If you’re like the majority of HR professionals and recruiters that we meet, then you’ve recently taken on the task of social recruiting.

In today’s candidate-driven market, more companies than ever have turned to social in order to broaden their candidate attraction strategy.

Learning how to effectively and consistently attract qualified candidates via social media is the contemporary HR struggle.

And the struggle is real!

If you, like so many of the people that reach out to us, are struggling to make social recruiting work then these tips are for you.

5 Key Success Factors for Attracting Candidates on Social Media

These are the best practices that we see contribute most to our clients’ achieving their social recruiting goals time and time again.

1) Use photos, pictures, and video

Images boost social media engagement.

Visually appealing content gets more shares, clicks, and favourites than any other kind. So including images with your job posts is a surefire way to attract more applicants.

This is part of a growing trend to make recruitment more like marketing.

Our most successful users add YouTube videos to their Facebook Career Sites, Tweet photos, and share memes to their LinkedIn.

2) Make Your Words Count

Another way in which recruitment is becoming more like marketing is the copy being used for job ads and employer branding.

Boring job ads do not attract candidates.

Smart, engaging copy is what sells your jobs and your employer brand to potential hires.

Use exciting language, be direct, and add humour whenever possible!

Save specific requirements for the job description and focus on key points for your social shares.

Quickly sum up who you are looking for, then focus on why your company should be their first choice, and then finish with a call to action that prompts them to apply ASAP.

This simple formula works for writing effective job posts that convert on social media.

3) Use targeted ad campaigns

Social recruiting can be free, but you’ll get much better results if you’re willing to allocate some funds to Facebook Ads.

Organic reach has declined in response to the growing number of companies flocking to social media.

Targeted ads are the best way to counter this decline.

Take your best content and most important to fill jobs and turn them into targeted ads for Facebook and/or your target candidates’ other main social networks.

These ads will help you reach a huge talent pool that print ads and job boards do not. They will also help grow your employer brand and your social media audience.

If you’re not sure how to get started with social media ads, here’s a paper that explains how to create and use Facebook Ads for social recruiting.

And here’s an excellent blog post by John Loomer explaining how to budget for Facebook Ads.

4) Prioritize mobile

A substantial amount of job seekers conduct their search via mobile device.

71% of social media use is mobile, 86 percent of active candidates use their smartphone to begin a job search, and 70 percent of active candidates want to apply via mobile (Source).

You must make mobile a part of your social recruiting strategy!

Thankfully, all 3 of the previous tips will help you reach mobile job seekers.

Mobile friendly social recruiting is visual, includes short concise copy and employs targeted ads.

Facebook Ads perform 10% higher on mobile devices than they do on desktop and improve CTR (click through rate) by approximately 29 percent.

But, if your application process is not mobile-friendly, then you risk alienating the mobile applicants that your social recruiting strategy attracts.

At Jobcast, we’ve solved this problem by making it possible for applicants to upload resume directly from their Android device or by using Dropbox for iOS.

We also encourage our users to create a social recruiting call to action and pin it to the top of their Facebook Timeline.

Here’s a bit more about how Jobcast makes social recruiting mobile-friendly.

5) Emphasize employer brand

People are more likely to engage with companies that they know and trust.

This is as true for recruiting as it is for marketing.

When job seekers see other people engage with your company online it makes them more inclined to do the same.

This is called social trust and it’s a powerful way get more applications from qualified candidates.

The more recognizable and likeable your online employer brand is the more social trust you’ll build and the more applicants you’ll attract.

To build a recognizable employer brand make sure that all of your branding is consistent.

Use the same company colours, logos, and language for all of the content you share, on all of your social networks, and on your company website.

You’ll also want to share tons of positive content about your company and your employees as well as job posts.

Check out this article for more about what steps you need to take to improve your online employer brand.

If have tips for better social recruiting, please let us know in the comments!

Candidate experience should be a core consideration at every stage of the recruitment and hiring process. Social recruiting, mobile-friendly application, and video interviewing should enhance the candidate’s experience as well as the talent acquisition process. I’ve highlighted these three aspects of hiring because each of them speak to how today’s candidate wants to be recruited.

