Receiving a new job offer is extremely exciting, but it's very important that you don’t just jump into a decision. There are a range of issues that it's important to consider before saying yes or no.

Salary

Before even applying for jobs, you probably should have a desired salary range in mind, based upon industry, your experience and your job requirements. Do your research and consult people you know within the industry. Make sure that any job offer you get meets these expectations - you don’t want to sign up in the excitement and then come to terms with a low salary when it’s too late. Think about how the salary will impact your lifestyle and that of your family. A difference of just 5% can have a big impact! Will you be able to afford all of your weekly expenses and still have money to spend? Perhaps draft some budgets to forecast what your future might look like on the offered salary. If you receive an offer lower than you are willing to take, don’t be afraid to negotiate! Make sure you can make a case as to why you deserve more and use industry statistics to bolster your argument if possible. Be confident and know how to sell yourself.

Benefits

Lower salaries can be offset by a good benefits plan. It’s important that you spend some time to weigh up the benefits being offered and determine their true value. Make sure to pay attention to insurance plans, holidays and the flexibility of your schedule. These will all come up at some point and it's important that you don’t sign up to anything too restrictive. Don’t be overawed by a large quantity of benefits, as it's definitely the quality that makes the most difference.

Costs

There are a lot of hidden costs involved in different jobs that you may not consider at first, when signing up. Think about all of the variables that may end up costing you money or time. How long will your commute be? Will you need to move areas of residence? Will you need to purchase a vehicle? Do you need to buy more expensive clothing? Will you have to buy food everyday? These are all basic things that many people overlook, that come back to bite you later. Consider all of these hidden costs and factor them into your evaluation. The biggest thing to remember when evaluating a job offer is that you always have the power to say no! Determine your BATNA, or your “Best Alternative to the Negotiated Agreement” and use it as a tool for negotiating a better contract or flat out rejecting.

An engaged workforce is key to creating a successful business. Through the engagement of your workforce, you’ll reap rewards through increased production, more inspired work and a much more jovial workplace environment. Engagement isn’t easy to develop. It must truly be cultivated by a leader who is truly motivated to create success and produce results. There are a number of ways in which leaders can do this, but the following three are the most important.

Inspire Genuine Connection

Connecting with your employees is the best way to spark up production and a more positive office environment. Aiming to have a genuine relationship with each and every employee in your office should always be your ultimate goal. Showing you care about your employees can come in many forms, it all depends on the employee and the situation.

Give

A lot of keeping your employees happy is about making sure they have everything they need to succeed. Making sure your employees are fully trained and prepared for their work is huge part of being a manager. However, providing them with material items isn’t enough, you also need to attend to their emotional and social needs. It’s also a great idea to have visible and achievable goals for each employee. Providing them with markers of their own success will provide them a great boost and will continue to push them to succeed and drive forward.

Acknowledge Employees

A compliment from a manager can be worth its weight in gold for an employee. Although simple, this basic acknowledgement is a strong way to encourage employees to go above and beyond their basic duties. As a manager, creating and maintaining a positive workforce is the most important part of your job. Make sure you focus on creating an environment that helps motivate and inspire your current employees.

A period of unemployment doesn't have to be a slow time for your career development, in fact if the time is spent wisely, it can be hugely beneficial for your career. Unemployment gives you a great opportunity to examine your skillset, your potential job opportunities and your career goals. Whatever your field, there’s always opportunities to continue to work even without classic 9-5 employment. Here are some tips that will help you spend your unemployment improving yourself and your chances of finding the perfect career opportunity.

Take up a volunteer position

While simple, this rather easy solution for the boredom of unemployment can be an incredible catalyst for future opportunities and growth. Whether you’re interested in getting involved with a not-for-profit or a professional association, these positions are plentiful and will provide you with great connections and references. Also, anytime you’re able to do extra, different work, you’re bond to learn new skills that will help you develop. Make sure you take advantage of any opportunities that come your way, or better yet, seek them out!

Attend

Finding events in your community to attend and network with fellow job seekers and employers is a no-brainer for anyone unemployed. These events are often put on by community centers and can, obviously, be extremely beneficial. As a quick tip for attending, do your best to show up with business cards and other work samples to make sure employers remember you.

