Social Recruiting

I communicate for a living. I am communicating with you right now. And now. And now!

But still, every single time I visit my doctor for a check-up, all of my communication skills go right out the window. I can barely manage to convey my age, let alone what ails me.

I have always had the gift of the gab. It's what I credit for the success of my previous career in sales. I can pretty much talk to anyone about anything. Unless, of course, that person is wearing a white coat and a stethoscope.

This is most likely due to the fact that doctors have always made me nervous. No matter how kind their eyes, or soft their bedside manner, I fear their authority and tongue depressors as much now as I did when I was a kid.

So, whenever I have to make a trip to the doctors office, my husband supplies me with both a pep talk and a list of talking points.

What does this have to do with social recruiting you ask?!

Well, social media and technology in general still makes a lot of people nervous (myself included, if I'm being completely honest). These nerves can make communicating difficult, and social recruiting doesn't work without good communication. You can't attract candidates through Facebook and Twitter without engaging with them.

Luckily, there are quite a few ways to make communicating via social networks easy. In fact, once you have a good formula down, engaging with candidates is a breeze!

Let's start with the basics. These concepts apply to pretty much any social network out there, even the image-based ones!

Make your posts relatable

People engage with posts they can relate to. That's why pet pictures, food pictures, and articles about procrastination get so many shares. These are concepts most people cant relate to. I would highly advise sticking with these kinds of posts and avoiding Tweeting about how you're drinking Cristal on a yacht, unless you are looking to recruit Mr. Howell from Gilligan's Island!

Post funny (inoffensive) comics on your Facebook Page, pics of staff parties on Instagram, and Tweet a recent article you thought was awesome.

Check out this article for more tips on how to engage candidates through social media.

KISS it

You don't have to overcomplicate things, in fact, it just confuses people! Respond with clear, simple language, and keep it short. Don't assume people know what anagrams like ROI, or KISS mean. Oh wait... (It stands for Keep It Simple Silly)

But, even if your writing isn't perfectly concise, just making sure that you respond to questions and comments in a timely and friendly manner is all that really matters.

Make like Goldilocks

Find that bowl of porridge that is neither too hot, nor too cold. I love this analogy. Mostly because I love breakfast. But also because it's a reminder of how important it is to experiment a bit, find your sweet spot, and then go with it.

Try using a "Call to Action" such as "If you're an awesome graphic designer, then Like this job!" or asking more direct questions. Experiment with different voices, wording, and post lengths. This will give you a feel for how your community responds to different communication styles, and a better understanding of much you need to interact.

Check out this post for more on how to find your social media sweet spot.

Be chatty

Unless you are communicating with a group of "experts" or other professionals in a similar field, it's important to maintain a casual tone.

Communicating via social networks is different from communicating via email. It's more casual, relaxed, and conversational. I'm not suggesting that you interact with potential candidates or customers the way you would with your pals at a UFC fight night, but remember that communicating on sites like Facebook is a conversation — not a monologue.

Hopefully these tips will have you chatting candidates up all over the internet or maybe even in real-life (God forbid)! Just promise you won't use any of them for dating, as advice columnist Ask E. Jean and I have a strict non-competition pact, and I don't want to get on her bad side!

Happy recruiting!

Timing really is important.

This is especially true when it comes to social media. In fact, other than open-heart surgery, I can think of no other instance in which timing is so crucial. Well, maybe Olympic track and field, or high speed car chases, or…

Moving on.

It’s not just the content of your post that determines how many views, shares, or likes that it gets. The timing matters too. Frequency, day of the week and time of day all play an important role in determining who sees the content you share. The same is true of your job posts.

Your job posts are more effective if they are seen by more people. So, determining when your audience is most likely to be online and posting in that time-frame is a great way to improve your social recruiting ROI.

You can read the article that we posted last week, for a simple guide to finding the best times to post on your Facebook Company Page.

.. but what if you aren’t at work during the hours you should be sharing those job posts? That’s where scheduling tools come in very handy! The Jobcast Facebook recruiting app includes a scheduling tool for all premium members.

Our scheduling tool allows you to set up your job posts to be shared at the optimal time for engaging candidates. It’s also super easy to use.

Here’s how:

Start by going to your Facebook Company Page and clicking on your Careers Tab.

This will direct you to your Career Page.

Next, from the Admin panel, select ‘Manage Jobs’.

