Today’s marketplace is in stark contrast with what it was in yesteryears. Many talent acquisition professionals would tell you that they find it harder to recruit today than they did years ago. Some of the reasons why this space has changed include the fact that there is more competition for the most talented, as well as the apparent shift in most job seekers’ expectations. As a result, companies are rethinking how they recruit, bringing new and modern approaches to talent acquisition. The following are 7 trends you should look out for in social media recruitment in the next year.
1. Social Recruiting Strategy is Essential
Available studies show that 32% of the best companies the world over now use social media to engage candidates. This has made it necessary for these organizations to invest in social media recruitment marketing and social media strategies, as well as increase their use of available social listening tools.
One big plus in this social networking approach to recruitment is that any existing disconnect between the story that executives are telling in their attempts to attract great talent and the actual working environment experience is quickly exposed on social media. Seeking to form informed opinions on a potential employer, candidates today use social media to find out what it is like to work for that particular company.
2. HR Tech Startups Will Explode
Want to get an idea of how big HR Tech is right now? Consider this: in 2016, CB Insights reported that of all the recruitment deals made that year, just 402 of them were worth around $2.2B. To avoid bias in recruitment via social media, companies are hiring HR Tech startups that have access and the expertise to use modern recruitment tools.
Instead of only relying on the experience of conversing with a potential candidate during an interview, these tools use neuroscience to predict and recommend the highest quality candidates. The most common tools today include Pymetrics which uses neuroscience, and Hirevue, which records word usage and facial expressions, then uses machine learning algorithms to recommend the best talent.
3. Instagram Stories are the Next Big Thing for Social Media Recruitment
Many business organizations have discovered several tools they can use to grow organically on Instagram, like Growr. This has made Instagram an important social platform to grow their brands. It also in part explains why they are now considering the recruitment opportunities that this platform makes available. Indeed, many now consider Instagram the biggest, most effective recruitment platform in the entire social media space. They use the platform to showcase their organizations as the best place to work. Many of these organizations are now using Instagram Stories for improved brand awareness in their efforts to attract top talent.
4. Talent Relationship Management Will Accelerate Quality Hires
Talent relationship management (TRM) software is gaining traction as the go-to tool for sourcing top talent. Instead of using Candidate Relationship Management (CRM) software, TRM is seen as a better choice because the focus should not necessarily be on the candidate, but rather on the talent. TRM takes a holistic approach to recruitment, going beyond the candidates to check what’s out there (talent networks beyond the organization), and the existing talent within the company (current employees). What’s more, internal hires are the most preferred because they, according to 40% of business organizations, consistently make for the highest quality hires. By the end of 2018, the use of TRM software is expected to have gone mainstream.
5. Passive Candidates are More Prevalent Than Ever
Passive candidates are employers of other organizations that are not actively seeking out new employment opportunities, but are not opposed to the idea of discussing the possibilities of taking up a new role in another organization if a great opportunity shows up. The prevalence of the passive candidate has been rising steadily, with as much as 75% of the workforce now being considered passive. For these types of candidates, social media presents the opportunity to familiarize themselves with the brand and find out enough about the organization to convince them to leave their current jobs for the new ones they’ve been promised.
6. LinkedIn is More Than Just a Professional Network
A few years back, all LinkedIn seemed to offer was a platform for professionals to connect. But this approach became unsustainable as other social networking platforms like Facebook took over the social networking space. As a result, LinkedIn was forced to evolve into something more than just a professional social network: it became a content platform. This has driven its continued growth to over 530 million members in 2017. Now, companies publish over 100,000 new articles every week on LinkedIn. Recruiters see this as an opportunity to attract top talent by telling the stories of their brands to an attentive audience eager to learn the work culture of the organization.
7. People Analytics Powers Data-based Decisions
Data and analytics are increasingly becoming the norm in most organizations. Businesses that have embraced the idea of data-based decisions are now beginning to entertain the thought of people analytics to find top talent. It is therefore unsurprising that 71% of companies today consider people analytics as a high priority. Going forward, you can expect these organizations to find better tools and approaches to getting usable insights that can help them make better social media recruitment decisions.
– Contributed by Monica Wilson, SocialGrowr