Social recruitment guidebook

SOCIAL RECRUITMENT
How to Use the Internet to Find Great Employees

Jennifer Elaine Sadler
Graduate Student: The University of Memphis
Email: jesadler@memphis.edu
Twitter: @Fourteenhearts
August 2012

Jennifer Sadler• jesadler@memphis.edu • @Fourteenhearts • University of Memphis
1

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION ................................................................................... 3

TRADITIONAL VS. SOCIAL RECRUITMENT .......................................... 4-5

CASE STUDIES
Social Recruitment in Action ................................................................... 6

BUILDING THE PLATFORM
Conversation & Competition Analysis .................................................... 7-8
Establish Goals & Claim Your Space ........................................................ 9
Join The Chatter ....................................................................................... 10
Invite Participation ................................................................................... 11
Track Results ............................................................................................. 12
Analytics .............................................................................................. 13-14

ACTION PLAN
Social Recruitment Process ....................................................................... 15
Step-by-Step Guide ............................................................................... 16-19

RESOURCES ............................................................................................ 20

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .......................................................................... 21

Jennifer Sadler• jesadler@memphis.edu • @Fourteenhearts • University of Memphis 2

INTRODUCTION

In March 2012, LinkedIn, the world’s largest professional
network, reached a membership of 161 million. Of those members,
there are college students, recent graduates, small-to-large business
employees, Fortune 500 executives, educators, CEOs, healthcare
professionals, and people from a wide array of other occupations in
200 countries around the world. With an abundance of potential
employees at your social media disposal, some companies are still
underutilizing the advantages of Social Recruitment. This
guidebook will explain the social methods of recruiting and provide a
plan of action so that businesses who are willing to take their
employee search social will have the steps to do so.

Professional Committee
Carrie Brown-Smith
Chair, Journalism Professor
Eric Brey
Hospitality and Marketing Professor
Addie McGowan
Social Media and Project Manager
(Bigfish Creative)

“Managers accustomed to using tools that only
well-funded corporate communications organizations can
afford may hesitate to engage with media that any
middle-school student can access. But to disdain new media
is to hobble yourself. If you fail to adapt to and make use of
your adversaries’ best tactics, you cede the field of battle.”
Gaines-Ross, L.
(2010. Reputation Welfare. Harvard Business Review, p.78)


TRADITIONAL VS. SOCIAL RECRUITMENT

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Businesses have an opportunity to change the way they recruit with the
technology available today. The search for jobs and recruiting possibilities are no longer
found only in the classifieds section of the daily newspaper. Employment sites such as
Indeed, Monster, and Careerbuilder all provide listings for new opportunities, but utilizing social
media in addition to these traditional sites can help to advance the hiring process and find the
right people at a lower cost. Understanding the recruitment process and the role of social media
is key. While all businesses have the ability to benefit from social recruitment, knowing the type
of people you are interested in hiring and their social habits online can help to narrow your
strategy.
Exact Target, an international software and interactive service company, developed The
Social Profile Interactive Tool as part of their Social Profile Report. This tool allows you to see
the personality traits of individuals online and how to best market to them. For example, a
“Business First” personality will likely use email more during the day because it is associated
with their daily routine, as opposed to a “News Junkie”, who would use Twitter more because of
its ability to provide constant information. These characteristics can define which medium would
work best for the personality trait you are searching for and help target that specific group.

FORMAL VS. INFORMAL: Formal methods of recruiting include newspapers,
agencies and the Internet, while an informal strategy will use current contacts, such
as referrals, as a means to recruit, according to a research study by the Department for
Work and Pensions.

PASSIVE VS. ACTIVE: A passive job seeker will not be as involved in the search
process as an active person, most likely because that individual is already in their ca-
reer field.


Traditional
recruitment may
appear to be social JOB SITE PRICE PER POST LISTING PERIOD
because it involves $210 (30 days);
using the Internet as Monster 30-60 Days
$395 (60 days)
well as other media
outlets to post open $69 (15 days);
positions. Simply Hired 15-30 Days
$99-199 (30 days)
However, job board
sites like Monster, CPC (Cost Per Click)
CareerBuilder, and Payment: Pay when
Indeed someone clicks on post, set No Set Period
Indeed were not your own budget.
built to be
interactive. Career Builder $419 and up 30 Days
What makes
recruitment social is
when companies take advantage of social plug-ins, online influencers, and keywords. The debate
now is in choosing which medium will be more effective and less costly.

According to the 2012
State of the Media Report,
recruitment ads now
represent a smaller
proportion of classified ad
spending in the newspaper
industry.


SOCIAL RECRUITMENT IN ACTION

Profile: The Master of Dental Hygiene Profile: The Hard Rock Cafe is an
Program is an advanced degree program international restaurant chain with a rock
for local and national students. and roll theme spanning 150 locations in
53 countries.

Challenge: Create a Facebook page for
the program that invited current students
and alumni to interact with prospective Challenge: Recruit 120 employees to
students while highlighting the staff a new opening in Florence, Italy in a
program for better recruitment. four week time frame. Candidates needed
to fit their brand identity.

Tactics: Instead of a page, a Facebook
group was developed. The group was
opened for all to have access once the Tactics: The company launched a
university approved the content. Facebook campaign and created a page
Applicants were invited to join the page to that allowed fans to apply for positions and
interact with students and staff. Photos ask questions if needed. The company
were added and administrators offered answered questions and invited
feedback for prospective and current participation from fans; they also gave fans
students. the opportunity to share open
positions within their own social circles.

Results: According to Rachel Ennis in her
article “Use of Social Networking for Results: The Facebook page grew by
Dental Hygiene Program Recruitment.” 1,000 fans in 24 hours and over 10,000 in
visibility of the program has improved and the four week period. 4,000 applications
students are able to use the group for were received and 95% accepted offers for
concerns instead of meeting with the employment. The company typically
program director individually. Aside from spends $25,000 recruiting and marketing
employee search, social recruitment can for a new store; this campaign cost $2,000
be used to gain more students and using Work4Labs, a social recruitment
highlight academic programs. company.


BUILDING THE PLATFORM

According to Towers Watson, a professional services company, employees look for specific
qualities in a company, and depending on location and generation, these attributes can change.

Towers Watson Complimentary 2010 Complete Global Report

Before jumping head first into social media and “Over the last five years,
expanding beyond traditional methods of recruiting, you would the Internet has started
need to know two things: (1) what people are saying about to be rebuilt around
your company and (2) what the competition is doing. These are people...We get our news
called a conversation and competition analysis. from friends and family.
In his book Cognitive Surplus: Creativity and We find jobs from people
Generosity in a Connected Age, Clay Shirky described a new around us. We trust our
form of ‘free time’ by noting that we now spend our individual friends more than we
minutes in a communal space. The time we spend to ourselves trust the critics.” Steve
is, more often than not, spent by using some form of social Fuller, Senior Vice
media. What are we saying and doing amongst Internet peers President and CMO of L.L.
that affect your business and its social capital? Social capital Bean. (Social Commerce
refers to brand image that generates profit online. Trends Report,2011)

Review sites can aid in an applicant’s decision to join an organization. Candidates are
now able to go to a site such as Glassdoor and see employee and company reviews. In social
recruiting, the first step is to visit sites like this to see what employees and the public are saying
about your company. Write down the positive and negative comments you discover. You could
counteract potentially damaging comments by addressing them internally or utilize social
media to highlight better attributes. Doing an anonymous company survey can help to gain
perspective on how your employees feel about their work environment.
While you are reviewing your own company, take time to see what your competition is
doing; this is the next step in the process. When it comes to recruiting, (1) how does your
competition gain their best employees and (2) How does their social brand stack up against
yours? As one very influential professor once told a group of students in his marketing class:
“You have to C.A.S.E. the competition: Copy And Steal Everything.”
You cannot win the battle if you don’t know the opposition’s tactics.


CONVERSATION

TOOL FEATURES
Glass Door Reviews from previous/current employees; CEO ratings; social media integration

Social search engine for *keywords (i.e. company name) in social media; provides
Social Mention sentiment rating based on results

Twitter Search Filters conversations based on keywords, dates, locations, ect.

Monitter Enables search of key terms on Twitter in real time

Searches Internet for keywords in blogs, news, videos and images; allows for
Addictomatic
customization and bookmarking for later use.

How Sociable Measures the social magnitude of your brand

COMPETITION

TOOL FEATURES
Shows unique visitors, rank, major competitors, similar websites, keywords that
Compete drive traffic, and words that customers use on the site’s home page search engine

Shows the sites your visitors also went to and keywords they used when searching
Google Ad Planner and analyzes demographics of specific industries. Weakness: lack of data for small
businesses.
Shows the rank, visitors, estimated price for traffic with and without ads, and breaks
SEMrush
down competition by keywords, *organic searches and advertisements.
Company pages give insights into direct competitors by showing which companies
LinkedIn
your visitors also looked into.

*Keywords: words that drive traffic to the content on your site. Search engines display
the most relevant sites based on your search terms, so choosing the right keywords on a
website can bring more traffic.
*Organic Search: unlike paid advertisements, these are the websites that populate on
search engines. The first few items in a search are likely sponsored, or paid, ads.
Websites displayed that are organic are not paid ads and have enough of the right
keywords to place high in search engines


ESTABLISH GOALS AND CLAIM YOUR SPACE

After you have analyzed the competition and conversation, you should keep a record of the
positives, negatives, facts and figures you discovered in your research. This will tell you where your
company started so you can know how far you’ve come. The next step would be to set up 3 primary
goals with a strategy for each goal. You can do more than three, but keep in mind the resources and time
you have to commit to recruiting. What qualities are you looking for in your candidates? What is your
time frame? Which social media networks will you use and what tools will you use to track the results?
Goals without strategy are a dead end.

Social Recruitment Plan

Goal #1 Goal #3
Goal #2
Desired Candidates Apply Increase Brand Awareness
Meets Budget
(Profile of Desired Candidate) (Optional Goal)

Strategy: Strategy:
Strategy:
Post Application on Use Keywords to Target, Claim Your Space
Social Media Advertise on Social Media or Highlight Company Features
Join the Conversation Job Sites Analyze Performance and
Employe Referrals Change Style When Needed

Goal #3 is optional as it is more of a marketing objective. Depending on the size of your
company, you may have one person who does multiple jobs (i.e. HR and marketing in one office). In this
situation, the third goal may be more useful. If your company does not already have an online presence,
you’ll need to claim your social media space. Set up accounts on the social networks that you will use
while recruiting. You don’t have to use every social media channel out there, but you want to make sure no
one else in cyberspace has created a profile for your company before you do.
If you know who you want, now you have to know where to find them. If you want
someone already in their field, i.e. a passive candidate, they may communicate through email more
than social media or be a member of networks geared towards people in their field. Using LinkedIn,
Twitter, and Facebook may appear to be the primary networks to utilize in social recruiting, but they are
not necessarily the places you should start. Small businesses may not want to budget for a LinkedIn career
page, but they could use industry-specific sites as a good way to search for talent within a certain niche.
AllNurses.com - MedicalMingle.com: online communities for individuals in the health
care industry.
Dice.com - eFinancialCareers.com: career websites for technology, engineering,
accounting and investment professionals.
Flavors.me - Cuttings.me - Pressfolios.com: portfolio sites for journalists, graphic designers,
and an array of other visual arts professionals.

