Social Recruiting

Gamification is a huge buzzword in recruitment lately.

For those of you thinking this means discovering top talent by forcing applicants to compete in epic games of capture-the-flag… you’re half right! But I’ll give you a quick summary anyway.

Basically, gamification is about the use of game mechanics outside of traditional gaming (think Fitocracy and Free Rice not Monopoly, Mario, or Words with Friends). Gamification was one of the hottest topics in social media last year and it will be even bigger in 2013.

For recruiters and employers, gamification can be used in three main ways. To engage candidates, to assess potential talent and to train new hires. As an added bonus it can also promote employer brand. Gamification for training is nothing new, so I’m not going to write too much about that — think: learning how to type with Mavis Beacon.

Here are some cool examples of how employers are gamifying their training process!

Before we can discuss the specifics of how gamification can (and should) be applied to recruiting, we first need to go over what makes it successful. Especially when you consider new statistics that show how most of the gamified apps produced this year will probably fail (although I think that could be said about apps in general).

Don’t let that put you off gamification though, it’s not actually very complicated to use successfully. Really, I promise, you can totally do this, so long as you keep these three things in mind:

1) Content

You can’t just slap a mustache and overalls on a recruiter and call him Mario!

Badges, leveling-up, and snazzy game dynamics on their own, while decidedly trendy, will not hold your candidate’s interest for long. There must be a challenge,  engagement, and an enticing reward, especially in a recruitment scenario. Don’t be like those banner ads that make you stomp a cockroach with your mouse, or throw a banana at a moving target, because we all know that the game is a sham, and the prize (an iPad!) is not real. That’s an extreme example, but it is good to remember that using  game mechanics just for the sake of gamification alone, isn’t fun for anybody.

A great way to begin creating quality content is by thinking about the audience you are gamifying for, which brings us to point number 2.

2) Target audience

Who are you looking to attract? Hopefully you know the answer to this and have already tailored your recruiting efforts accordingly.

The Hotel Marriott’s gamified Facebook recruitment app is a great example of catering to a target candidate pool. Their app is FarmVille-esque — perfect for attracting Facebook users, as they are already familiar with the formatting. It’s cute, brightly-colored, and appeals to a more conservative crowd. It’s also simple enough that it won’t intimidate less game-savvy candidates. It’s pretty much the opposite of what I want in a game, but they aren’t looking to attract me, so it’s perfect.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, there’s the recruitment games created by the Swedish Army. They’re competitive, difficult enough to be engaging, and look like games I would play for fun (the voice-overs used in both games totally remind me of Resident Evil).

Something that both companies’ games have in common is that they give the recruiter insight about their potential candidates. The Hotel Marriot app has candidates virtually perform common hotel service industry tasks. If the candidates are successful, they level up to more problem-solving tasks that require the kind of decision-making skills necessary for employment at a management level. The Swedish Army’s game requires teamwork, problem-solving, time management and cognitive skills while under pressure. Both apps are pretty ingenious and quite successful.

3) Reward

Participation, or “participaction” (as I like to call it), doesn’t happen without incentivization. For a successful gamification effort, you’ll need to offer your participants a reward for playing. According to Taghd Kelly, the reward can come in the form of prizes, validation, and/or objective completion. In the case of recruiting, the obvious prize is a sweet new job.

Validation is more about giving participants a way to show-off to their peers. The Swedish Army’s game does this by letting players challenge friends to beat their scores and gives the option of posting their high scores on Facebook.

Completion, if handled well, is one of the best rewards that a company can use. LinkedIn’s 100% complete profile is a perfect example of this type of incentive. In order to have a 100% completed profile, users must explore and utilize different aspects of the site. Not only is this a great way of teaching new users how to use LinkedIn, it also increases the user’s time investment, which promotes continued use of the site.

Completion also works to gamify blogs!

You have now reached 50% completion of Jobcast gameification certification and are a level 2 recruiting elf.

Make sure to read next Monday’s post, so you can reach 100% and become a level 10 gamified recruit-wizard (pointy-hat not included).

Happy New Year’s Eve!

I love New Year’s, possibly more than Christmas, possibly more than chocolate… Okay, definitely not more than chocolate, but a lot.

I do not love it because of the parties and booze — I’m definitely more of a “stay home and watch a movie” kind of gal. I do not love it because I think of it as a fresh slate or have any delusions of becoming a better version of myself (although making resolutions is always fun). Nope, I just love all the “best of” and “predictions for the new year” lists that flood the blogosphere this time of year.

I love the best-of lists because they catch me up on all of the things I am behind on and I love the prediction lists because they are the lazy man’s way to look like you know what you’re talking about.