56% of candidates now turn to social media first when commencing their job search, 9 in 10 job seekers are looking for work via mobile device, and 66% of candidates prefer video interviewing to the traditional. Candidates want to be able to connect with companies through social networks, they want to apply for a job from their phone, and they want the option to interview via video. Excellent candidate experience is all about giving the candidate what they want (at least within reason!)

How Do Candidates Want to Be Recruited?

- By Axel Andersen @axelandersen

Are you trying to attract candidates by offering fancy job titles and goodie bags? If you are, then according to Axel Andersen, you might need to rethink your strategy! In this post, Axel discusses the latest findings from LinkedIn and what those findings can teach us about how candidates want to be recruited.

3 Integral Ways to Better Personalize the Candidate Experience

- By Chris Brablc @cbrablc The current job market is candidate driven, which means companies need to pull out every tool in their toolbox in order to attract qualified applicants. Talent analytics is one such tool. Chris explains how companies can use data to create better more personalized experiences for candidates.

4 Ways to Efficiently Schedule Candidate Interviews

- By Emily Tatum @ETphonehome91 Try as it might, technology has not solved the frustration that is scheduling. Scheduling meetings is an unpleasant part of life for everyone, but it can be an especially frustrating experience when it comes to interviewing. This is especially true when the interviewee is currently employed. Emily Tatum has 4 great suggestions for improving the interview scheduling experience and the candidate’s experience as a whole.

Stop Lying To Candidates: Here's a Good Way To Tell Them Why They Didn't Get The Job…

- By Kris Dunn @Kris_Dunn Despite popular belief, a candidate’s experience doesn’t end when you decide not to hire them. Candidates that don’t make the cut for one position may be a perfect fit for a future job opening. Even if you are certain that a particular candidate should never be employed at your company, or any other, they may have friends you’d love to hire. If you burn your bridges with the undesirable applicant, then chances are they will tell their colleagues, friends, and connections about it! Kris Dunn explains how to tell candidates they didn’t get the job in the best possible way.

10 Funny Images That Perfectly Sum Up Recruitment

- By Sophie Deering @sophiedeering How does this contribute to candidate experience? Laughing is the best antidote for a bad mood and happy recruiters, hiring managers, and interviewers makes for happy hiring :D

There are over 1.44 billion monthly active users on Facebook, according to the social network’s first quarter 2015 earnings announcement. Facebook is now up to 936 million total daily active users and has 798 million mobile daily users!

Facebook just keeps on growing as does the amount of hiring managers and recruiters turning to Facebook to reach candidates and share their job openings.

Social recruiting is rapidly becoming an essential part of hiring strategy and Facebook is the major network being used by companies, such as Pepsi and the Gap, to spearhead their social recruiting efforts.

Facebook recruiting is particularly relevant today as millennials continue to take over the labour market.

Does Facebook Recruiting Actually Work

The line between passive and active candidates has blurred to the point of near irrelevance. These days, everyone’s a candidate!

And, these days, everyone’s on Facebook.

To keep up with the competition and win the war for talent, companies must adapt to the millennial way of thinking about and looking for work. They must have an employer brand presence on Facebook.

What 1,355 Millennial Candidates Want in a Job

Most of the Jobcast blog readers are already savvy enough to know that Facebook recruiting is an awesome way to reach top talent, but it never hurts to be reminded of why we do the things we do!

Nor does it hurt to revisit some of the keys to running successful Facebook recruiting campaigns.

3 critical things all companies should be doing for Facebook recruiting:

1. Start with Employer Brand.

Your employer brand is how your company’s values, purpose and corporate culture are perceived on the social web.

Your employer brand helps ensure that job seekers know what your company is all about and whether or not they are a good fit. It’s also what will attract top talent to apply for your jobs.

You need to communicate all of the perks being employed at your company has to offer and show job seekers that your company is a place where they can grow.

Your employer brand must also be consistent in the way that it is communicated across all of your social networks and on your company website. This communication should involve not only words, but also photos and video!

5 Innovative Ways to Build Employer Brand

2. Social Means Getting Everyone Involved.

Facebook recruiting success is not possible if you ignore the social part of the network!