Start a Blog

Whether industry specific or simply personal interest based, starting a blog can help you create a more developed personal brand. Also, having a blog can be a perfect addition to your application package. Most employers expect new hires to have some kind of online presence outside of basic social media pages. Do remember that any blog you create needs to be appropriate. Having something NSFW is okay, but make sure you keep it password protected, or better yet, don’t associate yourself with.

Treat your unemployment like a full-time job

It’s tempting to lax into a lull during a time of unemployment. This can harm you in many ways, but the biggest is just that it takes you out of your routine. Try your best to maintain your work routine while unemployed. In saying this I mean continuing to get up early, shower and spend all-day working on bettering yourself and finding a job.

Exercise

Keeping fit while unemployed is all about maintaining your motivation. It’s important that throughout your period of unemployment you maintain your fitness routine. Aside from staying fit, it will improve your mood and allow you to continue to stay positive.

We've all heard how important portraying a professional presence online is, however what you don't hear about is how many jobs are lost solely because of a unprofessional or weak social presence. Without any sense of exaggeration it can be said that social media is a necessity in today's job world. It's important you have profiles built-out to show off who you are, your achievements and job history. Being inactive on social media will, in many cases. jeopardize your chance at getting your dream job. Careerbuilder's great infographic demonstrates just how many employers actively look at their employees or future employees social media accounts. The numbers speak for themselves in this case. When done right, social media platforms can be a major help in getting noticed and eventually soliciting offers. While Facebook and Twitter are popular, it's important your presence doesn't end there. Being well-rounded, and at least having built-out accounts with several other sites is helpful. While there are obvious no-no's on social media, simply taking an hour or two to accurately build-out a profile is easy and beneficial. It's beneficial because it populates Search Engine Results Page's (SERP) when your name is queried, and it's easy because many sites draw off other and therefore don't force you to enter much additional information. To help job seekers better understand the role of social media in their job search, CareerBuilder.com conducted a survey last year that asked 2,303 hiring managers and human resource professionals if, how, and why they incorporate social media into their hiring process. This survey came back with results that showed direct correlation between active social media users and success in job hunts. In some cases it was that the employer got a good feel for the candidate’s personality. Others chose to hire because the profile conveyed a professional image. In some instances it was because background information supported professional qualifications, other people posted great references about the candidate, or because the profile showed that the job seeker is creative, well-rounded, or has great communication skills. A big thing that many employers look for is consistency. Listing your accomplishments and profession on Linkedin isn't good enough because some employers may only look at Facebook. Having a consistent message and imagery across your social media presence will make life easier on your potential suitors, as well as on you as you won't need to reinvent the wheel for each social media profile you build. Overall, social media isn't brain surgery. All it takes is a few focused hours and a goal in-mind. It's best that you simply sit down and map out where you'd like to go with your career and build your profiles with said goal in mind. Also, make sure you maintain a clean profile, instead of just cleaning it up when the time comes you think that they'll be analyzed. In this digital age, you just never know who is looking at your profiles when, so it's best to be safe rather than sorry. Scroll down for Careerbuilder's awesome infographic:

As we all know, social media has a multitude of uses, from helping us stay connected with friends and searching for jobs, to marketing, customer service, sales and recruitment. However, one area that is often overlooked is how businesses can use social networks internally.

Internal social networks, also known as enterprise social networks (ESNs), can help to create a sense of community online and are particularly useful for businesses that are moving to mobile or are spread across multiple offices. If you’ve not considered how ESNs could benefit your business, take a look at some of the advantages below:

1. Improved communication

   In an increasingly mobile workplace, gone are the days of chatting by the water cooler or being able to simply walk to the other side of the office to speak to a colleague. Enterprise social networks can therefore help colleagues come together and easily engage in conversations, regardless of geograhic barriers.

2. Improved collaboration

   It can be difficult working as part of a team when you’re not all in the same room. However, enterprise social networks provide a number of features that make it easier, from being able to effectively manange project progress, share files and much more.