This will take you to the Job Management section of Jobcast. From there, click on the “Customize” button, located in the menu at the top.

This will bring you to the Settings Tab. The panel with the gear is where you can create a customized URL for your Career Page. The clock icon will let you schedule a job post.

Click on the clock!

Next, select Add Scheduled Post and choose the network you’d like to share your post with.

For this demo we’ll choose to schedule our post to be shared on Twitter.

From here you can fill in a message that will be used for your Tweet. For example: Jobcast wants you!

There is also space here to attach some hashtags to your Tweet.

Then you may choose to only share jobs from a particular category.

And to only post jobs that are located in a specific country, state, or city.

Next, select the days of the week you want to post on.

Then you can select the frequency. This will stop you from appearing to be Tweet-bombing your jobs, and instead will stagger them out. Believe me, your followers will appreciate this.

You can select a ‘sharing window’. This means that the jobs will only be automatically Tweeted between these hours on the days you have specified.

Finally, decide if you’d like your previous jobs to be re-shared if no new jobs are available (a great option to keep your Page looking active)

There you have it. Regularly scheduled posts to effectively target the candidates you’re looking to attract.

If you have any questions don’t hesitate to let us know in the comments.

What were you doing at 5 a.m. yesterday morning?

Hopefully you were either in bed, fast asleep, or at a really, really amazing party.

Hopefully you were not like me, and totally unable to sleep, hyped up on caffeine, surfing Instagram all night long. The worst.

And all because I decided to schedule a coffee date/meeting for after dinner. Caffeine after three is never good for me (although it apparently makes me a better poet!), and neither is neglecting timing when it comes to your social media content.

Scheduling is a key part of social strategy. Understanding what days of the week, what time/times of day, and how frequently to post content is fundamental to your success.

It’s also a rather simple formula to master. Which is very nice considering how tricky social media can be.

There are a million great articles floating around the internet to help you understand how to time your content.

But here are a few of the basics, just in case you don’t have time to read a million articles this morning.

Twitter

Tweets have a very short “lifespan”, which refers to how long they remain visible to your followers. You should post hyper-current, trending content on Twitter, as that’s the type of content most likely to get you re-tweeted and followed.

Scheduling Stats:

• Monday through Thursdays are usually best, although participating in #FollowFriday is never a bad idea.

• Between 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. is the usual recommended Tweet window.

• You should generally aim to post content at least four times per day. Spread your posts out evenly so as not to “Tweet bomb” your followers. By my own logic, I really ought to Tweet more!

Facebook

Facebook content, like Twitter, should be current. But they do not have to be quite as trendy as your Tweets. Your Facebook posts should be very specific to your industry and company brand, whereas with your Tweets, you have a bit more leeway when it comes to content.

Scheduling stats:

• Wednesday wins best day to post, hands down!

• Aim for between 1 p.m. and 4 p.m.

• Post content at least once a day. You can be a bit more active, but the beauty of Facebook is that content has a longer lifespan there, than it does on Twitter, so you can  post less and focus more on making those posts count!

Google+:

Confession, I have been neglecting Google Plus lately, even though Google+ is great for social recruiting and employer branding. I’m going to remedy this as soon as I’m done writing this post, taking nap, then checking my Instagram.

Scheduling Stats:

• Weekdays are best, especially for social recruiting and business.

• The best time to post, give or take an hour, is around 10 a.m.

• How often? Well, personally, I would recommend playing it by ear a little with G+. Post whenever you have a new blog post to share, job to list, or find an article that you think is super pertinent to your Google Plus community

LinkedIn:

Oh LinkedIn — so persnickety! Your content should be relevant, but does not necessarily need to be current. You can get away with posting older articles, so long as they are on point.

Scheduling Stats:

• Tuesdays through Thursdays are best. Mondays and Fridays are not worth your time, according to most statistics. LinkedIn is just weird like that!

• The best time to post is around 8 a.m. give or take an hour, and then again from 5 p.m. until 6 p.m. Don’t post after 6 p.m. though, unless you want your content to disappear into the deepest, darkest recesses of the inter-web — never to be seen again!

• Depending on how important LinkedIn is to your strategy, you can post once a day or once a week. A happy medium is to post an article (brownie points if you wrote it yourself) once per week, and comment on other peoples’ posts once per day.