JOIN THE CHATTER

Your open positions are listed on job sites and you’ve claimed your social
media space. Now, it’s time to be social.
Once you have posted the job, place a link to the application on your social media sites. Always
use a link shortener to track results (this will be explained in the next section). Building rapport on
these sites will not only give your
company added credibility for future
prospects, but it will also give you the
opportunity to pre-screen interested
candidates by viewing their profiles and
current job titles.
On LinkedIn, you can create a
company page for free and post general
information about your business, products
and services, and invite employees to
connect. However, to post a position on the
site, it costs upwards of $195 for a 30 day
posting. A less expensive method would be
to purchase InMail, which is about $50 per
month (depending on the plan) and acts as
LinkedIn’s version of email. With InMail,
you are able to send emails to people
outside of your connections and you are
guaranteed a response. The least
expensive option would be to search
within your individual network for candidates and “connect” with them; it is free to send an email to
your LinkedIn connections. You can use the site to search for your best candidates and send them a
personalized email about your position.
Facebook Pages are company profiles that enable a business to connect with their fans and
share content across the platform. While sites like this are typically used for marketing, a recruitment
platform will require you to optimize your social sites to attract employees. You can highlight employee
benefits, perks at the workplace, and add candid videos or photos of employees on the job or during
special events. Adding this form of transparency also adds credibility and reliability, as noted by Jamie
Carracher in his post “4 Ways to Protect Your Small Business’ Reputation Online.” You also have the
ability to connect with other organizations and millions of users who visit Facebook daily. From a
recruitment standpoint, creating a page that highlights positive points about your business can give your
fans more insight and drive their interests to work for you. Twitter is a micro-blogging site that allows
users to create profiles and post status updates up to 160 characters in length. To engage in this
platform, you can use tools like link shorteners and hashtags to track conversations and keep your
posts short. Hashtags and link shorteners will be explained in a later section. Twitter is good for
recruitment in that there is opportunity to quickly respond to inquires about positions and view
profiles of candidates. If a candidate has a public Twitter account, their posts (or Tweets) are not
private; this feature allows you to view their communication style and how they manage their
personal and public online persona.


INVITE PARTICIPATION

In 1973 Mark Granovetter noted a pattern in how people found jobs, discovering
that it was through casual acquaintances and not friends and family. He called this theory
Strength of Weak Ties. The weak ties of acquaintances, or those that a person may not
know personally but still be connected to, can be advantageous when searching for
employment. Often times, the quality of your social network is better than the quantity.
Using this information, you can invite your current employees to participate in the
recruitment process by sharing posts or referring their contacts on various social
networks. Some connections will be strong, while others will fall into the category of
weak ties. Many professional career sites, such as LinkedIn, allow for users to share open
positions to their colleagues on social media sites.

Speaking for a brand online is less formal
“Empowering your loyal customers
than traditional media campaigns. In social media, it and fans to share the experiences
is personal and conversational. Gail Martin defines they’ve had with your brand(s) and
a True Voice in her book 30 Days to Social Media products with their social networks is
Success as: “...the collection of words and phrases the foundation of word-of-mouth
marketing. It also builds trust around
that most naturally describe your services and benefit your brand and bolsters your company
they provide. True Voice words are honest and reputation.” (Radian 6: Defining and
compelling, and they feel right when you use them to Measuring Influence)
talk about your company.”

You can also use the influencers in your social circles to gain more applicants.
Influence is less about the amount of followers you have and more about the ways you
are able to inspire others to take action, according to Defining and Monitoring Influence
by Radian 6. Klout, a social tool that measures influence, will give insight as to who
influences your brand. In some cases, hiring these influencers as part of your company
will inspire more brand recognition and over time that could motivate ROI, or return on
investment.

Sharlyn Lauby’s 6 Tips for Effective Recruiting on Social Media Sites
1. Create an Online Presence That Reflects Who You Are
2. Make the Most of Your Time
3. Individualize Your Approach
4. Be Authentic
5. Share Interesting Stuff
6. Focus on Substance
Via Mashable.com


TRACK RESULTS

Keeping track of what works and what doesn’t could save you time and money for the next
recruitment you plan. For example, if a post about a company highlight receives more attention than
one about a general job announcement, that style should be used more often. There are some simple
methods to track performance of web efforts.

Use Link Shorteners and Hashtags
•Link shorteners will make those longer URLs into short links that
are tracked when a person clicks on them. They can be used to
track if someone came to apply from Facebook, Twitter, or by
email. Sites that provide these for free and track their performance
are Bit.ly and Goo.gl.
•In addition, using unique hashtags on Twitter will give you the
ability to track conversations. Hashtags are symbols (#) that are
placed before keywords; examples would be #recruitment, #job, or #career. Conversations
that contain these tags are grouped together so that everyone is able to share in the dialogue.
Because there can be a lot of conversations around some hashtags, or tags for short, creating
something unique for recruitment may serve better for your company. A unique hashtag
could be as simple as #AmericanRVjobs or #FedexRecruit. Tracking hashtags can help
identify influencers and see who is driving conversations. Hashtracking.com is a site that
analyzes these tags to show influencers, measure reach, and track the flow of conversations.

Try an email blast
• It may seem like email blasts are old fashioned, but
there are many consumers who still subscribe to
companies for new information and specials. 93% of
online consumers have given their email address to at
least one brand, and 88% are checking their emails
daily, according to a research study by Exact Target. If you aren’t already including your
open positions in your email blasts, you are not targeting a group of people who may have
a ginuine interest in your company.

Analyze Insights and Traffic
• Depending on where you decide to post open positions,
some sites will track the amount of times it has been
viewed. On sites such as LinkedIn and Facebook,
insights are given as far as new fans to the page and
statistics on engagement with the brand. From a
marketing standpoint, social networks show which
content generates the most buzz. You can use this data to
see what days of the week customers are coming to your
sites most and target different messages on those days.


ANALYTICS

Analytics are necessary to measure in marketing and HR, but each area requires a different focus.
Marketing departments will use sites like Google Analytics to track visits, bounce rates, and
traffic generated from social media. HR would need to know how many people applied and the amount
hired based on the costs of recruiting. This section will break down analytics for marketing and
recruitment.

MARKETING TOOLS
Google Analytics is a free site that tracks visits and activity on your website. A web tutorial
explains, in detail, the measurements offered. There are many different sets of data that are analyzed and
available, but there are a few that your company should monitor on a consistent basis.

1. Page Visits: how many people have come to your
website.
2. Percent of New Visitors (or Unique Visits): the
number of people who saw your website for the first
time.
3. Average time on Site: how much time they spent on
your website.
4. Bounce Rate: the percentage of people who came to
your website and immediately left. It is best to have a
low bounce rate.

For your social recruitment plan, there is an additional set of data that you should track.
1. Under Traffic
Sources, click Social,
then Overview: this
shows the number of
visitors who came to
your website from
social media sites and
lists which site they
came from (i.e.
Facebook, Twitter,
LinkedIn, ect.)

2. Under Social, click Pages: this shows what page on your website visitors went to after they were
directed from social media content, such as a post on Facebook that links to the company’s homepage.


RECRUITING TOOLS

! Ranstad, the world’s 2nd largest recruitment agency, developed a guidebook for Internet recruiting and used
a chart to explain how recruiters can measure their efforts. Below are 2 modified versions of the chart. The first
chart is meant to list the traditional recruiting tools you would use to create a conversion rate that helps
determine which ones worked best during the process.
In the first chart below, Monster.com is used as an example. It includes the cost, the “proposed” number of
candidates who filled out an application, the number of people hired from those applications, and the overall cost
per hire. The ending totals show how much it would cost to hire one position in 30 days, and which site proved to
draw the most qualified candidates.
The second chart is a measure of how effective social media is in your recruitment process. Facebook and
Twitter are used as examples and show the amount of increase in fans and followers over a weekly period. This
chart will show the total fans gained per week. with the last week of each social tool being the total number of
fans. You can use this to see which week attracted more people and know the messages that work from those that
do not.
TRADITIONAL TOOL DATA

POSITION:____Accountant___________ Time to Fill Position:__30 days_____
# of Cost/
Tool Cost of Tool # of Hires Cost/Hire
Applicants Applicant

($210)/(100) ($210)/(10)
example Monster.com $210 100 10
= $2.10 = $21.00

Totals (leave blank) $210 100 $2.10 10 $21.00

SOCIAL MEDIA TOOL DATA

POSITION:____Accountant___________ Time to Fill Position:__4 weeks_____
Social Start Count Week Week Week Week Shortlink
Media Tool (Fans or followers) 1 2 3 4 Referrals

(numbers vary if
you’ve already
example Facebook 5 20 30 50 10
“claimed your space”.
If not, start at 0)

example Twitter 0 20 35 50 65 15

Totals (leave blank) 0 25 55 80 115 25

Shortlink referrals can be found in the analytics section of your shortlink website (Bit.ly; Goo.le). Place the number
of links referred, or clicked on, from Facebook, Twiiter, LinkedIn or any of your other social networks.