3. Transparency

   A problem many businesses can have is understanding what other teams are working on. If you add a mobile workforce into the equation then this can become even harder. Different teams may each be working on similar projects (doubling up on time and money), or projects where if efforts were combined, could be even better. Enterprise social networks can help reduce these issues, by providing more transparency to the mix. For example, employees can share projects they are working on, along with their progress. Some managers may be concerned by complete transpareny, but it is often possible to keep certain information private where required.

4. Find internal expertise

   Running a project that needs specific expertise? It can be difficult knowing if anyone has the required skills, particularly in a larger business. You may therefore turn to someone who is underskilled, or hire a consultant which can be costly. Enterprise social networks can help you see what talent is already available in-house. Employees can create their own profiles and add their professional experiences and skills. This is then easily searchable, so next time you have a project, you can find the best people for the job.

5. Share ideas

   Two heads are better than one, but if you struggle to get your team together for a brainstorming session, consider getting everyone to contribute via your enterprise social network. You can open this up to your wider business and unlike a brainstorming session where you allocate a time, ideas can be shared online 24/7. This can mean more people and more ideas, which can help your business stay on its toes, be more innovative and keep moving forward

6. Develop relationships

   Enteprise social networks are much more than just a platform to communicate, they can also be used to help colleagues build stronger relationships with their co-workers. This can help employees feel happier in their role and it can make the business run smoother, with fewer conflicts.

7. Increased productivity

   Enterprise social networks can help to create a more open and innovative culture. Employees can also feel more engaged, which can boost productivity and also improve employee rentention.

If you’re interested in enterprise social networks for your company, then there are a number of solutions to consider. Here are 3 suggestions:

1. Yammer

   Founded in 2008, Yammer is a freemium enterprise social network owned by Microsoft. Users can start groups, share ideas, collaborate, upload documents, create public groups and much more.

(Screenshot from Yammer website)

2. Chatter

Created by Salesforce, Chatter can help employees share knowledge, track projects, collaborate and ultimately stay connected whenever and from wherever. Take a look here to find out more.

(Screenshot from Chatter website)

1. Workplace

   The most recent and exciting development in enterprise social networks is Workplace. Created by Facebook, it aims to help you do work, without getting distracted by your friend’s holiday pictures, getting caught up in a chat or coming across adverts. You therefore have a separate log-in to your personal Facebook account. Employees can still enjoy many of the standard Facebook features, such as a newsfeed, groups, messages, events, Facebook Live, reactions and search. However, there are also some other features that have been specifically built for Workplace. These include a dashboard with analytics, shared spaces and much more.

(Screenshot from Workplace by Facebook website)

Author Bio

Elizabeth Harmon is a writer for Open Colleges, one of Australia’s leading online education providers. She is a Freelance Social Media Consultant with a number of years experience in the field. She has worked with a growing list of clients around the world, helping to build successful social media strategies, create effective content and much more. Follow her on Twitter @Liz_Harmon.

It seems like right now is a great to be looking for a job. Steady growth seems to be a trend that's going to continue in many industries, and U.S. unemployment rates are down below 5%. Whether you're currently unemployed looking for a job, employed looking at your options or just coming out of school, now's the time to look at something new. The job categories that grew the most this year have been Community and Social Service, which grew 14.61% and Computer and Mathematics, which grew by 14.49%. These two grew by far the most, however next up with slightly smller, yet still impressive growth numbers are Health Care Practitioners and Technicians, which grew by 9.89%, and Construction and Extraction, which grew by 9.24%. Rounding out the top 5 categories is Art, Design, Entertainment, Sports, and Media with 8.42% growth. The national average for growth is 4.47%. As far as cities are concerned, New York grew the most in all categories. They were leaders in 4 out of the 5 categories, as well as saw growth of almost 10% higher than the next best city in Computers and Mathematics. While the large centers on the east and west coasts saw tremendous growth, large growth was seen in every corner of the country. The full list, provided by ABODO, with a full breakdown of each sector is below.

