Have you gotten the feeling lately that recruiting is different than it used to be? That’s because it is. Candidates have access to more information than ever, the unemployment rate is back to pre-recession levels, and recruiters have more tools than ever before to help them.
If your hiring process is too long, you could be losing candidates. A study showed that 47% of declined offers in the second half of 2015 were due to candidates accepting other jobs, up 10 points from the first half of 2015. Additionally, a Gallup poll found that 51% of employees were considering a new job in 2015.
The secret to closing candidates faster is using all the tools at your disposal to get to know them and create a more seamless hiring process. We gathered three experts to discuss these issues in a webinar, Hire Better Talent Faster: How to Optimize Your Employer Brand and Candidate Apply Process. Here’s what we learned:
Embrace the new normal
Bjorn Eriksson, Chief Marketing Officer, Smart Recruiters discussed the balance of power shifting in in the recruiting world. He explained that the recruiter has three roles: as a networker, building talent pools of candidates; as an innovator, coming up with creative ways of finding the best candidates; and as a data scientist, monitoring and reporting on the talent pipeline.
Allegiant Travel has embraced this new recruiting environment by getting candidates involved. Rebecca Ahmed, Manager, Talent Acquisition and Employment Services at Allegiant shared that after each interview, candidates receive an autogenerated message to rate their experience on Glassdoor. They can then use the information they gather to improve their recruiting process.
Authenticate your employer brand
Showing your employer brand is more than just updating your careers page and Glassdoor profile. It’s about putting yourself in candidates’ shoes and creating an application and hiring process that understands their needs. Kira Federer, Product Marketing Manager, Glassdoor, shared a Glassdoor survey finding that the #1 interest of candidates is what makes a company an attractive place to work, outranking compensation and benefits. Because candidates are attuned to marketing speak, it’s important to avoid jargon and stock photos when you show candidates what it’s really like to work at your company.
Eriksson added that they also want a seamless recruiting experience. One-click apply with social profiles or instant resume upload as well as mobile apply reduces candidate drop off, allowing candidates to apply on the go. In addition, they expect consistency in the employer brand across channels, as well as a view of where they are in the recruiting process.
Use data to improve candidate experience & overcome counter offers
Allegiant Travel uses a variety of data sources to monitor and improve upon its candidate experience. On Glassdoor, Ahmed can view feedback on each role and location, and share with the appropriate hiring teams. She also shared that Allegiant uses data from culture- and skills-based assessments, a reference checking partner, and video interviewing technology along with interviewers’ candidate evaluations to make hiring decisions.
Eriksson showed how to track candidate sources and introduced some metrics you may not have considered: candidate to interview, candidate to hire, spend per candidate, and spend per interview. Combining these stats with the standard cost-per-hire metric allows companies to better evaluate their recruiting channels and optimize their spending.
On Glassdoor, employers can get a window into the competition by comparing their interviewing data and company ratings to competitors. If your hiring process is longer than average or less positively rated than average, decide what can you do to improve it. If your company ratings are above or below the competition on measures such as work-life balance or compensation, you can use that data as a selling point with candidates--or be prepared with stories to address candidates’ concerns when they arise in interviews.
In the new recruiting environment, there’s no shortage of tools out there to help you recruit faster. By putting yourself in candidates’ shoes, choosing the right partners, and paying attention to your metrics, you’ll be able to create an efficient hiring process that gets quality candidates in the door with ease.