ACTION PLAN

Social Recruitment Plan

Goal #1
Goal #2
Hire general manager and Goal #3
Increase brand awareness
sales staff with experience Hire within 30 days on a
for customers and
(1+ years staff and 5+ years maximum Budget of $500
credibility for candidates
management)

Strategy:
Strategy:
*Facebook Ads
*Involve Current Employees Strategy: *LinkedIn Job Post for
(Referrals)
*Claim Social Space General Manager
*Tag Keywords in
*Join the Conversation: *Twitter and Facebook post
Application and Social
brand info; don’t sell, engage for Sales Staff
Conversations *Email blast about positions
*Reach out to Fans and and ask subscribers to for-
Subscribers ward to friends

Channels: (Social)Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn (Traditional) LinkedIn Job Post,
Monster.com
Tools to Analyze Performance: Bit.ly (Link Shortener); Facebook Insights, LinkedIn
Follower Statistics, Unique hashtags to track conversations, Google Analytics for
application page on Website, Hootsuite to filter across different media platforms, Constant
Contact for Email Blasts, Twitalyzer to see traits of candidates who use Twitter

“Today’s small businesses and solo professionals live in an exciting time for
marketers. Never before has it been possible for small and mid-sized companies
without lavish budgets to utilize the same marketing tools as major corporations.
Social Media is equally accessible to ‘mom and pop’ companies, one person firms,
and huge organizations.” 30 days to Social Media Success by Gail Martin.


TEMPLATE

Use this template as a step-by-step guide for your social recruitment strategy and
check off each step as you have completed it. Use the material in this guidebook to
help through each phase.

Conversation Analysis
What are consumers and employees saying about my company and would it be
considered good, fair or bad?

• This is where you can use Glassdoor.com, SocialMention, Addictomatic, and other tools you
have found to discover the overall sentiment of your organization. It is not necessary to
write each negative or positive remark, but place yourself in the position of the candidate
and determine if these comments would deter you from applying.

For example: By reading comments, you discover that many people are dissatisfied with the
ability to advance in your company; that key takeaway would be “opportunities for
advancement”. If this would not deter you from applying, it would be a fair takeaway; if it
would, that would receive a grade of bad. On the other hand, if you discover that many people
are pleased with the “opportunities for advancement”, that is a positive takeaway and can be
graded as good. Do not only list good or bad takeaways, but rather dig to find a variation.
This is where you can do a company survey and make it simple by allowing employees to
grade you on the scale of good (positive), fair (needs improvement), or bad (negative).
Gaining a variety of responses will give you areas of focus for social media. If many people
like your pay range, that is a quality you should highlight through Facebook, Twitter, or other
social networks.
*Note: Whenever possible, be sure to respond to negative feedback. Write a comment on the post
and include an email to take the conversation offline, but never leave a negative impression online if
you are able to mend it.

Key Takeaways Grade (Good, Fair, Bad)
1.________________________________________ ____________________
2.________________________________________ ____________________
3.________________________________________ ____________________
4.________________________________________ ____________________

Competition Analysis
What are some key actions that my competition is doing that makes them
successful?
• This section can include the social networks your competition has a presence on, the com-
pany features they choose to highlight, or how many fans they have. From a recruitment
standpoint, you can see who their employees are by looking at employee biographies on the
company’s website or LinkedIn profiles (if they have a LinkedIn company page, employees will
be listed in this area).