Breakdown of Top Performing Cities in Each Occupation

This is a more specific breakdown of the top 10 cities in each occupation field. Categories below are:

• Arts, Design, Entertainment, Sports and Media

• Health Care Practitioners and Technical

• Construction and Extraction

• Computer and Mathematics

• Community and Social Service

Major Jobs in this Category:

• Actors

• Journalists

• Public Relations and Communications Practitioners

• Social Media Specialists

• Designers

• Musicians

• Athletes

As you can see, these type jobs are concetrated in the urban metropolitan areas. Unsurprisingly, Los Angeles leads the country. Its location quotient of 2.69 reflects the extensive infrastructure of the film and television industries. Similarly, New York City — the publishing, theater, and art capital of the United States — holds an extremely high location quotient of 1.95.This map looks like a cultural heat map of the United States, with cities like San Francisco, Seattle, Austin, and Nashville confirming their general reputations for artsy cool. One surprise on this list could be Columbus, OH, which even at the #10 spot shows a robust location quotient of 1.11. The city, home to both Ohio State and Columbus College of Art and Design, has emerged in recent years as an art and fashion mecca. In fact, Columbus employs more fashion designers than any city in the country not named Los Angeles or New York City.

Major Jobs in this Category:

• Physicians

• Surgeons

• Support Technologists

• Lab Technicians

• Dentists

• Chiropractors

• Therapists

Because of the nature of this field, the playing field is incredibly level across the board. The aspects of growth in this category could involve an aging population in those cities, or a growth in the amount of labs moving in those towns.

Major Jobs in this Category:

• Carpenters

• Plumbers

• Welders

• Heavy Machinery Operators

• Construction Workers

• Roofers

The data in this graphic shows where the biggest growth in the housing market is happening. The extensive population growth in Texas is displayed here, as well as the housing lull happening throughout the Midwest. Skewing mainly to the South and West, the booming economies of Texas, Arizona and, to a lesser extent, California are evident. Denver is seeing a large boost in it's housing market and economy, making them a diamond in the rough as far as the Midwest is concerned.

Major Jobs in this Category:

• Software Developer

• Marketing Coordinator

• Graphic Designers

• Digital Specialists

• Programmers

• Web Designers

This fast-developing industry continues to see its major growth on the West Coast. Major hubs in San Jose, San Francisco and Seattle are expected, while the spots for Denver, Boston and Columbus are slightly more unexpected. Because of the lighting fast nature of this category, the growth and decline numbers are always going to be skewed in one direction or the other.

Major Jobs in this Category:

• Social Workers

• Counselors

• Probation Officers

• Religious Officers

• Environmental Workers

• Substance Abuse Workers

Philadelphia is the leader in this category, while Boston, New York, and Detroit follow closely. While the other categories tend to lean towards more metropolitan areas, this category is more concentrated in smaller, less densely populated areas. For a more in-depth breakdown check out ADOBO full analysis.

Finding the right person to take over a role at your company is challenging. It often costs thousands of dollars just to fill one low- to mid-level position, and even more for management positions. That's why assuring that each hire you make is successful is of utmost importance in today's business world. Studies have found that new hires are one of the biggest factor in creating animosity and discord in the office. On top of that, in a 2014 survey done by BambooHR, it was discovered that one-third of the 1,000 respondents said they had quit a job within the first six months of starting it. Plus, more than 16 percent left between the first week and the third month of their new job. Along with being extremely costly monetary wise, this also creates discontent and confusion among the remaining members of your team. While the majority of businesses find success with new hires, if you're interested in some best practice techniques or are part of that minority that has struggled with onboarding new staff, try these 3 tips below.

1. Smooth Introduction

Making sure that your new hire has a smooth first week or two is excruciatingly important. Nothing is worse for a new hire to experience at your company than an aimless, unproductive and unstructured intro period. If nothing else, assure that they're at least busy with work, don't let them sit and stew about their decision! A good practice is to send out all of intro/contract/HR paperwork prior to the employee arriving on the first day. This simply allows both parties to be completely ready for the other as soon as the first day starts. Having experienced listless companies who ignored any onboarding procedure, there's nothing more frustrating. On top of dealing with paperwork prior to arrival, make sure you get your new hire to send through a quick bio and picture, so that you can familiarize them with your team. This allows both your hire and your team to be included in the process, as well as gives both familiarity right off the bat. Here a few other more obvious, but sometimes forgotten about details that need to be taken care of:

• Setup you new employees workstation before they arrive

• Establish short and long-term goals with the hire

• Make sure they have everything they need to be productive on the first day

• Have a meeting at the end of the first day to clarify any issues or just ask them how their day went

• Send them home with an organization-specific care package

2. Allow for Team Input

Allowing current members of your team into the discussions about the hiring process is a great way to get them involved. While serving many purposes, overall this practice is just to make sure that everyone on your team feels included. Also, you never know when a member of your team might have a connection to someone who may fit perfect with the organization. By including your team in the onboarding process, this gives the relationship with the new hire more potential to be a success. It does this by cutting away any resentment your staff may have about the decision. In theory it should allow your team to get any questions or concerns on the table prior to the new member coming onboard.

3. Setup Check-Up Meetings

Understanding your employees perspective is incredibly important. It's not good enough to simply make decisions for the company on your best judgement without consulting staff. The same concept applies to the onboarding process. Make sure that you're having check-in meetings with your new hire, as well as with your team. Hearing what they have to say will give you the opportunity to adjust on the fly and eliminate festering issues. A more formal way of doing this is through a formal questionnaire at the end of the first week. Include any questions about their thoughts on your orientation process and assimilation with the team and office. Not only will this allow you to identify any pain points that might reduce your new hire’s job satisfaction, but it also helps inform you about onboarding best practices for future hires. A significant amount of job turnover happens in the first couple of months, so assure that you're treating your new hire to a seamless onboarding process. – Don’t drop the ball after you make the hire. The onboarding process is just as critical as the recruitment process when it comes to optimizing hiring results. Smart hiring practices extend into your new hires’ first few months of employment, and recognizing that can save your company a lot of time and money.

So ...

You’ve rolled out your social recruiting strategy and have begun to see results…

You’re sharing job posts, promoting your company employer brand and engaging with candidates.

What now?

It’s time to let everybody else know about all of the great work that you’ve been doing! Creating a social recruiting report is the most effective way to communicate your progress.

Instead of just telling your boss what you’ve been up to why not show them?

With a social recruiting report you can use visuals to communicate ideas more clearly, charts and graphs to show your progress over time, and statistics as concrete proof of the progress that you’ve made.

Here’s how you can make your own social recruiting report.

Decide what to measure:

The data and statistics that you choose to include will fall into two categories: employer branding and recruiting.

For employer branding you’ll want to track:

• Number of Clicks Per Post - This will show how interested your audience is in what you are sharing.

• Shares/Retweets - This data is great for seeing how your content is received and how engaged your followers are. Shares are awesome because they mean that your brand is getting exposure amongst non-followers.

• Likes/Favorites  - Likes and favourites aren’t just about showing how many people enjoy your content, they also act as social proof to your other followers.

• Followers - How many followers you have tells you the number of people who are interested in your company. Increasing your number of followers improves the reach of your content, your social proof, and increases the likelihood of job seekers finding you.

For recruiting, you’ll want to track:

• Job Views by Source - Where people who view your job posts are coming from. This will help you learn where people are finding links to your job posts.

• Applicants by Source - Where applicants are finding your job posts. This will help you learn which social networks are connecting you with potential hires.

• Hires by Source - Where your actual hires are coming from. This will show you where the highest quality of candidates are coming from.

For each of these areas, you’ll want to gather information about where your social recruiting stands currently, how it has progressed over time, and how you think it will progress into the future.

How to Find Your Social Recruiting Stats and Data

For employer branding:

• Facebook - Facebook Insights will give you all of the information that you need about Clicks, Shares, Likes, and Followers for your Company Facebook Page.

• Twitter - Twitter Analytics are excellent for finding out all that you need to know to create your report.

• LinkedIn Analytics for Business - LinkedIn’s analytics tool (located near the “Home” link on your LI business page) is nowhere near as insightful as those you’ll get from Facebook or Twitter, but it’s still the best/only tool out there for LinkedIn.

• Google+ Insights - Google does a lovely job with their analytics tool and provides a simple, easy to read ‘audience overview’.