The most effective way to reach top talent, communicate your employer brand, and get more high-quality applications is to get your employees/colleagues involved.

Ask for their help!

“When you ask for support, you are trusting in others, which strengthens the trust between you and your supporters.” – Lorie Corcuera

You’ll be surprised by just how eager most people are to lend a hand.

Have employees spread the word that your company is an awesome place to work. Encourage them to post on their Facebook Timelines and the Company Page’s Timeline about their work and the office culture, share photos and engage with job seekers.

People are significantly more likely to consider a job if they hear about it from someone that they know, so capitalize on all of the social connections that your employees have.

3. Share, Comment, Like, Engage.

Content marketing plays a huge role in social recruitment.

Your company should be marketing itself by putting out a variety of written and visual content about accomplishments, events, and awards and sharing this content on Facebook.

You’ll also want to share links to other people’s content that is interesting to the candidates you are targeting.

11 Content Ideas for Social Recruiting

But on top of pushing content out, you also need to engage if you want to draw job seekers in!

Joining Facebook groups, liking other people’s content, commenting on posts, and engaging with anyone who reached out to your company via Facebook is an essential part of building a well-rounded social presence.

The more positive exposure and engagement that you cultivate for your company, the more your content will be shared and the more qualified candidates will want to connect with your company online.

The rules of work have changed a lot since I got my first real job. It used to be that I had to commute to my job, dress up nicely, and arrive at 8am sharp every morning. These days my work life looks very different... I’m working right now. I am also sitting on my couch wearing slippers. Some days I start at 5am and I'm done by 4pm. Some days I start at noon and work late into the night. Most of my meetings take place on Skype, and our team projects are managed with Basecamp and Trello instead of whiteboards and memos. And my commute is non existent save the occasional bike ride to a near by cafe or coworking space. Some of these changes are extremely welcome (goodbye high-heeled business lady shoes!) Some of these changes are not so great (goodbye coffee break chats with sassy coworkers!) But, love it or hate it, this is a new reality for many of us. Ross Perlin recently wrote an interesting piece for Fast Co. in which he says that these “new rules [of work] belong to another universe—flexible, precarious, and entrepreneurial, less and less tied to specific times, places, and employers.”

These Are The New Rules of Work

- By Ross Perlin

The article provides 5 examples of how work is changing, for better or worse. Perlin’s article is quite controversial and, as such, warrants dialogue and response, which it got from this Blogging4Jobs article:

5 New Rules for the World of Work

- By Mike Haberman

Mike agrees that there is a general shift towards the way of working that Perlin describes, but argues that he is likely overstating the size of that shift.

3 Keys to Effective Branding in a Millennial World

- By Maren Kate Donovan

One of the reasons how we work is changing is that the generation of workers has changed significantly. Millennials work differently and they need to be recruited differently as Maren’s article explains.

5 Scientifically-Backed Ways to Increase Job Tweet Reach

- By Greg Rokos

Researchers at Cornell University conducted a study backed by the National Science Foundation to measure sentences based on construction, rhetoric and keywords to determine which tweets get shared more than others. Greg explains how to improve your Twitter recruiting based on their research.

How to Optimise Your LinkedIn Company Page for SEO

- By Sophie Deering

Once you’ve optimized your Tweets, why not hop on over to your LinkedIn Company Page and get it up to speed as well?! Check out Sophie’s article to learn how. Actually… I think I’m going to head over the our LinkedIn Page and make a few changes too!

Jobcast is one of the top three companies nominated for BCTIA’s Most Promising Startup award.

We are very excited about this nomination and the perks that come along with it!

One such perk was the recent article about Jobcast featured on Techvibes, Canada’s leading technology news site, events calendar, and job board.

In the article author Jonathan Woods highlights some of the key benefits of social recruiting and Jobcast. He also interviewed Jobcast’s CEO, Ryan St. Germaine about why he thinks social is the future of recruitment.

Here’s a snippet from Jonathan’s post:

Jobcast Transforms Recruitment in Age of Social

“Social is the new major channel for career success and talent recruitment.