Key Takeaways
1._________________________________________________________________
2._________________________________________________________________
3._________________________________________________________________


Establish Goals and Strategies

Goal #1: __________________________________________________________
Strategy:__________________________________________________________

Goal #2: __________________________________________________________
Strategy:__________________________________________________________

Goal #3:__________________________________________________________
Strategy:__________________________________________________________

Claim Your Space
• In this section, list the sites you will use to post your application, i.e.
traditional recruitment websites. Also list the social media sites you will utilize during the
process. Be sure to go to the last portion of this template and fill in these sites on your charts.
If you already have a social media presence, simply fill in the amount of fans you currently
have as a starting point.

Set up accounts on these social media sites (i.e. Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter):
__________________________________________________________

Put application on these traditional sites (i.e. company website, Monster, Indeed):
__________________________________________________________

TIPS FOR POSTING YOUR APPLICATION
In Ranstad’s “Guide for Effective Internet Recruiting”, the company gives tips for your
job posts. They keep in mind the five major criteria candidates are focused on when searching
for a position: salary, benefits, location, hours, and the nature of the position (seasonal or
permanent)

1. UTILIZE KEYWORDS: Think about the keywords that you will use in your job summary to
attract more of the right candidates, and be as descriptive as possible. Focus on the attributes
that you would be looking for as a candidate.

2. USE FAMILIAR JOB TITLES: You don’t have to break down positions too much or you
may not attract the right people. For example, saying that you need a “client communications
specialist” when you actually need a “call center representative” could attract a very different
pool of candidates who may not fully understand the position.

3. PROVIDE A SALARY: If you are unable to provide a specific salary then you could give a
salary range.

4. HIGHLIGHT YOUR BRAND: A job post that highlights key features of your company and
links to the website could not only gain more traffic and a broad interest group, but it is an op-
portunity for you to brand yourself to a new audience of job seekers.


Join The Conversation
• Use link shorteners and keywords to post positions on social sites. Open dialogue about jobs,
highlight company events and employees, and join in discussions about employment
benefits. Always keep in mind the goals and strategies you have set up previously.

3 things to highlight about the company:
1.__________________________________________________________
2.__________________________________________________________
3.__________________________________________________________

Sample Posts and Tweets:
Tweet: “We’re looking for a Gen. Manager for our San Francisco store! Deadline to
apply is next week. RT to friends, here’s the link: (application shortlink)”
• RT: Retweet, meaning to copy the post someone has written onto your timeline for your
followers to see.

Facebook Post: Each quarter our company helps the community by volunteering for
different projects. This month we are going to help the Humane Society with their
adoption marathon and take applications for our new location opening up! Come out and
learn about us, meet the team and even take home a new family friend!
• Highlighting these qualities about your company makes you have a real voice, as opposed to a
sales pitch.

Invite Participation
• Ask employees to join in the recruitment process by participating in the dialogue and refer-
ring colleagues to open positions. Also, find influencers through tools to see who is talking
about your company the most and invite them into conversations.

Influencers (Optional):
1.__________________________________________________________
2.__________________________________________________________
3.__________________________________________________________

Suggested Activities:

• Once you have set up a career page, you can make your cover photo a snapshot of your
employees and invite those employees to comment on that photo. They can also submit photos to be
voted on by the public and the one with the most votes can become the next cover photo.
• Post links to news articles that feature your business and highlight the paper or organization that
wrote the story. Building these relationships online with other organizations can strengthen your net-
work.
• Invite fans to ask questions about the positions you have open. This form of transparency, as dis-
cussed earlier, gives more credibility and trust of your brands to the consumers. It also gives your
brand a True Voice, or natural voice (as described by Gail Martin in an earlier section).


Track Results
Use the charts below to track your progress and review what has worked best in
your recruitment campaign. This will help you to know which methods to use for your
next recruitment process. These charts were Adapted from Ranstad’s 2009 Guide to Effective
Internet Recruiting.

TRADITIONAL TOOL DATA

POSITION:_________________ Time to Fill Position:___________

# of Cost/
Tool Cost of Tool # of Hires Cost/Hire
Applicants Applicant

Totals (leave blank)

SOCIAL MEDIA TOOL DATA

POSITION:_________________ Time to Fill Position:___________

Social Media Start Week Week Week Week Week Week Shortlink
Tool Count 1 2 3 4 5 6 Referrals

Totals (leave blank)

(Adapted from Ranstad’s 2009 Guide to Effective Internet Recruiting)


ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

The links provided here are for additional research about social recruiting and
marketing using digital or social media.