For recruiting:

This can be a little trickier!

You will either need to use an ATS that provides you with tracking, so that you can see where applicants come from, or use a social recruiting tool that provides you with the data you want to track.

Jobcast is just one of those social recruiting tools. It provides you with reporting that will show where your job views, applications, and hires are coming from. Jobcast’s reporting can also be used to see just how much traffic your social recruitment efforts are driving.

Creating Your Social Recruiting Report

Twitter, Facebook, and Google+ allow you to export all of your data to a CSV file.

Unlike Facebook and Twitter, Google+ requires a bit more than just clicking an export button to download your data.

This article explains how to download data from Google+ Insights.

Unfortunately with LinkedIn, you will have to create a CSV or Excel sheet manually!

For recruiting, getting the data will depend on the ATS or platform that you use for your social recruitment.

Once your data is ready to use, you’ll need to choose a presentation tool.

You can use Google Docs or Excel to build your social recruiting report, but I would recommend taking advantage of some of the amazing visualization tools available to you.

My favourite tool is Piktochart, as it is pretty easy to use and you can import data from Google Spreadsheets. You can even splurge and upgrade to a pro account to gain access to some excellent social media reporting templates.

Here’s an example of what a social recruiting report can look like with Piktochart.

Make sure to write a quick brief that explains the findings in your report. Explain the trends you see and speculate on why you think you’re getting those results.

After this summary is written, it’s time to lay out what your goals are for the future, and what you’ll need going forward to accomplish those goals.

Use the numbers presented in your report to develop actionable paths to these goals and to prove the ROI on what you’ve done so far.

What tools do you use to make reports? Let us know in the comments!

69% of job seekers would not take a job at a company with a poor employer brand. (Source)

Millennials value a workplace culture-fit more than any generation before them.

And, every year, more candidates turn to social media to assess potential employers and to look for work.

Companies cannot reach today’s candidates without creating a strong, visible employer brand, engaging job seekers on social media, and selling the heck out of their culture.

In short, companies need to start marketing themselves to potential hires if they want to win the war for talent.

The key to marketing is connecting with your audience. To do this with job seekers, you will need to engage them on a personal level, at the right time, and with the right message.

In this article you’ll learn how to create a social recruiting marketing plan that will help you achieve that goal.

Step 1: Create a candidate persona

Before you can even begin to connect with your audience, you need to know who they are.

Do not confuse this step with knowing what you want in an employee!

Understanding your audience is not the same as knowing what qualifications or skills they should have on their resume.

In marketing, this is called creating a customer persona. For recruiting, we’ll just replace the word ‘customer’ with ‘candidate’.

Good marketers study their audience to learn their behaviors and understand their attitudes. They use this information to build comprehensive profiles that detail their customer’s wants, their everyday problems, and their needs.

To create a candidate persona ask yourself:

• What is your candidate's goal?

• What perks matter most to them?

• What motivates them?

• What social networks do they use?

Personally, I like to use a tool called personapp for this, but a pen and paper will work too!

Once you create your candidate persona for your ideal candidate, you can use it to target them with (recruitment) content marketing and your employer branding.

Which brings us to step 2…

Step 2: Perfect your employer brand

Your employer brand is vital for reaching candidates.

Investing in employer brand is shown to cut back employee turnover by a third. A robust employer brand can reduce cost per hire by 50%, and poor employer branding will cut your application volume in half.

In marketing, branding defines the company and how others feel about the company.

In recruiting, employer branding defines your company culture and how job seekers will feel about you as a potential employer.

To create a strong employer brand you must share your company’s story in an authentic way. Your values and culture must shine through in every aspect of your branding.

Your branding should be consistent no matter the medium. From job post to Facebook Page, your message must be clear and cohesive.

Job seekers should feel as though they are getting an inside look at what it’s like to work at your company. Your brand should inspire confidence and trust in them, so that they feel confident that your company is a good place to be.

And remember to always keep your candidate persona in mind when coming up with employer branding ideas.

Step 3: Content Marketing

Content is the core of marketing.

Building your employer brand depends on the content you create, not just on how you promote it.