Jobcast, a Facebook Recruiting App that makes it possible for employers and recruiters to build fully branded career sections on their company Facebook Page, plans to capitalize on this.”

Read the rest of the article, Jobcast Transforms Recruitment in Age of Social, on Techvibes!

Working with Facebook is both a blessing and a curse. You probably feel the same way as you try to navigate Facebook recruiting! You love the volume of job seekers that Facebook gives you access to, the ability to share job postings and recruiting videos, and the opportunity to highlight your brand. If you’re anything like me, you hate the constantly shifting rules, disappearing features, and declining organic reach! One specific thing that all Jobcast users and Facebook app developers struggle with is that Facebook hides third party apps from their mobile users. Our clients and other companies with Facebook Career Sites find this extremely frustrating as it makes it difficult for them to advertise their Facebook Career Site to mobile job seekers. And we all know that mobile recruiting is essential!

In response to Facebook playing hide and seek with our users’ Career Tabs, we added a mobile-friendly custom URL feature to Jobcast. Your custom URL is smart, so it can tell if a job seeker is using a mobile device or desktop. When the job seeker is using a mobile device, they are directed to a mobile-friendly version of your Facebook Career Site. Once the job seeker lands on your FB Career Site they can browse your jobs, and even apply directly from their mobile phone by using Dropbox (iOS & Android) or the upload button (Android.)

Check out this tutorial to learn how to create your mobile-friendly custom URL with Jobcast But you still need to advertise your custom URL to the mobile job seekers that land on your Facebook Page. Here’s how: Create a post that advertises your Facebook Career Site and pin it to the top of your Timeline! Start with a nice large image that fits your brand well. I like to use Pixabay.com for this because the images are free to use for commercial purposes (always make sure that your images are legal to use!)

Then find yourself an image editing tool. I usually go with Photoshop, but unless you do a lot of graphic design I would recommend using Canva instead. Canva is an excellent tool for making all kinds of great graphics for social recruiting! Use this tool to add text to the image that you’ve selected that let’s people know that you are hiring or that you’re company is a great place to work. Here’s an example of how to do this using Canva. Select Facebook Post from their templates:

Upload your chosen image:

Then add your text by choosing either the simple text editor or a template:

Download your image and save it somewhere safe :D

Now go to your Facebook Page and create a Post that features your custom URL and instructs job seekers to click the link and view your job posts:

Add your image and then click Post:

Once you have shared your post, click on the little grey arrow at the top right of the post and select “Pin to Top”:

A small bookmark symbol will now appear at the top right of your post and it will remain pinned to the top of your Page’s Timeline for 7 days:

After that it will return to the date that it was published. You now have the option to re-pin this post to the top of your Page or to create a brand new post advertising your Facebook Career Site. If you have the time, we suggest creating a new post to keep your content diverse and interesting!

LinkedIn threw HRTech software providers and many employers for a loop last week when they implemented changes to their API that restricts the use of their “Apply With LinkedIn” feature.

But us tech nerds aren’t the only ones struggling with LinkedIn these days.

According to Irina Shamaeva anyone using LinkedIn’s “Job Posting” feature to recruiting is at risk of alienating potential hires by no fault of their own.

Why You Lose Potential Candidates with LinkedIn Job Posts – Posted by Irina Shamaeva @braingain

“While professionals may consider changing jobs for many reasons other than money, the salary is one of the most important factors. If you post jobs on LinkedIn, you need to be aware of the salary information, automatically communicated to your potential applicants.”

In her article Irina explains how LinkedIn includes estimated salary information provided by Pascale.com with job posts and in the LinkedIn advanced job search dialogue and why this may be losing you applicants!

I do give LinkedIn props for featuring her piece in their “Recruiting & Hiring” channel 😀

Data Reveals How Candidates Want to be Recruited – Alyssa Sittig

Another thing I think LinkedIn deserves recognition for is their awesome use of infographics.

LinkedIn recently released their Talent Trends 2015 survey of 20, 000 professionals working in 29 different countries.

They then compiled the highlights from their survey in this Infographic.