I do NOT make predictions, as I am too afraid of being completely wrong and my wrongness being forever etched into the public record.

But I have to write about the new year at least a little, or I’ll be cast out by the Bloggers Guild of the Netherlands and I have grown used to all the perks. Free pickled herring anyone?

I have definitely noticed some trends in social recruiting, HR and social media that I think will gain even more ground in the coming year. All of these trends have been blogged about by other people, and I will link to them, so if I’m wrong, I can point my finger accusingly. But, on the other hand, if any of these predictions turn out to be true or useful, do feel free to attribute all credit to yours truly.

Things to be super aware of, obsess over, and express frustration about for 2013:

Mobile!

Obviously. We’ve already talked a bunch about the importance of mobile and it’s only getting importanter (also trending for 2013 : making up words!). There’s still a surprising lack of focus on mobile as a social recruiting tool, even though in 2012 we saw the amount of mobile users shoot up to 1.2 billion. The importance of Facebook ads that directly target mobile will just keep on rising, especially considering that 55% of Facebook users log on with mobile and that number doesn’t look like it’s going to drop anytime soon. Sales of PCs are down and mobile devices are up up up!

I am a prime example of this trend. Gen Y’r and proud (actually not at all — rather ashamed in fact — mostly due to Garden State being considered our generation’s defining film)*, I do not use a PC, as I work pretty much exclusively with a tablet and other super smart mobile devices – I’m that cool. So, if you must make one social recruiting strategy resolution this year, make it mobile-related and you will not be sorry. If you are sorry, please blame ERE.net (not me!) as their article claiming that mobile recruiting is about to get very hot is far too convincing.

Social Proof

Social proof refers to the perceived popularity and acceptance of your online presence by others. This perception is affected by positive comments, Likes, re-tweets and other similar interactions. Social proof makes you more appealing and trustworthy, and as such makes visitors more likely to Like your Facebook page or feel comfortable signing up for your newsletter.

It’s basically like how having a decent friend group makes you seem more date-worthy and less like a potential psychopath. People are much more likely to do something if they know other people are doing it to, especially members of their own peer group. This is why Facebook sponsored stories work so well and why I, and many other social media bloggers, predict that ads and recruiting campaigns should try to increase and capitalize on social proof if they want to be more socially successful in 2013.

Gamification

HrExaminer has been talking about gamification for a while now, and I’m seeing more and more articles about its applications for HR, recruiting and social media in general. We all know that gen Y’rs grew up on a steady diet of video games and soft-drinks. This means we are only motivated by achievement badges that we can post on our Facebook pages (social proof!), leveling-up, and sugary treats.

Gamification has been used for ages in schools and the workforce to train new skills.  I still have fond memories of learning to type with the classic Mavis Beacon key-mashing game. More recently, it’s being used to increase employee engagement and offer the feeling of reward for a job well done, according to Forbes. Although I honestly think a good pep-talk is a better way of accomplishing these goals, I must admit I’m a sucker for Gameification when it comes to health and fitness. So, maybe it would easily manipulate my competitive nature in the workplace as well.

It’s a trend, it’s gaining in popularity and I’m super interested to see whether or not it’s successful, especially when it comes to recruitment. For a cool example of how companies are using it to recruit, check out My Marriott International’s Farmville-esque app.

Job Boards

Okay, this is less of a trend and more of a “hey, I told you so”.

Jobcast is a Facebook app, but we still cater to job board and their users because, well, the overwhelming majority of job seekers still use them and that’s not going to change in 2013. We wrote a few months back about how job boards are still very relevant for social recruiting, but if you don’t believe me, check out this rather blunt quote pulled from the Fistful of Talent blog:

“The Job Boards? Still not dead. Why? Because the majority of ‘job seekers’ still go to a job board to find a job and most corporate HR/Talent Pros still don’t know how to pick up a phone and actually recruit passive talent. As long as ‘Post and Pray’ is the primary recruiting strategy of corporate talent acquisition – the Job Boards will live.”

I think they just may live past the point of “Post and Pray”, mainly because they’re comfortable and useful – just like that old pair of jeans that you just can’t bear to part with. For more info about job boards check out what the Job Board Doctor Blog has to say.

Last but not least…

Facebook!

Mostly because it’s where the most important app of 2013 is located. Of course I am referring to the Jobcast app, and I know you’ll all agree. But I also mention this because of a growing amount of evidence that points to Facebook beating out other online networks for social recruiting clout in the coming year. Like this study that says job Seekers Choose Facebook over both LinkedIn and Twitter — awesome.