Content marketing is key to getting job seekers’ attention and building a strong audience. Content is what drives traffic to your career site, gives candidate a positive impression of your company culture, and converts job seekers into applicants.

Remember to use the candidate persona you created when coming up with content ideas.

Think hard about the kind of information that would appeal to your candidate persona and use that to help shape your content.

Share job search tips from a hiring manager’s perspective, career advice, industry news and other articles that will appeal to your audience. Asking current employees about what they would want to see is a great way to get ideas about what to post.

Here are 11 content ideas for social recruiting

Step 4: Get Your Message Out There

This is where social media really comes in handy!

Use social to reach job seekers with your employer brand and new content.

Your customer persona will help you decide which networks to use, and what hashtags will get your posts the most engagement.

Set up a social media schedule and start sharing your jobs, blog posts, videos, and all your other content.

Don’t forget to also share content from other sources, and to engage with your community regularly to keep your social media presence social and not spammy!

Another great way to get your content out there is to contact popular bloggers that your desired candidate is likely to read, and then see if they will publish some of your best content.

Make sure to leverage your team’s social media presence by asking them to share, like, and comment on your posts.

To free up more time, so can better engage with your audience, consider using a social recruiting automation tool like Jobcast.

Step 5: Measure Results

Marketers know that they have to be constantly improving if they want to succeed. They also know that the best way to improve is to know exactly where they’re going wrong and what they’re doing right.

The same is true for social recruiting.

Track engagement and application volume for each campaign that you run. Use the information that you gather to determine what’s working for you and what isn’t. Then make decisions moving forward based on that knowledge.

Well, that’s five concrete, actionable steps that will help you move forward with your social recruiting efforts. We wish you the best of luck, and encourage you to get in touch to let us know what has worked for you.

Happy planning!

Brands have been using user generated content in their marketing campaigns for a long time. By getting users and customers involved in campaigns and the content that is being shared, brands are able to get their customers more engaged with their brands, establishing a stronger connection with these customers. Companies can also apply this to their workforce and employees. By sharing content that employees make themselves, companies can actively encourage workers to share their own experiences. By doing this, employees can contribute to recruiting efforts and help grow a bigger and better team of employees while making their voices heard. So, what kinds of content can you get your employees to post?

Employer Hashtags

By encouraging employees to use an employer hashtag, you can easily track and view what your team is sharing on social media. You can simply click on the hashtag on Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook or track it using a social media dashboard, and this will populate any posts using it. Using an employer hashtag can also be low risk - there is no need to hand over credentials for any of your company’s social media accounts. Instead, you are able to choose which posts you would like the re-post or share on your own profiles. This can also be a great way to track how your employees are feeling about work. If they are sharing fun content and positive experiences, you can be sure that they are enjoying working with you. If, on the other hand, they’re sharing negative experiences, you can catch issues as they happen and resolve them.

Instagram Takeovers

With over 500 million monthly active users, this is a great platform to reach out to tons of potential new employees! Using Instagram, you can showcase what life is like at your company. Instagram has introduced more ways to share content, including a 60 second video limit and a new feature called Stories, which lets you upload content for 24 hours. With a 60 second video, you can share things like employee profiles or quick clips of quirky office traditions. The new Stories features gives you the freedom to upload more casual content, because after 24 hours, this disappears! When you create Stories on Instagram, you can also create quick doodles on images and videos that you share. This means that you can include more fun and casual clips without having to stress too much about whether they fit into.

Employee Blog Posts

While social media posts are quick, fun, and easy to consume, blog posts can be a great way to get a deeper look into the days of your employees. By asking your team to write about their own experiences, you can let them feel like they are making a big contribution. By reading through different perspectives, prospective applicants can get a better sense of the work environment as a whole. Blog posts can also be used to help walk job seekers through what your recruitment process looks like. When these job seekers have this knowledge and have a better idea of what they can expect when applying for a position at your company, this can encourage them to apply! Using employee-generated content saves you time creating content yourself, engages your employees, and helps to reassure potential applicants that what they’re seeing and hearing is genuine. With social media becoming a bigger and bigger part of our world, incorporating marketing practices into your social recruiting can help you connect with potential new employees.