How Workers Find Jobs Now – Peter Cappelli

If you love information like that released in LinkedIn’s survey, but prefer more objective sources, then this article is right up your alley.

Peter shares relevant information on the state of the labour force and the mindset of job seekers found in the most recent census.

How Social Recruiting Can Give You Advantage in Tight Job Market – By Jessica Miller-Merrell @jmillermerrell

Jessica explains how social presents a unique opportunity to reach, engage and relate to the candidate before they consider applying for a job.

She emphasizes the importance of using social to connect and build your employer brand in order to really capitalize on the unique benefits that social recruiting has to offer.

How to: Actually Engage Candidates You Source (As Proven by Science) – Holly Fawcett @HollyFawcett

Just how do you go about engaging with a job seeker that you randomly tracked down online?

If this is something that you struggle with, or an area where you feel that you could use a refresher, then you will love Holly’s article.

It’s full of awesome, science-backed advice for engaging candidates effectively.

That’s it for this week! If you have a blog post that you think we should feature, then let us know in the comments 😀

Over the next the next decade Baby Boomers will leave the work force en mass.

62% of Fortune 100 companies believe that this will lead to a skilled labour shortage that will negatively effect their organization.

Companies need to start planning ahead and gearing their human resources department, recruitment, and retention efforts towards qualified millennial candidates if they want to avoid the negative effects of this “Baby Boomer Brain Drain.”

Gen Y’s employment patterns contrast significantly with those of the generations before them. They are more likely to job hop than Boomers and have very different expectations of their employer.

Software Advice recently conducted a survey that studied a sample drawn from the 1,355 applications that they received for sales positions in 2013.

Software Advice asked all of their candidates to answer a few longer-form questions, including: “What is most important to you in a job?”

Here's what they found:

#1: Money Still Matters Most (But Not by Much)

Perhaps unsurprisingly, given that the U.S. is still recovering from an economic crisis, “Salary and Benefits” was the most important thing to our Gen Y sample when looking for a job (mentioned by 34 percent of applicants). However, money didn’t win by much: Salary and Benefits was ranked the most important characteristic by just three percentage points.

Interestingly, several of those applicants who ranked Salary and Benefits of lesser importance noted they had previously worked in a high-paying job—and had discovered that money wasn’t everything. It seems that compensation may be of diminishing importance as Gen Y workers garner more professional experience.

“I’ve realized that a good salary is not worth it if it means sacrificing your happiness or doing something that truly interests you,” read one such response.

Similarly, the rest of the data stands in contrast to what previous generations deemed most valuable. “Stability” came in near the bottom of the list (6 percent), and even seemingly-vital qualities such as “Work/Life Balance” and “Good Management” (4 percent each) paled in comparison to the importance of, for example, “Having a Strong Team and Co-Workers” (about 20 percent).

#2: Culture and Atmosphere

Second to compensation, “Culture and Atmosphere” was ranked the most important aspect of a new position by our sample Gen Y applicants (31 percent mentioned this). This data suggests that for Millennials, it’s not enough just to have a well-paying job—they also need to like where they work.

Many mentioned wanting to be in a “positive,” “pleasant” or “friendly” working environment. They also cited a desire for a company culture that was “challenging,” “dynamic” and focused on achievement and recognition.

#3: Fulfillment and Satisfaction in What I Do

Thirty percent of applicants cited a need for “Fulfillment and Satisfaction in What I Do,” making it the third most important quality for our sample. Those who mentioned this characteristic noted that they wanted to enjoy the work they were doing every day, and wanted to do something they had a personal interest in.

Responses included “having a passion for what I do,” “loving my job,” being involved with “meaningful work” and doing something “rewarding.”

#4: Growth and Development

Mentioned by 25 percent of applicants, “Growth and Development” was the fourth most important characteristic. Part of this may be due to the fact that Gen Y applicants are, by definition, on the younger side of the age spectrum: many cited a desire for “learning” or to gain more on-the-job “experience,” and noted they wanted to “advance [their] career.”

Others sought specific opportunities for upward mobility, while some mentioned wanting to be able to set and achieve professional goals.