So, from all of us at Jobcast, have an amazing New Year’s!

Personal Branding. It's a buzzword, and people love to hate buzzwords. .. but, just because it's a buzzword doesn't mean it's not worth learning about. Most of the bloggers dissing it already have pretty solid personal brands themselves. Sure, they'll tell you that they're just being their authentic-selves, but isn't that just another way of saying they're being true to their personal brands? Not all of us are that comfortable being our authentic-selves on the interwebs. We need a little push, a plan — a brand strategy! — to keep us on track, and help us face our social networking demons. Curse you LinkedIn! Yup, LinkedIn terrifies me. It's the digital equivalent of resume-updating-phobia. Have I accomplished enough in my life? Why did I change my major so many times? Does my avatar photo make me look dorky? Yes -- to all three. If you haven't noticed, I'm using this blog as therapy. Like last week's post, about discovering your personal brand, which I used to update my bio and improve my LinkedIn profile. Hopefully it helped you too. Now we're going to lay out three easy (actually) steps to building a personal brand. 1 - Start Small You have a mission statement and bio all written up, have listed your goals, and know your target audience, now it's time to put this info to good use. You don't have to buy 10, 000 Facebook ads, connect with every single person LinkedIn recommends, or tweet your every move. Instead, start small and build up gradually (just please don't start posting pics of every cappuccino you order). Update your profile on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter. Click Like on one new page a day, comment on LinkedIn Answers at least once a week, and respond wittily to some tweets you find interesting. It's these types of interactions that grow your social network and personal brand in an incremental way. Hot Tip : LinkedIn Answers is a great place to connect with peers, see what topics are trending in your field, and show off your knowledge. Don't have any answers? Asking a thoughtful question is equally beneficial and — bonus! — you can learn something new. Keep your brand in mind for each of your new posts and your personal brand will grow automagically (I'm a word wizard!). See, I told you these steps were easy. 2 - Be Consistent This is a tricky one for a lot of people, but mostly because of shiny-new-toy-syndrome. New things are exciting! This is why when I first joined Instagram, I posted pictures of all of my snacks, my feet, and pretty much anything that I thought was remotely interesting (mostly snacks ... and my feet). Thank goodness I only interact with friends on Instagram — very, very forgiving friends. Posting or tweeting every random thing that pops into your head/in front of your iPhone is considered spamming and it is not well received by the general public. The desire to implement a new personal branding strategy may make you want to tweet about it every 15 minutes, but it's much more effective and respectful to tweet/post/share content consistently spaced throughout the day. That content should be varied, of high-quality and in line with your brand. It can be original content or not — a good mix is probably best.  If you find yourself running out of ideas for tweets, try following some interesting people to get inspired.

@ArenaFlowers is amazing! Hot Tip: If you need to take a break, tweeting on Fridays is often less effective than other business days. 3-day tweet weekend! 3 - Just Start (NOW!) There's no time like the present. Your bio may not be perfect —  perhaps your avatar is a little blurry, and  maybe you haven't yet figured out how to use hashtags. These are all pretty minor details that shouldn't derail you from putting yourself out there and getting social. Rome wasn't built in a day, but your Facebook Page sure can be. Buzzword or not, strong social recruiters succeed by harnessing the social networks they've built up with their personal brand. I believe in you.

I spend a lot of time working on my GPP. GPP, for those with a life outside the gym, means general physical preparedness. To me, it means the ability to protect friends and family if (when) the Zombie apocalypse happens. To those who haven't watched Resident Evil as many times as me, it means developing the physical abilities necessary to succeed at whatever tasks life may throw your way. Be it rescuing cats from trees, lifting heavy grocery bags or escaping freaky Zombie dogs, great GPP is the best tool in your belt. That's why I do pull-ups; honestly, the fear of zombies nipping at my ankles is about the only thing that could motivate me enough to do such a thing! Great social recruiters have something in common that I'd like to call GSMP, or General Social Media Preparedness. I'd like to call it that, but realize it would be very silly, considering there's already a much more common name for this type of preparedness : Personal Brand. These recruiters have worked hard to cultivate their personal brand and it's a huge part of what they bring to the table. They know that they can't simply tweet a job post and expect it to go viral without having first built up a network to receive their tweet. The best social recruiters have worked hard to find their own voice, build their online reputation, and create relationships. They come to the social networking game prepared, which, as with Zombie dogs, is the best way to come out ahead... or at least with your leg still firmly attached! I don't know about you, but my personal brand needs a little work. I wrote about this last Wednesday and linked some great articles and apps for improving personal branding. These links are awesome, but I thought it might help to lay out a few really important steps to creating and making use of an effective personal brand.