Your own personal blog:

Staying on trend will help your blog posts, as trending topics are more likely to be posted to Facebook and shared on Twitter. But, you need to also focus on writing what’s often referred to as “evergreen” content. This means content that will stay relevant for several years. This is because blog posts have the longest lifespan of any other social media content you produce — they are the social media version of a gift that just keeps giving!

Scheduling Stats:

• Choose two weekdays that work well for you. Mondays and Wednesdays work well, as they are earlier in the week, giving you more days to share them through other social networks.

• Posting in the morning will also mean that you’ll have more flexibility for sharing throughout the day.

• As previously mentioned, two times per week is perfect for blogging. Any less and you’re simply not putting out enough content to stay relevant with your reader base. More than that  is great, if you have some extra time or ideas kicking around, but two posts a week has the best return on investment.

Check bit.ly for more great stats on content timing

As with all things in life, your social schedule is unique to you. These suggestions are a general guideline.

Once you’ve been actively scheduling posts for a while, and built a bit of an audience, try using an app like followerwonk (for Twitter), to assess what times are most effective for you personally. You may be shocked to learn that posting content at three in the morning is actually the best possible time for your gluten-free taco truck business… Or that your Facebook Fans are very active on Sundays, and that’s a perfect day for you to post new jobs.

In order for your content and job posts engage and convert, make sure to use a scheduling tool like the one included with the Jobcast Premium Facebook recruiting app. That way you can make sure you’re posting at the best possible times to get your jobs seen.

We’ve been talking a lot about staying relevant on the blog lately.

Because, when it comes to social recruiting, staying up to date on all the latest trends in media and technology is crucial to being successful.

Right now nothing is more relevant than mobile.

Last year alone saw the use of mobile increase by 103%. More than 2 out of 3 Facebook users log on via mobile, and even more importantly, about 1 in 6 users use Facebook from mobile exclusively.

And not only are people using mobile more often, they are using it specifically to hunt for work. According to a recent article on Mashable, 77% of  job seekers surveyed were using mobile for this purpose. This is not only because of the increased use of smart phones and tablets for searching in general, it is also because people do not want to look at career sites from their work computers. They use personal devices to keep their searches private from their employers.

If you want those candidates to apply for, or even to view your job posts, you must optimize your Facebook Career Site for mobile.

And yet, far too many Facebook Career sites are not. In fact, in a recent survey, we found that only 1 in 20 of the career sites we looked at were mobile-friendly.

This is why we think it is so important to provide mobile optimization for Jobcast Premium users!

Facebook won’t allow apps to work in-site on mobile devices, this makes mobile tricky. To work around Facebook’s rules, and ensure that your job posts are mobile friendly, you can use Jobcast to set up a fully-branded custom URL.

Your custom URL is smart, so when a candidate clicks through it, if they are using desktop, they’ll see the desktop version of your job post, and if they are on mobile, they’ll be directed to the mobile version of your Facebook Career Site.

The mobile version of your app uses ‘responsive’ design.

Responsive design means that your Career Page will detect the gadget that your visitor is using, how big or small their viewing screen is, and then responsively redraw the Page to make it easiest to read.

This is extremely important because job seekers are looking at your posts from all different sizes and types of devices, so responsive design is essential to candidate experience.

No more awkward, squinting, pinch/zoom job hunting!

The easier it is for candidates to find jobs on your Page, the more applications you’ll get. It’s as simple as that. As we’ve already shown, more candidates than ever before are searching for jobs on Facebook using mobile devices. This means you need your Facebook Career Site to be responsive and optimized for mobile.

Here’s how to get your own custom Smart URL!

First, pour yourself a cup of delicious tea, hot or iced, it’s up to you.

Go to your Facebook Company Page and click on your Career Tab. This will direct you to your Career Page.

If you are logged in as an admin (which you must be in order to make changes) you will see an Admin Menu Bar. Click on Manage Jobs.

This will bring you to the Job Management section of Jobcast. Click Customize at the top of your screen to go to the General Settings page.

On this page you will see a space to enter your very own custom URL.

Enter your desired domain name.

HOT TIP: Make it the name of your company, otherwise applicants will be very confused!

Share this new custom URL with everyone you know, link to it on your company site, put it up on LinkedIn, Pinterest, and Instagram, and Tweet the heck out of it.

What better way to learn than by studying other successful people?