•HOW TO USE SOCIAL MEDIA AS A RECRUITING TOOL BY TIFFANY BLACK

•HOW SMALL BUSINESSES ARE USING SOCIAL MEDIA (INFOGRAPHIC) BY DAVE LARSON

•GUIDE TO MONITORING SOCIAL MEDIA CONVERSATIONS BY JD LASICA

•20 FREE, AWESOME SOCIAL MEDIA MONITORING TOOLS BY JD LASICA

•11 BEST WEB ANALYTICS TOOLS BY LOU DUBOIS

•6 TIPS FOR EFFECTIVE RECRUITING ON SOCIAL MEDIA SITES BY SHARLYN LAUBY

•RADIAN 6: DEFINING AND MEASURING INFLUENCE (WHITEPAPER)

•THE SOCIAL PROFILE BY EXACT TARGET (WHITEPAPER)

•SOCIAL COMMERCE TRENDS REPORT 2011

•RADIAN 6: 30 IDEAS FOR YOUR 2012 SOCIAL MEDIA PLAN (WHITEPAPER)

•SOCIETY FOR HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT

•SMARTRECRUITERS.COM

•AMERICAN MANAGEMENT ASSOCIATION

•ADVANCED WEB METRICS WITH GOOGLE ANALYTICS (2ND EDITION) BY BRIAN CLIFTON

•WEB ANALYTICS 2.0 BY AVINASH KAUSHIK

•RECRUITING WITH SOCIAL MEDIA BY RAJ ANAND

•HERE COMES EVERYBODY BY CLAY SHIRKY

•COGNITIVE SURPLUS: CREATIVITY AND GENEROSITY IN A CONNECTED AGE BY CLAY
SHIRKY

•GETTING STARTED WITH GOOGLE ANALYTICS

• Google AdWords is also a useful source for discovering keywords and running paid search
advertisements for Google search engines. Their web tutorial explains more advantages of this tool.


ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Without the guidance, encouragement, and lessons from those on my committee, I would not have
the knowledge and education that I do today. They continue to push the boundaries of my ability to
learn more and make me strive to have academics as a part of my everyday life. I am truly thankful for
their unwavering support.

Carrie Brown-Smith, otherwise known by her Twitter handle
@Brizzyc, is an assistant professor of journalism at the University of
Memphis. Often hailed as the department’s “social media guru”, Carrie
has a special interest in research on the changing dynamic of news in the
digital age and how that affects journalism and democracy. She teaches
undergraduate and graduate courses at the university and serves as
director of the city wide Memphis high school paper, The Teen Appeal.
She received her PhD from the University of Missouri and currently runs
the website The Changing Newsroom to share her research with the
public.

Eric Brey teaches digital marketing and hospitality management at
the University of Memphis. Using edutainment, a mix of education and
entertainment, he has presented hundreds of consumer and technology-
specific topics. He also regularly publishes reports and papers, which are
well received by the business community. He goes by his Twitter handle
@ProfessorBrey and has built a brand around that name. Collaborating
with Carrie Brown-Smith and Kris Markman, a professor in the College of
Communication at the University of Memphis, the three have developed
the university’s first Social Commerce minor spanning all three
departments (Communication, Journalism and Marketing). His personal
website is ProfessorBrey.com.

Addie McGowan is the Social Media and Project Manager for
Bigfish Creative, an advertising, marketing and multimedia firm in
Memphis, TN. She graduated from Trinity University with her Bachelors in
Sociology and Communication and now specializes in meeting the social
and digital needs of clients in the Mid-South Area. Addie regularly gives
presentations on the Bigfish strategy and integrating social media
effectively for businesses. She has worked as a marketing consultant,
research analyst, and account executive, as well as currently working with
Social Butterflies as an event coordinator. Her Twitter handle is
@addiemcgowan.


Through God All Things Are Possible.

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