Step 0.5: Check Yourself Before You Wreck Yourself

Before you can start to build your personal brand you need to figure out what you want your brand to be. This decision should be based on your perception of yourself, other peoples perceptions of you, and the type of clients and candidates you are looking to attract. If you keep these three things in mind when building your brand you'll be able to brand in a way that attracts clients while staying honest to who you are. Your personal brand is what separates you from everyone else in your field. So it has to be different. It is also the face you present to colleagues and clients so it can't be so different that it freaks them out. It's a fine line, but really not that hard to navigate. If you want to find young, edgy talent, you want to attract trendy, design firms, and people other than your mom find you hilarious, then you're personal brand can include wry jokes, tweeting about punk rock, and cuss-words. Basically, you can strive to emulate That Cynical Girl , Laurie Ruettimann. I wish I was that cool and self-aware! If your client base is straight-laced and corporate, and you're hunting for experienced talent who would rather wear suits than sneakers to an interview, make like John Sumser of HR Examiner and establish yourself as a wise authority in your field. To discover how best to brand yourself, I recommend (1) writing down your brand mission statement, (2) goals, (3) which audience you're trying to reach and (4) what type of content / voice that audience responds to.

Example: Sam Parker Mission statement

- Write articles that are informative, helpful, and entertaining. Do ample research, create my own unique content and do everything in my power to warn people of the up-and-coming zombie apocalypse. Goals

- Provide content that will keep my readers interested. Expand readership. Promote Jobcast and help Jobcast users. Which audience?

- Employers, recruiters, other bloggers in my field and job seekers. What my audience responds to

- Respect, good information, using clear language (not buzz-words), a little humor and a lot of Facebook talk. Next week: Steps 1 - 3 and my love hate relationship with LinkedIn.

In case you hadn’t noticed, everyone and their seven-year-old has a smart phone. Adoption rates continue to soar, and as they do, more and more people are using their phones to manage online networks. Last year, there were more smart phones sold than PCs and recently Facebook revealed that over 50% of their users are primarily logging on with mobile. Social recruiters cannot ignore the importance of mobile, nor can we. That’s why Jobcast is constantly working to improve mobile functionality for our app.

Many of our clients ask us for advice on how to improve their social recruiting — a huge part of why our blog exists. Since Jobcast has some pretty unique features that can help social recruiters dominate mobile, so we thought we’d write a post about them.

Unfortunately for Facebook app users, Facebook doesn’t load Page apps on mobile. This can be very frustrating for recruiters and job seekers alike. So, when clients use our built-in sharing tool to post a job, we generate a smart bit.ly URL.  These smart URLs intelligently redirect mobile candidates to a mobile friendly site, so that they can continue to view job-listings.

But wait, there’s more!

Metrics are also extremely important for running effective social media campaigns. With all of the different available networks, it’s important to figure out which ones work best for your specific needs.The Jobcast app provides detailed reports of performance metrics, so that users can plan their next move.

Remember that smart URL we were just talking about? (if you don’t, you may want to consider eating more salmon.. I mean it was just a few sentences ago!) Well, when a job-post is shared on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter with our tool, a unique trackable URL is generated for each site. With Jobcast, you can then access reports with information about which social sites your talent pool is using most.

But how does it all work?

Here’s a little tutorial we’ve put together: Firstly, here’s an example of  a typical job post

Now, if you were to copy the URL from the browser’s navigation bar, and share that — it would only work for desktop users! You’d have a 50% loss of reach already.

Not to worry! If instead you choose to share your links with our built-in sharing tool:

It will create a link that looks like this:  http://bit.ly/SsJtOT

Much cuter, huh?

Not only does this link redirect mobile clients to a site they can actually use, but it also creates those awesome smart URLs we were talking about earlier! This means better metrics, which leads to more effective recruiting campaigns.

We do it because we care. And we are optimization nerds!

.. but really it’s because we care. Our clients are amazing! We are so very thankful and honored to work with you all.

If you would like to suggest blog topics, ask questions about the Jobcast app, request new features or just chit-chat, you can reach us on Facebook, or Twitter, or right here on our blog!

When exactly did “viral” become a positive word? It still makes me think of the flu! But, in the world of social media, everyone wants their creations to go viral.  That’s why how-tos about creating viral videos, memes, blog posts and tweets are so very popular. That is why I am blogging about viral job postings; It’s to please the masses… Otherwise I would be blogging about teacup kittens and the latest James Bond flic (It was pretty awesome by the way. The kimodo scene!).

How do you make a job posting viral? HOW?!?! 

Well, first things first, you need to use the internet. No, not just for streaming Dexter and perfecting your Gangnam Style dance — not that those things aren’t important. You need to be on the internet creating a web presence, promoting your company, and generally making yourself known. We have tons of posts on how to do that already, so, if you don’t have a blog, Twitter, branded Facebook Career Page, and/or Pinterest account, that’s step number one. If you have no community to share with, you’ll have no one to contaminate!

Presuming that you have all your networking ducks in a row, we can move on to step number two:

Content!

No one wants to share boring content. No one. People do all the time, but usually it is about themselves, so they are under the false impression that what they are sharing is extremely interesting (see my teenage selfs’ Live-journal for a perfect example!).

Most job descriptions are a total snore. Position Title, Summary, Essential Functions, Qualificationzzzzzzzzz… Unless these details are accompanied by a ridiculously generous salary, the chance a post like this is going to be shared once, let alone go viral, is pretty darn slim. To make your job post interesting you need a hook. Brag about your sunny location, great vacation policy, amazing staff parties, or your world-class foosball table! What does this position offer your desired candidate that no other position does?

This company used its generous vacation policy to make their job posting go viral, worked like a charm. Using images to describe a job post like this campaign does is another great way to stand out from the crowd. It’s especially effective for sites like Facebook and Pinterest.

My current favorite tool in the social recruiting tool belt is video! Companies, like this one, are using recruiting videos that show off their awesome company culture to attract talent.

Once you have a stellar post, Pinboard, or recruiting video ready to go, it’s time to get social. Post on all of your networks, promote on popular search engines and job boards, and don’t forget to leverage your connections. If you know people in the field you are currently hiring for, ask them to share your post. Get in touch with “influencers” and ask for their advice and help. Ask other employees to share the post on their social networks.

Be social!

Being social means starting conversations. So, once you post your job and chat up your connections, don’t hole-up in quarantine — connect. Be present on Facebook and Twitter to respond to questions applicants may have. Banter wittily. Post more photos and comment on the status of your talent hunt! Be the best virus-spreader you can be by continuing to sneeze (digitally, of course) on everyone through every available channel.

Now, just in case all this talk of coughing and going viral has you feeling a bit queasy, I’m going to sign off with this recipe for delicious chicken soup, yummers.

Sponsored Stories are all the rage. But what are they?

“Sponsored stories are messages coming from friends about them engaging with your Page, app or event that a business, organization or individual has paid to highlight so there’s a better chance people see them.”

Weird fact about me and Facebook. Their sponsored stories have no effect on me. None at all. Nada.

This has nothing to do with their effectiveness. Seriously. Click through rate (CTR) percentages for sponsored stories are crazy high.

Nor their relevance to my life. I’m sure the stories popping up on my feed are well-tailored to my demographic (Mashables told me so). Data from Spruce Media shows that with sponsored stories, Facebook has been more successful than ever at showing users ads that are geared towards their interests and demographic.

It’s definitely not because of my reliance on the mobile app for most of my Facebooking; Sponsored story CTR performance is highest with mobile. Which is crazy important, seeing as 60% of Facebook activity is now mobile (that percentage is probably higher today, and will be even higher tomorrow).

And, although I’m loath to admit it, sometimes I get super confused and think sponsored stories are just regular parts of my news feed! Facebook, you’re so sneaky!

Nope.

They fail to convert me because I’m confused by all the things my new Dutch friends Like. I should be clicking on so many sponsored stories (at least according to these stats and graphs), but living in Holland has made me immune. Now if only I was immune to the fattening effects of Dutch treats! Damn you Stroopwafel!

So what’s the take-away for recruiting? From what I can gather, there are three major points to focus on when it comes to recruiting and sponsored stories.

Visibility

Sponsored stories show up in users’ News Feeds. This is the same place that updates (hot gossip) show up, so this is where users are often focusing their attention. It’s not surprising then that these ads are getting a lot more love (CTR). As with Facebook ads, you’ll get to target a very specific audience with your sponsored stories, which increases the chances that those viewing your stories will click-through, that they’re actually potential candidates, and that they’re not my grandma.

Trust

People are much more likely to click-through to your page if they think you’re legit. Sponsored stories promote user trust in two ways.

The first is by showing potential candidates that their peers Like you, yes Facebook is basically high-school all over again. Sponsored stories show people that their friends think your page is great by highlighting it when they comment on and Like your Page. Facebook users are much more inclined to visit and Like pages that their friends and colleagues have pre-approved. Sort of like word-of-mouth, but without the bad breath.  You get to choose whether to promote Likes, Comments or Activity with your stories and whatever you choose comes with a stamp of approval.