I've learned everything I know by imitating comic book characters and Jamie Oliver. Hence my fantastic salad making abilities and wicked crime fighting skills.

When it comes to learning new tricks, examples go a long, long way.

We're always paying attention to companies who are super at social recruiting because it's the best way to take your Facebook recruiting practices to the next level.

Unlike cooking and rescuing redheaded reporters from danger, Facebook recruiting is still relatively new. But luckily there are still lots of innovative early adopters to learn from.

We put together some examples of specific best practices employed by family-run business Gordon Food Service, hospitality giant Hotel Marriott, and the province of Saskatchewan. All three of these businesses provide fantastic examples for any employer interested in giving Facebook recruiting a try. We'll explain how you can learn from their example and apply their strategies to your own recruiting.

Gordon Food Service

Gordon Food Service has made their Facebook Career Page a place where people can get a more in-depth look at what their company culture is really like. How their staff interact, what their values are, and what the company prioritizes are all showcased on their Facebook Career Page.

GFS uses Facebook to communicate their brand message not just to candidates, but also to current and potential customers. This is why they make branding a key part of their Facebook Career Page.

What can you learn from Gordon Food Service's strategy?

Use your Facebook Career Page to express company culture and promote your brand.

All of Gordon Food Service's content is valuable, in that it is useful to clients and potential candidates. The GFS Facebook Career Page is fully branded with company colors and a custom banner to maintain brand consistency. They post updates about community service projects, fun staff activities, and sponsored events. GFS also posts food-related questions to their fans, topical articles, and great tips on new trends in food. GFS engages with their fans by creating dialogue and asking and answering questions, which has garnered them a very loyal Facebook following. Check out their Company Page and you'll find tons of positive comments and thank yous from their customers and employees.

Follow their lead and your Facebook Career Page will grow your brand and your talent pool.

Next up, Hotel Marriott

Hotel Marriott turned the social recruiting world on its head by using a social game to recruit thousands of hourly workers for their massive expansion outside of the U.S.

Potential hires create their own virtual restaurant, buy equipment and ingredients on a budget, hire and train employees, and serve customers. Gamers earn points for happy customers… and lose points for poor service. Players' success is based on their operation turning a profit.

What can you learn from Marriott?

Experiment

I'm not suggesting you invest thousands in creating a virtual game - far from it! But trying new social strategies will set your employer brand apart.

Try out different kinds of content, posting on different days or at different times, and maybe even make a short recruiting video. You won't know what works best for you unless you experiment.

And last, but most definitely not least, Think Sask Jobs!

The Think Sask Jobs campaign is an effort to brand the Province of Saskatchewan as an awesome place to live and work, in order to fill the many new jobs created by its booming economy. Phoenix Group has been incredibly successful in using Facebook to create an Employer brand for Saskatchewan. Their page has over 5,000 Likes and their average daily reach is around 1.7 million users.

What can you learn from the Think Sask Jobs campaign?

Have a Game Plan

Much of their success is owed to the creation of a brilliant and specific social strategy. Phoenix group researched how frequently they should post, what days and time work best, and what kinds of content are the most appealing to the workers that Saskatchewan needs.

They then created a game plan based on their research.

For example, the content posted on the Think Sask Company page is divided evenly into three categories: job postings, posts about how to get hired in Saskatchewan, local culture and fun lifestyle-related content. That way they know exactly what kind of content is needed each day.

Even the choice of Facebook as a medium for their social recruiting effort was based on solid research into where potential candidates were looking for jobs.

Researching before beginning a social recruiting campaign is a must (you can start with this article about how to use Facebook for recruiting), as is creating a plan to guide your efforts.

What do all three have in common?

All of these businesses uses metrics to measure their success. Tracking what works and what doesn't is an important part of any recruiting campaign, social or not! That's why the Jobcast Facebook recruiting app supplies an easy way to view reports and statistics. You can't move forward without knowing where you've been, so make sure you keep your metrics up to date. For that we recommend using the super effective combination of the Jobcast Facebook recruiting app and Facebook Insights.

Hopefully these awesome Facebook recruiting examples inspire you the way they do us, happy social recruiting!

This past week, I found myself smack-dab in the middle of the most intense HR/social recruiting conference in the history of the world.

I’m calling it Parental HR SmackDown 2013 (#psmack2013)

Yup, my parents flew all the way out to Holland, stayed with us in our tiny loft apartment, and (very kindly) answered all of my questions about recruiting. They also ate a lot of cheese, walked the canals, and enjoyed Belgian beers.

.. but back to the recruiting.

Why would I choose to devote any of this precious family-time to talking shop? Well, you can only say so much about canals and cheese before you need to shake things up. And, even more importantly, my parents have over 60 years of HR experience combined. They are certified HR nerds.

When it comes to finding great candidates, coming up with effective interview questions, drafting contracts, and pretty much anything to do with HR, my parents know their stuff. Since covering all of these themes in a single blog post would be crazy, let’s focus on a topic that gets my parents pretty fired up.

Wait for it…..

Job posts!

Told you they were nerds.

So without further adieu: How to write a job post that will make your my parents proud!

Rule #1 Make a list

We’re going to start with the most important thing you can do, according to both of my parents: Write down what you picture your ideal candidate to be. Make a list of what qualities you are looking for, what your deal breakers are, and what level of education you want them to have.

“You would not believe how many times I’ve been brought in to consult, asked what skills and qualities I need to screen for, and been told by clients that they’ll know it when they see it”

Said my pops, obviously rather frustrated.

“You will not know it when you see it!”

Starting a hiring campaign before you know exactly what you are looking for wastes time. In order to write job posts that will attract the type of candidates you want to hire, you need to know who those candidates are.

Smack… Down!

Rule #2 Tailor your posts to your desired audience

Seeing as you already know what you are looking for in a candidate, now all you have to do is figure out what they want from you.

According to my mother, the best way cut down on resumes from the non-ideal candidates and to attract the ideal ones, is to highlight the right aspects of your company culture and of the position on offer.

For example, studies show that young professionals now rate flexible hours over salary in order of importance when it comes to accepting a position. So, if you offer flexible hours, make a point of saying that in your job post. If you are trying to hire more women, point to your awesome daycare program. If you’re looking to hire young hourly workers, talking retirement plans isn’t going to peak a lot of interest; Job perks (like staff meals) will.

Another thing to keep in mind is that if you have a specific management philosophy, strong company values, or cultivate a specific kind of company culture, make sure you address it in your job posts. Doing so will attract candidates that are the right fit for your company, which is hugely important when it comes to retention.

Rule #3 Include salient details, but don’t forget the basics

Daycare, flexible work hours, vacation plan, lifestyle perks, and other positive things you offer candidates should be included in your job posts, but so should the less exciting stuff.

Salary, location, hours, education requirements, a specific description of basic duties, if uniforms are required, and any other pertinent information should be disclosed.

Even if you aren’t offering the best wages out there, you should still include salary in your post. People are actually much more likely to respond to job posts that disclose salary, even if that salary isn’t the highest on offer.

Even more importantly, being upfront and clear about the basic requirements you need candidates to meet cuts down on time spent interviewing people who are not a good fit. Which means cutting down on how much you spend on hiring consultants… like my dad. He’s retired now, so it’s safe to print that!

Rule #4 Call them to action!

When posting jobs on Facebook, end with a strong call to action. This last rule is entirely my own. It’s a little more recruiting 2.0, but my parents vetted it, so I feel safe including it.

The best way to get Facebook users to do what you what them to do? Tell them to do it. If you want people (other than your parents) to engage with the content you post on Facebook, you need to include call to actions in your posts.

For example:

We’re looking for a talented graphic designer, who has hands-on experience in the field of app development, and enjoys a fast-paced and challenging work environment.

Does this sound like you? If so, apply now!

And there we have it. If you want to attract candidates, keep hiring costs down, and earn the respect of my parents, just follow those 4 simple rules.

Have any tips on writing more effective job posts? Tell us in the comments!

(See what I just did there?!)

It's spring. Finally!

Time for barbecuing in the park, colorful tulips and fresh-starts.

A fresh-start can mean a lot of things, from finally throwing away the moldy pesto that's been hanging out in the back of your fridge, to starting a new job, to the beginning of True Blood season 4!

But for those of us interested in social recruiting, a fresh-start means rethinking social media strategy, freshening up our Facebook employer branding, and True Blood season 4! I mean it, there's a lot to be learned about branding and HR from those vampires. You try branding a group best know for their pasty skin, scary fangs, and thirst for blood. Not easy!