Gen Y Wants More Than Just a (Pretty Big) Paycheck

What Gen Y really wants is to make a good living—but these young professionals also want to find happiness, fulfillment and opportunity in their work, and to build the foundation for a career that rewards in ways beyond the mere financial.

Our data aligns with other findings about Gen Y in the workplace. A recent survey of 500,000 employees between ages 19 and 30 listed the top 10 companies for Gen Y workers. All of these companies pay their young employees very high salaries—median pay ranges from $55,800 at defense contractor SAIC to $92,800 at Microsoft—and boast ambitious yet flexible workplace cultures. But perhaps most importantly, a majority of workers at each of these companies feel that their jobs are “meaningful.”

For example, at mobile technology company Qualcomm, the survey’s number-one employer, Gen Y employees receive a staggering average salary of $90,000.

Not only that, 72 percent of these employees say they are doing meaningful work, 87 percent have high job satisfaction and 95 percent have a flexible schedule.

Google, the survey’s second most popular company, is regarded by many as the archetypal Gen Y employer—and small wonder, considering over 40 percentof Google’s employees were born between 1982 and 1993. (Birth years for when Gen Y starts and ends range from the early 1970s through the early 2000s.)

Average salary for these Millennial workers at Google is a whopping $80,000, and the company goes above and beyond to ensure that the culture and atmosphere is friendly and accommodating, employees love their jobs and there are plenty of opportunities to grow.

Examples of Google’s Gen-Y friendly perks include:

• Unlimited free food.

• Friday social hours with free beer and wine.

• A company gym with free fitness classes and team sports.

• A concierge service that handles employee chores and errands.

• The ability to bring pets to work.

• Maternity leave for moms and dads, plus on-campus daycare.

• “Massage credits,” which employees can give each other for good work and can redeem for a one-hour massage at work.

• The “80/20 rule,” in which 80 percent of employees’ time is spent on assigned work, but 20 percent can be spent pursuing “passion projects.”

• Lectures by celebrities and industry thought leaders.

So, if your company is looking to hire Millennials, make sure that you are offering positions with not only attractive pay—but also the kinds of non-monetary rewards Gen Y really wants.

For more about this survey and tons of other fantastic information about social job seekers, HRTech, and millennial candidates check out the Software Advice blog.

Know your candidate is one of the major tenants of recruitment. This knowledge informs how your reach job seekers, how you sell your company to them, and how you convert them into applicants. To help you stay abreast of the latest workforce trends we’ve gathered 5 excellent blog posts about today’s candidates.

Baby Boomer Brain Drain – Alison Napolitano

10, 000 Baby Boomers turn 65 each day! – Click to Tweet

Baby Boomers exiting the labor force will potentially push the skills gap to an all-new high! So expect the current workforce trend towards a candidate drive market to continue. This infographic explains the impact that the Baby Boomer brain drain will have, how companies are preparing (or not preparing) for it, and what you can do to avoid the pitfalls at your workplace.

A Different View of 'Top' Talent, Namely That it is Mostly a Myth – Steve Boese

The desire, especially in tech, to recruit “rock star” candidates is one of my least favourite workforce trends. In this article, Steve explains why this trend is misguided and often harmful to a company’s overall success.

Recruiting Across Cultures: One Size Does Not Fit All – Michael Sanger

Hiring on a global scale is becoming much more common place. Many companies are broadening their talent pools to include a significant number of non-local candidates and employees. HR and recruiters need to consider the cultural differences that influence how they assess candidates. Michael explains how the workforce trend towards diversity complicates HR by forcing us to question employee expectations and cultural bias.

How Some Men Fake an 80-Hour Workweek, and Why It Matters - Neil Irwin

Cultivating a culture of business has been a rising workplace trend for a couple of decades now. Working long hours, traveling at a moments notice, and being in constant contact with clients and colleagues via mobile is no longer the exception, but the norm for todays workers… Or is it? Neil’s article explores recent research showing that many of the people, particularly men, who are supposedly putting in 80- or 90-hour workweeks, are actually faking it!

