Inbound Recruiting: What’s It All About

Jun 12

In today’s technology-driven world, companies without a digital presence will not succeed. Many companies deploy inbound marketing techniques to help grow their business.

Through the inbound marketing approach, companies attract new customers by delivering relevant, helpful content and adding value at every stage of the buyer’s journey. Individuals are nurtured through the various stages of inbound marketing via blog posts, search engine optimization, social media, email campaigns, and workflows.

Consumers are also doing a lot more research before they buy, relying on review sites like Yelp and Google to make informed purchase decisions. The shift in how consumers make purchasing decisions is also evident in how job seekers conduct their research and choose which companies they want to work for.

COMPANY-CENTRIC → CANDIDATE-CENTRIC

The job search has historically been very company-centric. Traditionally, companies have used techniques like ads, career fairs, and brochures to attract talent. Today, the landscape has shifted; it is now a candidate market, and the power has exchanged hands.

A candidate-centric approach is how many companies are now looking at their talent acquisition strategies. Companies at the forefront of this shift are using LinkedIn, Glassdoor, and other social media platforms to tell their story, nurture candidates throughout their journeys, and find their next great employees.

At the core of this candidate-centric shift is the candidate experience: how job seekers perceive and react to employers’ sourcing, recruiting, interviewing, hiring, and onboarding processes.

EMPLOYER BRANDING AND EVP

The way you can create an awesome candidate experience and set the tone for great employee engagement is through employer branding (defined as the discipline of defining, developing, and managing a company’s reputation as an employer).

At the root of any good employer branding effort is a defined Employee Value Proposition (EVP) or set of offerings, associations, and values that can be utilized to positively influence target candidates and employees.

As important as it is to know your EVP, it is also important to know what your EVP is not. Although closely aligned, your EVP is not the same as the company's mission, vision, or values. More specifically, it is the promise you make to current and future employees.

William Tincup, an HR writer, speaker, and advisor, simply puts it: “your unique scent.”

According to a LinkedIn survey, 75% of job seekers consider a company’s employer brand before applying, and 52% of candidates seek out the company’s websites and the company’s social media to learn more about a prospective employer.

Now more than ever, job seekers are behaving like consumers in their research and the way they think about a new career.

INBOUND MARKETING TO INBOUND RECRUITING

When you look at the buyer’s journey through an inbound marketing approach, you can see how strangers to a company’s brand are nurtured through the attract, convert, close, and delight stages to hopefully, and ultimately, become promoters. The journey through the various stages is shaped by different tools and techniques, such as blogs and social publishing, calls to action and forms, email campaigns, and customer surveys.

With a few minor tweaks to the inbound marketing strategy, you can create an inbound recruiting strategy that adapts to the way job seekers are behaving today. Replace leads and customers in the inbound marketing strategy with candidates and employees in the inbound talent acquisition strategy.

If inbound marketing now matches the way people shop and buy, inbound recruiting now matches the way people find careers. We can look at each stage to determine the best approach for nurturing candidates throughout their journey to ultimately become one of your next employees.

ATTRACT STAGE

The ultimate goal during the attract stage is awareness. Here, companies can use awareness tools such as blogs and social media to develop and deliver content that is helpful to job seekers. The savvy job seeker is also checking review sites like Glassdoor for a peek behind the curtain of what it’s really like to work at your company.

The average candidate uses 18 different resources to research a company before applying (source).
79% of job seekers are likely to use social media in their job search (source).

CONVERT STAGE

Getting visitors to convert into candidates requires great job site content and a call to action, such as an online application or customized landing pages for job seekers. Many companies overlook the importance of job posting copy, but they’re a strategic piece of content strategy and should be equally engaging. In the candidate-centric market, your job site content should help tell the story of what a job seeker might experience if they join your company.

60% of candidates quit an application process because it took too long (source).
73% of candidates say the job search process is one of the most stressful things in life (source).

CLOSE STAGE

Your hiring managers play an integral role in closing candidates into employees during this stage of the inbound talent acquisition strategy. Additionally, companies can deploy nurturing email campaigns and applicant-tracking system workflows during the close stage to help change candidates into employees. Providing candidates with the LinkedIn profile URLs of the individuals they will be interviewing with, or emailing them interview prep materials, helps create a great candidate experience.

87% of job seekers view the interview process as a way to get to know the employer (source).
72% of hiring managers say they provide clear job descriptions, while only 36% of candidates agree (source).

DELIGHT STAGE

Many companies think the candidate journey is complete when the candidate accepts an offer; forward-thinking companies know this is just the beginning. Your employees are a treasure trove of referrals, and if they are engaged and happy to be working for you, they’ll bring their friends. Perhaps the best indicator of a successful, thriving, and enviable company culture is a robust employee referral program. Many employee engagement techniques can help ensure your employees always stay delighted.

On average, referrals account for 30% of a company’s hiring source, decreasing time to hire by 40% (source).
57% of employee wouldn’t recommend their organization as a good place to work (source).

Attract, convert, close, and delight: the same stages of the inbound marketing strategy apply to inbound recruiting. Going digital with talent acquisition and treating prospective employees as you would treat prospective customers is essential to remain competitive in today’s labor market.

Chris Skaggs

Digital and social media, branding, recruitment and content strategy are all skills Chris has developed as he has built teams, processes and strategies from the ground-up. In his previous experience, Chris has served in various roles including: recruiter, ambassador, director, vice president and co-founder. His work and experiences have been featured on CNN, Marketing Sherpa, Thrive Global, CBS Radio, Recruiter.com and Glassdoor to name a few.

Chris received a Bachelor of Arts in Human Ecology from The University of Texas at Austin where he was an active member of Phi Kappa Psi fraternity.

He is passionate about giving back to his community. Chris is a current member of the board of trustees for the Texas Health Resources Foundation and a past board member for the North Texas Christian Academy. Additionally, he alongside his wife, co-founded Leighton’s Gift, a nonprofit with a mission to turn a tragedy into something positive in memory of the couple’s daughter, Leighton, who tragically passed away.

Outside of work, Chris can be found spending time with his wife, Amy, of 13 years, and his children Jaxon (7), Leighton (angel) and Olivia (4). He also enjoys wine, coffee, cooking and watching his beloved Longhorns in any college sporting event — Hook ‘Em!

https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrislskaggs/