Engaged Recruiting: The Social Recruiting Approach

Companies currently face numerous hurdles when it comes to attracting qualified employees. The challenge spans from selecting the right platform to creating strong incentives that motivate suitable candidates to actually apply. Along the way, you must not only present your company authentically but also compete for the attention of a small pool of suitable talents.

In this blog post, we have summarized the most important market trends and best practices to provide you with essential tools to prevail in the “War for Talents”. We examine why social recruiting might haven’t worked out for many companies and explain step-by-step how you can optimize your own recruiting strategy to attract top talents.

What is Social Recruiting?

Social recruiting refers to the use of social media and networks to find, approach, and hire potential candidates. There are several reasons to use social recruiting in the search for employees:

1. Wide Reach: Social media has an enormous reach, with millions of users worldwide. Platforms like LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, etc., allow job postings to be quickly and effectively broadcast to a broad audience.
   
   
2. Targeted Approach: Social media enables specific targeting of candidate groups. Using filters and targeting options, companies can precisely reach applicants with the desired skills and experiences.
   
   
3. Cost Efficiency: Compared to traditional recruiting methods like newspaper ads or job fairs, social recruiting can be more cost-effective. Many social media platforms offer free or low-cost options for posting and promoting job offers.
   
   
4. Interactive Application Processes: Applicants can ask questions, give feedback, and directly interact with the company via social platforms, leading to a more efficient and transparent application process.
   
   
5. Employer Branding: Through social recruiting, companies can strengthen their employer brand by providing insights into their culture, values, and work environment. This can attract applicants who possess relevant skills and personally fit well with the company culture.
   
   
6. Faster Response and Recruitment: Social recruiting allows for quicker responses to dynamic staffing needs and shorter hiring cycles. Job postings can be published immediately, and potential candidates can be quickly identified and contacted.

Overall, social recruiting can be an effective and efficient method to reach and hire qualified applicants, especially in an increasingly digital and complex environment.

How Does Modern Social Recruiting Work?

The requirements for social recruiting are constantly changing. Simple standard campaigns used to suffice, but nowadays, almost no company neglects using their social channels for recruiting processes. Given the increasing competition, it becomes significantly more challenging to reach and convince the right users.

Surprisingly, social recruiting can be relevant and helpful for all job groups. Not only can you reach target groups who spend a lot of time on the computer, but also workers engaged in physical or manual labor. The success-driving strategy behind ad placements changes here.

Where Should I Post Ads?

There are numerous platforms for social recruiting where employers can find and approach potential candidates. The choice of platform depends on various factors, including the target group, industry, and type of position advertised.

As mentioned earlier, manual laborers should be targeted differently than office employees. Below, we introduce several platforms in more detail:

1. LinkedIn: LinkedIn is a leading platform for professional networking and recruiting. Employers can post job ads, strengthen their employer brand, directly approach potential candidates, and search for talents in LinkedIn groups and forums.
   
   
2. Facebook: Facebook offers various ways to approach potential applicants, including posting job ads on the company page, using Facebook job groups, and placing targeted ads. Be mindful of platform-specific limitations—we’ll show you later how to circumvent these with a few tricks!
   
   
3. TikTok: Using videos and storytelling, TikTok can convey a lot about your company and values. It’s often used for employer branding, and with some know-how, you can also run successful recruiting campaigns. Both Gen Z and Millennials are active on TikTok, with users spending an average of 52 minutes per day on the platform!
   
   
4. Instagram: Instagram is ideal for sharing visually appealing content. Use it to give insights into your company culture, tell employee stories, and reach potential applicants. Platform-specific details must be considered here as well—we’ll discuss more later.
   
   
5. Xing: Similar to LinkedIn, Xing is a professional networking platform popular in German-speaking countries. Employers can post job ads, search for employees, and connect with potential candidates.
   
   
6. Reddit: Reddit offers a variety of subreddits on different topics and industries where employers can post job ads and reach potential candidates. Often underestimated or overlooked, Reddit offers unique potential for successful recruiting campaigns.
   
   
7. Industry-Specific Platforms: Depending on the industry and job field, there may be specialized platforms or forums for social recruiting. These can be great for targeting skilled professionals in a specific area.

Identifying the platforms that best fit your goals, target group, and company is crucial. Often, a channel mix leads to success. At Hackabu, we frequently post on TikTok or Instagram for our clients, showcasing the company’s benefits. This is followed by a remarketing campaign to re-target interested users.

Social Recruiting Hack – Meta Ads Without Restrictions?!

On Meta, it’s officially not possible to use detailed targeting for job ads due to anti-discrimination policies. However, we’ve found a way to precisely target potential candidates with interests, lookalike audiences, and remarketing.

To do this, understand Meta’s algorithm: before an ad is approved, Meta reviews it. If you deliberately don’t categorize the campaign as a “job offer,” they will analyze whether categorization is necessary. If you want unlimited targeting options, “trick” the system by using employer branding wording in texts and calls to action, like “Learn more about [Company Name]” and mentioning the job only in the image.

The ad might still get rejected, but with some trial and error, you can communicate the key message to your target audience without restrictions. Overall, posting job ads on Meta requires strategy and flexibility to overcome targeting challenges. With careful planning and execution, you can successfully attract qualified applicants on this platform.

Making Your Job Ad Attractive

Simply communicating open positions is not enough for social recruiting ads today. It’s crucial to present and sell the company and the job compellingly, using tactics and strategies similar to regular advertising. Highlight unique selling points like sales arguments for a product or service.

Critically evaluate your benefits and compare them with other companies in your industry. Flexible working hours, home office, and training opportunities are now standard for office jobs. Traditional companies should also consider offering more than just free fruit, coffee, and a pleasant work atmosphere to make office jobs attractive.

For benefits like team cohesion and work atmosphere, many companies now use images and videos to convey these aspects. Creativity is needed, and younger employees can help. Well-executed content can be very sympathetic and authentic, especially to younger target groups.

Interaction Trumps Reach

For job ads, reach should not be a campaign KPI. The greater the reach, the higher the potential wastage. Instead, focus on reaching relevant people and prompting interaction.

How do you reach the right people and get them to interact with your ad?

Our experience shows that people are naturally curious and respond reliably to gamified interaction elements online. Use this to generate high interaction rates with relatively simple means.

Social Recruiting Case Study

We’ll illustrate how you can reduce your HR team’s workload by up to two-thirds and make applications up to 70% cheaper with a concrete example. Our proven methods help you recruit more efficiently and use resources more effectively.

For such social recruiting campaigns, don’t just focus on actively job-seeking candidates. Also target those who are not actively looking but might consider a change—the so-called “passive job seekers,” who make up about 70% of the job seeker pool.

Our approach: Develop a quiz with specific challenges for the target group, formulating industry-specific questions. We further simplify the HR team’s work by segmenting leads by criteria like location and experience. After automation, leads and their contact details are forwarded to the relevant HR staff. This optimization process reduces the HR team’s workload significantly.

For instance, a user clicks on the ad, completes the quiz correctly, and we immediately communicate interest and invite them to an interview. Wrong answers result in an automated rejection or an offer for a position with lower requirements.

If you want more applications and a reduced HR workload, don’t hesitate to reach out. We’ll create a personalized automation plan and implement it for you. We look forward to helping you optimize your HR processes and set your company on a path to success.