 73% Of Professionals Don’t Love Current Positions – Sarah Adams

Careerealism’s 2015 Employee Satisfaction Survey results are in! After polling their 1 million plus monthly reader base career advice site, Careerealism found that:

• 38% of participants said their job was “okay, I guess”

• 35% of participants said they hated their current job

• 27% of participants said they “REALLY love” their job

Check out Sarah’s blog post to learn more about their survey.

At Jobcast we have a pretty good Facebook following for a b2b business of our size.

According to Facebook’s Pages to Watch feature, only 1 out of our 6 main competitors’ Pages has more Likes than ours. Even though this competitor is winning the war for Page likes, when it comes to engagement our Page outranks them by about 20%.

But, of course, we would still like to see our Page grow and reach more potential users.

I think it’s safe to assume that you want the same for your company’s Facebook Page, especially if you are using Facebook for social recruiting.

More Page Likes and better engagement means reaching and connecting with more job seekers!

The problem with this is that Facebook’s organic reach has been on the decline, so if you aren’t paying for Facebook Ads it is hard to get your content seen.

You may be wondering how Facebook decides who sees what?

A proprietary algorithm decides.

This answer may be less than satisfying but, honestly, no one but the team at Facebook knows exactly how the social network decides what gets seen and what doesn’t.

What we do know is:

• Content with photos and video is more likely to get seen as Facebook prioritizes these posts.

• Newer posts are prioritized over older posts.

• The more a user interacts with your Page the more likely Facebook is to share your content with them.

• That Facebook hides posts from users if they have marked them as spam or not interesting.

• The device a user accesses Facebook influences what content they are show.

This is only part of the story and it doesn’t look like Facebook will be sharing the rest of it anytime soon!

Here’s and article by Sproutsocial that explains how Facebook ranks posts in more detail.

Full story or not, there are still a few proven ways to increase your Facebook reach and boost engagement!

Photos and Video

Facebook gives more weight to posts that include visual content such as photos and videos.

Use this to your advantage and share more visual content.

Recruiting videos are perfect for this because they also boost application rates!

Photos from staff parties, team-building exercises, and employees are excellent too.

If you don’t have a lot of original content to share, then you can post interesting YouTube videos, infographics, and even memes to your Page.

Here are 5 great tools for making visual social media content.

Twitter & Email

Promote Your Facebook Page using Twitter and Email.

Add a link to your Facebook Page in your email signature accompanied by a call to action that encourages your connections to Like your Page.

Then do the same with Twitter by sending out Tweets with a Link to Your Facebook Page and a similar call to action.

This is a great way to spread the word about your Facebook Page.

Join Groups

Find and join popular Facebook groups related to your field and use these groups to reach more Facebook users who are interested in companies like yours.

When you first join one of these groups it is important to post more than just selfish content (such as job ads and requests for Likes.)

Instead, start by posing a question or sharing a really interesting article to the group Timeline.

If you really want to make the other group members like you, then respond positively to the content that they have shared and engage them in dialogue.

People love getting this kind of recognition!

One thing to keep in mind is that you cannot join groups or comment on groups as your Page so you will have to do this from your personal account.

Get Help

Your coworkers and staff are one of the best assets at your disposal for growing your Facebook reach.

Ask them to help by sharing the content you post and encouraging them to ask their Facebook connections to Like your Page.

Your current team’s connections are very similar to them demographically speaking.  It is quite likely that they met at university or even at a past job and, as such, they have a similar skill set to your current employee/coworker and are an excellent group to target.

Making this both a great way to boost your Facebook Page reach and to get your employer brand noticed by a large pool of potential candidates!

Facebook Ads

If you have the budget for it, then Facebook Ads are the most effective way of boosting your reach.

Facebook Ads help you to specifically target the type of users that you want to connect with. This means that using FB Ads you will not only improve the size of your Page’s reach, but also the quality.

Better quality reach means that your content is getting seen by the people that you want to apply for your jobs.

When it comes to social recruiting, it is always better to make one high quality connection with a potential candidate than 10 connections with people who have little interest in what your company has to offer!

Learn how to use Facebook Ads for social recruiting in this white paper.

If you have any tips for boosting Facebook reach please share them in the comments!