The second way that sponsored stories encourage trust is through their presentation. They look like any other post. Daniella’s getting married, Duncan Likes Castleville, Pam changed her profile pic (she has such cute hair!) Did you catch that? Facebook puts your ad smack dab in the middle of a potential candidate’s comfort zone, which makes them much more likely to click-through to your page.

Mobile

Social networking is mobile. Just ask your colleagues next time you all go out for a drink. Oh wait, they’re all ignoring you. They’re way too busy “checking-in” and Tweeting about how awesome it is that you’re all out for drinks! 60% of Facebook users log on through mobile first and these numbers are continuing to rise. Sponsored stories have much higher CTR for mobile than desktop. This percentage increases further when both mobile and desktop are targeted together. To recruit successfully on Facebook, getting your ads seen on mobile is a must. Sponsored stories are the most effective way to get that done.

Now if only I could figure out how to use sponsored stories to send fancy baked-goods to my friends back home! Sam Likes stroopwaffel. Click it! CLICK IT!

There is a lot of controversy over the effectiveness of Facebook ads for small business. Most of this controversy seems to be about its lack of effectiveness for hard sales, which is a problem, but only if we’re approaching Facebook as we would Amazon.com. Soooo… Let’s not and say we did, okay?

Instead, let’s continue to view Facebook as a place to grow brand awareness, increase talent pools and nurture brand loyalty. Let’s see it as a place to create community, be social… as a social networking site. We know that Facebook ads do a great job of targeting specific demographics, increasing visibility and fostering relationships over time.

If we look at Facebook ads as a way to accomplish these tasks, then there really isn’t much controversy over their effectiveness — especially for small businesses. Small businesses, more than any other, need to get their message out there and become visible to a larger community. Facebook ads are a great way of doing this.

Still not sold? (I swear I am not getting paid by Facebook. Why am I not getting paid by Facebook?!?) Here are some more reasons why Facebook ads and small business make an awesome team:

• Facebook ads increase likes. You can then message these fans periodically and incentivize them to share your Page with their peers.

• Facebook ads let you target a very specific demographic. If you are promoting your real-estate company, you probably do not want to waste ad money on 13 year-olds. Unless you’re based in LA. Then you’ll only want to be targeting 13 year olds, specifically 13 year old pop-stars named Justin Bieber.*

• Facebook ads let you build a list to track the success of ad campaigns.

• Facebook ads have less keyword competition than Google ads.

• Facebook ads reach users in their comfort zone. They never have to leave the warm Snuggie-like zone of Facebook in order to visit and like your Page.

• Facebook ads are better for increasing word-of-mouth sharing. Only my mother-in-law sends cut-outs from newspapers these days. Other people share things via, you guessed it, Facebook.

• Facebook ads direct people to your Page, where other customers, users, friends, mother-in-laws have left nice comments about you, which makes you more trustworthy.

How do you make an effective Facebook ad? By following this tutorial, obviously! (I used the best bits of everyone else’s tutorials and mashed them all together, saving you time, because I’m nice like that)

Tutorial

I’m half-assuming you already know this part: Log onto Facebook, go to your Page, select “Build an Audience”, then click “Create an Ad”. Facebook loves to change these steps — just try watching a tutorial from last month and you’ll see what I mean — so be prepared for slight variations.

Choose your destination: Select the page or URL that you want advertised. Simple.

Facebook will pull info from your selected destination. Easy peasy. Then you’ll need to choose what you want your ad to do. For our purposes we’ll choose to “Get More Likes” (don’t worry, we’ll talk about promoting page posts in the very near future… okay, okay, next Monday!)

Next, we create the ad itself. Facebook will provide a headline, and then below that you can enter text. Keep the text short and sweet, as you don’t get a lot of characters. This is where you enter your call to action (Do NOT use all caps, Facebook hates this and your target audience hates this — no one likes being yelled at). You’ll select a “Landing View” which is where users who click on your ad will be directed. It’s often better to choose a specific tab and not just your timeline. As our goal is to have people download the Jobcast app, we’ll choose to direct people to the tab where they can do exactly that. Then, you’ll need to upload an 100 by 72 pixel image. Luckily for us, our logo is awesome and Facebook auto-filled our image selection — thanks guys!

Next you get to select your “Sponsored Stories”. For this we’ll keep things simple and choose “People Liking Your Page” which plays into that trust-concept we talked about earlier. Nice!