Well, here are a few links to help you keep your employer brand fresh and your social recruiting springy:

Do you read Copy Blogger? If not, you really ought to check it out. Even if you don't consider yourself a writer, I'm willing to bet you still spend a fair amount of time writing. Even if it's only job descriptions, contracts and emails, you're still writing. Copy Blogger is one of the best resources to make your writing more effective. And, if your emails, contracts and job descriptions are more effective, then by default, YOU are more effective at your job.

Lorelle VanFossen writes the series "Blog Exercises", featured on Copy Blogger. In the series she provides simple exercises to improve your writing. Technically, the articles are aimed at bloggers, but I've been applying them to content marketing, Twitter, and email with great success. Oh, and her writing is a delight to read, in part, due to her fantastic use of George Carlin quotes!

For those out there who prefer to learn by example, Tim Ferris recently interviewed 5 online businesses that gross over $250, 000+ per month. Tim may not be everyone's cup of coffee, but if there's one thing he knows, it's how to model success. Much of the information gleaned from his case studies is pertinent to Facebook branding and can also be applied to social recruiting.

Speaking of case studies... If you haven't checked out how Gordon Food Service is using Facebook to recruit for their family-run business, or how The Phoenix Group is creating a strong Facebook Employer Brand for the entire province of Saskatchewan, get on it! Both case studies provide great advice and examples of successful social recruiting and employer branding.

LinkedIn is a crucial part of social recruiting success. One of our very favorite bloggers, and social media guru extraordinaire, Stacy Donovan Zapar shares 6 tips to help you spring clean your LinkedIn profile.

If you really want to stay fresh, not just at work, but in life, apparently all you really need is sleep. Encouraging employees and employers to get proper sleep raises productivity, slashes healthcare costs, and boosts moral. What's not to love?!

We saved the best for last! A hot tip from yours truly, exciting huh?

Update your profile pic

With the magic of smart phones, there's no excuse not to have a stunning picture with which to represent yourself. Stand in front of a white wall, where there's natural light and have a friend snap your picture. If you want to get fancy, use a filter app (I like Instagram's "Rise" filter, as it hides how pale I am). Your profile pic is your online introduction. Make it work for you, not against you.

If that didn't convince you to show your lovely face then maybe this article will!

Happy Link Love Wednesday everyone :)

Unless you are Ryan Gosling, being charming is hard work. You have to brush your hair, make the right amount of eye contact, and refrain from telling terrible jokes, even if someone sets you up for a killer pun. Tricky stuff!

Things get even trickier when networking online. Sure, you can skip the hair brushing and eye contact, but you still have to engage people. And without the assistance of intonation, facial expressions, and firm handshakes, this can be difficult to say the least. Without these physical signs of congeniality, it’s easy to become a bit robotic with our online interactions.

Since Facebook recruiting is all about engaging potential candidates via the internet, what is an employer to do when trying to build a Facebook Talent Community?

Let’s bring it back to Ryan, or the Gos as we like to call him. He is pretty much the most beloved actor in Hollywood today, by both men and women. Sure he’s good looking, but come on, there are many more modelesque male actors out there (looking at you Channing Tatum!). He’s talented, but he’s no Johnny Depp. And yes, he’s funny in interviews, but a comedy genius he is not.

So what makes him so appealing? (Other than the fact that he is Canadian). It’s his humanness. The Gos is basically the male version of the girl next door. He’s nice, kind of goofy, handsome, but not too perfect, and is willing to make fun of himself. He is the opposite of a robot.

How exactly does that apply to building a Facebook Talent Community?

Simple.

Be a Ryan Gosling. Don’t be a robot.

With that in mind, here are some tips to make your talent community more awesome:

1 – Know your audience

You can’t please everyone. Ryan will never appeal to my dad, so why would he even try? He wouldn’t. Nor should you. My dad is retired.

Posting super-generic content in an attempt to appeal to everyone comes off as robotic. If your main hiring focus is for construction positions, then focus on appealing to construction workers. Find out what kind of content your target audience likes, how best to interact with them, and what kind of language they respond to. A great way to accomplish this is by asking current employees their opinion and even getting them to spend a little time on your company Page.

