of a business before they commit to joining, in order to see whether they will fit in with the culture and have the best chance of professional success and happiness.

Social media is a great communication tool, and many job seekers will look to company pages and profiles on various social media platforms to get a feel for the culture of the business. Communicating the company’s values and culture through social content is an important duty for HR managers to carefully consider and implement.

Social media provides a subtle yet powerful way in which a corporate culture can be publically displayed. Posts regarding team-building efforts, office gatherings, health and wellness initiatives or performance incentives can give job seekers an understanding of what working for the company will be like. Peoplehr blog is a good example of that where you can find all such kind of posts.

Creating a team-building hashtag on Twitter, posting photos from the office party or using an article on LinkedIn to congratulate high performing staff can all be effective ways to demonstrate an organisation’s culture through social media.

Successfully managing the reputation of an organisation is another of the tasks that fall onto the shoulders of HR managers. An active social media presence in itself can present a company as innovative and engaging, and this is precisely what a company should aim to do as part of reputation management.

Nobody wants to work for a company that has a bad reputation, and many job seekers will turn down a job with a company that they perceive negatively, even if that person is unemployed. For this reason, HR should be monitoring social media for mentions, especially when it comes to what former, current and potential employees are saying about the company.

When appropriate, an HR representative can take part in the conversation, but special care should be taken when controversial or negative conversations are being dealt with. Companies need to monitor their social channels closely to ensure that their positive reputation is maintained.

Even if a company has an excellent corporate culture internally, monitoring and responding to negative mentions, comments and other social media content directed at the company is crucial to maintaining a good reputation and safeguarding future recruitment possibilities.

Social media has undoubtedly transformed the way we communicate in our personal lives, and now companies are beginning to realise the strategic value that social media can bring to talent acquisition and other important HR functions.

About the Author

Peter Pedroncelli is a South African journalist based in Johannesburg with a specialisation in media studies. He writes and edits content for a variety of magazines and websites on topics related to social media and business.

An all-star employee will have the skills and the drive to exceed your expectations. They’ll also have the personality to fit in well with your company culture. They can help to grow your business, embody your brand and become part of the next generation of leaders within your company.

But attracting talent like this is easier said than done. Here are a few tips for hiring an all-star employee:

Promote Your Brand The companies with the best talent have a knack for promoting their brand. They sell their business as a great place to work – somewhere the company culture is second to none and where employees are able work on cutting edge initiatives within dynamic teams. You need to promote your employer brand if you want to attract all-star employees.

Create a Talent Pool If you’re on the lookout for top talent, the search should never end. Create a talent pool of previous applicants and allow people with an interest in your company to register their details too. It might be that the right opportunity isn’t available for a candidate at the moment but one could arise further down the line.

Offer Opportunities for Creativity and Initiative The best applicants love an opportunity to flex their creative muscle and work on their own initiative. Whilst this is unlikely to be possible all of the time, be sure to let applicants know that there is time designated for a little exploration and experimentation during each working week. This is an appealing factor for potential employees and may also give your company the edge as a little creative thinking could lead to your company’s next big idea.

Provide Employee Perks Employee rewards are a great way to improve employee morale and win over a top candidate too. Sure, big things like a decent pension plan, health insurance and child care vouchers are important. But a few smaller perks never go amiss. Complimentary snacks, fun team-building days or even just showers at the office for those who run or cycle to work can all make your company seem that bit more attractive.

Be Ethical Workers these days want more than just a day job and a pay packet. They want to feel like they’re helping to make a difference. Try to be forward thinking in your approach to business. A recycling initiative or links with a local charity or an ethical approach to conducting business could help you to attract top talent. These are the people who will care that their work contributes to the good of communities and environments.

Be Flexible Increasingly people aren’t prepared to be a slave to their job. Companies and employees alike should be striving for a good work-life balance rather than high levels of stress that lead to a burnout. Flexibility with regards the working hours and days can help employees to achieve this and can help you to attract that all-star candidate. To put this into practice you could let employees work from home sometimes,introduce flexible working hours or encourage employees not to answer emails away from the office.

Embrace Diversity Remember that not all candidates fit into a designated box. By embracing diversity you could open up your company to a whole host of potential employees with the ability to further your business and drive success. Workplace diversity has been shown to reap a number of rewards for businesses who are prepared to make it a priority.

To hire an all-star employee, you need to look at your business from the ground up. Your company culture, your employer brand and your recruitment style all play an important part in getting those top candidates through your door.

Sarah Kearns is a hard working mother of three daughters. She is a Senior Communications Manager for BizDb, an online resource with information about businesses in New Zealand. She loves cooking, reading history books and writing about green living.

Facebook is a great tool to connect with everyone from your family and friends to any of the other 1.65 billion monthly active users on the site. Did you know that there are hundreds of millions of Facebook Groups that you can join? With that much reach and potential, it’s no surprise that Facebook Groups present a great opportunity to share your job postings with tons of people who share common interests with you and your company.

Jobcast knows that more and more people are using Groups to look for new jobs and further their careers. To help you take advantage of this, we’ve introduced a new feature:

You can now share job postings to Facebook Groups directly from your Jobcast Dashboard!

To start using your Facebook Groups network, just follow these easy steps:

1. Choose any of your job postings and click “Share Job”.

2. Under “Pick Your Networks,” choose “Facebook Group”.

3. Follow the prompts to log into Facebook and then simply choose which group you want to share to.

4. Write a message to include when you share this link.

5. That’s it – you’ve just shared your job with everyone in your Facebook group!

Start sharing jobs to your Facebook Groups!

Log in to your Jobcast account today!

Here at Jobcast, our product development team is always looking to build and improve on our product and now, it’s easier than ever to manage your Jobcast account with our newly redesigned Dashboard!

Our users have spoken and we have listened. We know that these are the Jobcast features that you use the most, so we’ve put them on the front page and given you easy access:

• Post a New Job

    – We know that you want to start finding candidates so we’ve added quick access to add your latest job opening.

• Manage Current Jobs

   – Have you found a great new employee through Jobcast? Great – just click from the Dashboard to update or close your current job postings.

• Invite Your Team

  – Give members of your recruitment or management team to Jobcast, it’s as easy as sending them an email.

• Go to your Career Page

  – Want to check in on your Facebook page or your mobile career site? One click will take you directly to your Career page.

• Switch Companies

  – Are you a recruiter managing different companies or a serial entrepreneur? Easily switch between your different Jobcast company accounts from your Dashboard!

…all from one page!

Want to see the changes for yourself?

Log in to your Jobcast account today!