Now here’s the most important step, “Choose Your Audience”.

How you narrow down who sees your ads will be a determining factor in their success. Be specific. We’re choosing to target The USA, Canada and Mexico with this campaign, because I want to see if we get traction in these regions. Then I’ll select an age group. Ageism is bad! But you know who your audience is and there’s nothing wrong with targeting them specifically. You can select to target men, women or “All”. Again, sexism = bad! But being realistic about who you’re targeting is not. I encourage playing with these options, watching your metrics, and adjusting in future campaigns. The data you uncover may surprise you. We have selected women here, but we could eventually run three campaigns: one targeting women, one for men and one for both. Then we’d get some interesting data about that campaign.

Next, we can choose specific interests (see screenshot above). Type in a few and Facebook will suggest more options.

Now Facebook asks us to select how the target audience is connected to our page. As we’re running a campaign to get more likes, we don’t want to target people who already like us. Unless by the time I publish this article Facebook starts allowing double-likes.

Finally, painfully, budgeting. Yuck. You can choose between a “Daily budget” or a “Lifetime budget”.  This is pretty self-explanatory: one sets a budget per day, while the other is set per campaign.  You can choose to run your campaign until your funds run out with the daily budget, or choose to run it within a certain time-frame, which works with either option.

Next we get to selecting optimization (see screenshot above). This is one place you’ll really need to go into the advanced options. We’ll want to optimize “Per Click” rather than impressions. It may be a bit more expensive, but it’s worth it, as otherwise we could be paying for an ad that pops on the screen of a person who has left their computer to make a sandwich. Facebook will suggest a bid per click — it’s best to offer a bit more than the minimum suggestion to ensure your campaign gets the go-ahead from Facebook. No need to go high with this first round of ads. If your bid is rejected, or you know that you have a ton of competition, you’ll bid a little higher.

Now all that’s left to do is review our ad and click “Place order”.

All done, time to check Twitter!

So we’ve established that Pinterest is worthwhile as a recruiting tool. We’ve gone over how to create a presence on Pinterest. We’ve talked more than enough about every Pinners responsibility to post pictures of infographics and kittens. So let’s get down to brass tacks (is that not the best saying ever?!)

How exactly do you actively find candidates on Pinterest?

First things first: You’ll need to ask the question “Is active Pincruiting possible for the position I’m trying to fill”? For a lot of fields, the answer is no. Let’s use Taco Bell as an example. They have a huge recruiting presence on Pinterest, but are they using this site to actively searching for new line cooks, HR reps or managers? No. The boards they have are focused on attracting candidates and creating awareness of these positions. Actively seeking these types of candidates on Pinterest would be just plain silly. No one has a Pinboard dedicated to their love of rolling burrito, after burrito, after burrito. Trust me, I looked!

Now, if you are looking for someone obsessed with fashion who will make your storefront look amazing, or a graphic designer to give your brand a facelift, or a tech-savvy blogger to write articles your clients actually want to read… I give you Pinterest.

Let’s say I’m desperately in need of a graphic designer to update my brand. I’ve had a lot of resume submissions, but haven’t found anyone all that promising and, let’s face it, I don’t really know that much about design. Relying 100% on my own taste is maybe not the best idea; I’ve been sporting the same haircut since I was 18! That’s where Pinterest comes in.

So, I log into my already awesome Pinterest account and go to the main page to begin my talent search. Pinterest’s search functionality, like so many networking sites, is not super functional. I know, it drives me crazy too, but since the results are so visual you can scroll through them much more easily and quickly than on other sites. From the main page, I can choose to browse Following, Categories, Everything, Popular, or Gifts. None of these categories are useful for what we want to do, and unfortunately it isn’t possible to narrow them down any further with an advanced search option. This is very useful if you want recipes for protein pancakes or pictures of Apple products, but not for recruiting.

For my purposes I’ll search “graphic designer”. Then I can choose to view results for Pins, Boards or People. As there are so many results I’ll select Boards. Searching under People is pretty useless in most cases, as it’s only going to yield results if someone has included the searched terms in their username. For something as broad as graphic design, there will be many great Pinboards with those terms in the title

Now, if I want someone based out of a specific location, I might have trouble searching by Board. For example, another search including the word Toronto yields one measly result. Not a big deal, I’ll just switch to the Pin option and low and behold, we get a ton of results!

I’ll scan through the Pins our search has returned and click through to the ones that look profitable. These will be pretty obvious. They’ll look professional, match my search criteria and appeal to me visually.