2 – Build on what you’ve got

No, I’m not going to reference Ryan’s biceps (okay, mentally maybe). Instead I’m going to take us all the way back to 1997 when the Gos was just a scrawny teen with a mushroom-cut. He played a girl-chasing nerd on Breaker High. Not exactly a role to brag about, but he built his career up from that terrible, terrible show to star in respectable movies like Lars and the Real Girl (my favorite Gosling endeavor).

For Facebook recruiting, having a base to build upon is really helpful. If you have a Company Page, even if you haven’t been using it to grow your employer brand, it’s a fantastic starting point.

Some companies start new Pages just for hiring. This means losing the Likes and community you’ve already established. With a quality Facebook recruiting app, you can capitalize on what you’ve already built by adding a Career Page to your pre-existing Company Page. This means you don’t have to start from scratch, and lets you grow your company brand alongside your employer brand, with all of the content you post.

3 – Flaunt what you’ve got

Unlike most Canadians (see Kids in the Hall), Ryan does not have perfect comedic timing. So what did he do when he was cast as a lead in a blockbuster comedy? He did the best he could with the dialogue, and then took his shirt off. A lot. His abs made up for anything he was lacking in comedic chops. Even straight men were impressed. Be like the Gos: Don’t hide your shortcomings — distract from them with your strengths.

Maybe you don’t have the best comedic timing either, and that’s cool. Instead of trying to be funny, just be super friendly and helpful. If you don’t have slick products to showcase, post images of company BBQs. Share the things your company does well, the knowledge that you’re proud of, and remember, everyone likes a good BBQ!

4 – Diversify

From trashy teen TV, to dramatic lead, to real life super-hero (seriously — he saved a lady from being hit by a car, for real). The Gos has tried it all, and so should you!

Take risks with your social strategy. Try posting a range of content, interacting more, maybe less, or just differently. Perhaps your candidate pool doesn’t respond to a lot of business-related links, but they freaking love Dilbert cartoons. Maybe they really like it when you reach out and chat them up, but then again maybe they don’t. You won’t know until you try.

To keep track of what works and what doesn’t, make only one big change to your recruiting strategy at a time, and pay attention to how your talent community responds. Even better, use an awesome Facebook recruiting app to track your metrics — just sayin’.

That’s all for now. May all of your recruiting be fruitful. Oh, and if by some slim chance you are Ryan Gosling, my contact info appears at the top-right of this blog post.

Today is the most important holiday in my new home, Utrecht. In fact, it's the most important day in all of the Netherlands. It's Queen's Day, or Koninginnendag in Dutch. To an outsider, Queen's Day sounds like any other boring statutory holiday. Well, at least to this Canadian it did. But, here in Utrecht, it is anything but. The Dutch are completely, utterly, head-over-heels in love with their queen. The royal colour orange is featured in every window display. Dutch men wear orange pants, Dutch women wear orange dresses, and Dutch kids wear orange everything! Orange flags hang like canopies over the parks, there's a party on every block, a flea market on every street, and people everywhere sharing bright orange pastries. The Dutch know how to do a party. They also seem to really understand community. How to build it, how to keep it strong, and how to enjoy its many benefits. We've been focused a lot on community lately at Jobcast. It is in part because we believe social recruiting is all about engaging with one's online community, but also because we're working on some cool additions to our Facebook recruiting app! Our last two posts have sought to give our readers some practical tips to grow their social networks and Facebook communities. Today we're going to look at every recruiter and employer's most important type of community:

The Talent Community

A talent community is different from a talent pool, in that it's not just a spreadsheet filled with data on potential candidates. It is in fact, a type of network created by employers and recruiters for the purpose of improving their talent pipeline (here's a definition of a talent pipeline — sorry for all the jargon!). This network usually consists of potential hires, current employees, former employees, and past applicants. This group forms a community that can engage with each other to give referrals, stay up to date on job opportunities, and simply share information related to their profession, all via social networks. Cool eh? Facebook is the perfect place to foster a talent community. Its very nature encourages engagement, and you (hopefully) already have a strong employer brand presence on Facebook. Maybe (ideally!) you even have a branded Facebook Career Page with listed jobs. Now, before we get too excited, keep in mind that unless you are hiring chocolate-tasters, potential candidates are unlikely to spend a great deal of time engaging with your talent community. If you are not offering immediate employment, active candidates will probably be more inclined to spend their time looking at specific job postings. Passive candidates will, as always, be more inclined to spend their time on Facebook Liking pictures of kittens in fancy dress. Okay, so that's the cons out of the way! Let's look at why Facebook talent communities are awesome: Easy to join