Examples:

I am seriously into pirates and ampersands so my choice is clear! Thank you Vinod, I shall follow all of your boards as I bet you’ll be a great resource for the future.

I’ll favorite him and then click through the image to it’s source location. Well, hello Grant Burke! Reliable and passionate with some serious internet love — sounds like a solid lead to me.

That’s a quick-start for those of you looking to actively recruit on Pinterest. Happy hunting!

There are way too many amazing tutorials about how to use Pinterest, and I would be kidding myself if I thought I could write a better one. I did think about making a vlog but then I would have to put on makeup and comb my hair! Not happening. So I will skip that topic all together and get right down what to we’re all really interested in : Recruiting.

We already talked a bit about why Pinterest is a useful tool in the social recruiter’s arsenal. Just ask these huge companies that are already making Pinterest a priority to recruit and grow their brands: Taco Bell and General Electric.  On second thought, don’t ask them, they are way too busy being huge companies. These smaller businesses may be more useful examples: Carousel Consulting, Flexjobs and The New Traditionals.

So what’s your first move? What’s the one thing you need to start recruiting on Pinterest?

Pinboards.

Start simple: sign up with your company Twitter or Facebook account and your bio will be filled in automatically. You can worry about tweaking it later. For now, let’s just focus on the easy stuff.

I recommend setting up four boards before you start worrying about following, re-pinning or liking.

Pinboard one: We’re Hiring!

If hiring is your main focus, then start with a Pinboard dedicated to job posts. Pin an image for each position — they don’t have to be job specific, but it helps! Shoot for simple, quality images. If your images are too busy, then your Pinterest account will end up looking cluttered.

If you’re not using the Jobast app then you’ll have to make sure that the image you pin links back to your career page. With each Pin you should include a brief description of the position, its location and your company name (makes you more searchable, yay!). Eventually, if you have quite a few openings, you can make a Board for each category of job. This really isn’t necessary though, and it may distract you from posting super cool infographics, which would make me sad.

(By the way, the Jobcast app is currently the only recruitment app that let’s you select any image from your Company Facebook page to Pin. Other apps usually just use your logo — boooring. With Jobcast you can use any pic you like, and this makes us pretty amazing. Not to toot our own horn or anything 🙂 )

Board two: All About You

This Pinboard should be dedicated to what your company does. Ours is called “We are Jobcast”. Subtly referencing the band Devo with your board names, as we did, is a really great idea. People will then associate you with dancing, funny hats and generally positive things. This board is where you’ll post company blogs, videos and any media coverage you receive. Post about your best products or most exciting projects. This board will work hand in hand with the information provided in your profile to explain what your business does. Use it to brag a little — show the world how awesome you are!

Board three: Company Culture (my favorite)

You NEED a Pinboard that shows off company culture. This is, in my humble opinion, the most important board. An amazing reference for this is GE’s Factory Floor Pinboard. Crazy, right? It made me want to work for them and I don’t even own a car, let alone know anything about engineering!

This Pinboard’s purpose is to show potential candidates how fantastic it is to work for your company. Post your recruiting video. If you don’t have a recruiting video, then watch this. Done watching? Now, go make a recruiting video, and post it (everywhere — Pinterest, Facebook, your company blog —  EVERYWHERE!) Post pictures of staff parties, the company foosball championship, team events, and current employees. This is another great excuse to have some fun at work. May I suggest a chili eating competition? It shows creativity and gumption!

Board four: Cool Stuff We Found on the Internet

A Pinboard dedicated to all that is awesome. The most fun, but also the most complicated. This Board will be dictated by your brand, which means you’ll really need to think about what content is and isn’t appropriate without losing your “fun factor”. If you prefer to keep things strictly professional, then limit your posts to awesomeness related to your field. If you want to project a cutting-edge, tech-savvy image, that’s easy. Post lots of images of Apple products! If you want to be perceived as both a super fun and rewarding workplace, then post a good mix of content related to your field, adorable kittens and gorgeous infographics.

For my next article I’m thinking something along the lines of “How to lose friends and alienate people with Pinterest!”… I’m open to suggestions though 🙂

Links! (As if this post needs any more #allthelinks)

• Pinterest for Recruiting and Employer Branding. An in-depth article I wish I’d written. Crystal Miller’s use of puns makes my heart sing.

• Tips to Use Pinterest for Business. These tips are super straightforward and easy to implement, <3

• 5 Tips for Using Pinterest for Recruiting. We disagree about about how to post jobs, but I am open to differing opinions on social recruiting… So long as we agree that pictures of kittens boost productivity.

• Pinterest Can Help Recruiting Get Visual. Yes. Yes it can!