People are busy. And aren't we all sick of filling out online forms? That's a huge part of why only 10% of people who visit career sites fill out applications. To join your Facebook talent community, all they have to do is Like your Career Page. 'Nuff said. Encourages a Good Fit

The key to a successful talent community is your current employees. Get them on board, engaging with your Facebook Page, and they will be a testament to your company culture. The way they interact, and what they post, gives potential hires insight into what your company culture is like. And vice-versa. Encourages Referrals

Your current employees are always an asset when it comes to referrals. Facebook talent communities make it even easier for them to recommend their peers to you. It also creates a place where you can actively ask for referrals and get real-time answers. There's also the potential to crowdsource referrals by finding connections between potential candidates and current employers or peers. You Can Snoop

(a little, don't get creepy!) Unlike with spreadsheets, you can engage with potential hires who are part of your talent community. You can ask them questions, either as a group or selectively, to get to know what kind of talent is out there. Try asking candidates what they think constitutes a positive work environment, or what they look for in an employer. That's a whole lot of pros! Oh, and not to mention that positive interactions on your Facebook Page help to strengthen your employer brand. If you still need convincing about the awesomeness of talent communities, check out this article by Lou Adler. I'd stay around and try to convince you more, but I have a queen to celebrate, and my face won't paint itself orange.

Last Monday we covered what Big Data is. No, it is not Starfleet Lieutenant Commander Data’s rapping name. Almost as cool, it is an abundance of information that can be leveraged by employers to improve their social recruiting. We also delved into how Big Data can be used to find candidates. How it can be a boon for talent-mining and help recruiters to separate the cream of the crop from a myriad of less creamy resumes. That sounds a bit gross, let’s move on.

The hiring process involves more than just getting candidates interested in your jobs. It is also about finding candidates who fit with your company culture, who will be a positive addition to your team, and who will be productive in their roles.

Finding the right candidates.

HR can leverage Big Data to find the best possible hires. Collecting and analyzing existing data about top performing employees and comparing it with information about prospective employees makes candidate selection a more scientific and successful process.

You might be surprised by the type of data that you should focus on. Yes, it’s a good idea to look at employment history and education, but things like hobbies, health, location and personality traits are as important, if not more so. Employees that sleep more, tend to take fewer sick days and, interestingly enough, employees that are active on multiple social networks tend to be more productive in general.

Comparing this kind of data from prospective candidates with your current top performers is a smart way to hire. A small warning though, it is important that you use a consistent template for each candidate you interview and pay close attention to any legal issues on discrimination when hiring based on personality traits vs experience.

Retention

Gathering and analyzing diverse data sets is also useful in making informed estimates about candidate retention. For example, employees who live closer to their place of work, stay in their positions longer. So when hiring it makes sense to consider a candidates location. As such gathering data of this kind is very helpful to the hiring process especially if attrition is an issue.

Big Data can also be used to understand why employees vacate positions and to come up with solutions to keep them. Google recently used Big Data to explain their unusually high attrition rate for female employees and then implement an effective solution to the problem.

As we all know, employee morale is an important influence on retention. Using apps like Morale.me is a great way to keep tabs on morale levels, so that adjustments to company culture can be made if needed.

Metrics!

Back to social recruiting for this one. Metrics are so important when it comes to recruiting strategy, and without detailed insights about how previous recruiting campaigns were conducted, there’s no way to measure success. Understanding how, where, and why previous social recruiting campaigns were successful (or not) is fundamental for effectively planning future campaigns.

That’s why Jobcast always provides metrics with our recruiting app, even for users on the free plan. Gathering and analyzing data about your previous campaigns will show you how applicants found your job posts, which social networks attract what kind of candidates, and how often you need to post jobs and content in order to get the best recruiting results.

These are just a few practical ways to use Big Data for better social recruiting practices and hiring in general. There are so many more! If you are interested in a more complex break down of Big Data, here are a serious of articles you can read. But be warned, they require a substantially greater time investment! Hopefully these ideas are helpful for your recruiting efforts.

Also, hopefully there really is a rapper called Big Data. If not… I may consider a change of careers. I wonder if there’s any good big data on the success rates of Star Trek-themed hip-hop groups who rap without emotion and like cats. Check.