No-one can be oblivious to the rise in the use of the internet for business and pleasure - and the world of recruitment communications is no exception. When tasked by our clients to undertake a recruitment campaign, we advise on the best methods to find and attract an appropriate pool of individuals.
This can be a combination of activities which often includes some forms of advertising. Several years ago this would most probably be a press advertisement in one of the national broadsheets.
Candidates, either passive or active job hunters, used to scan the recruitment advertising pages of the Daily Telegraph and the Sunday Times routinely, making one or other an obvious choice, even if the role was fairly specialised. Today’s media environment has changed dramatically and is now much more dynamic and complex.
Online advertising is increasingly important and has become a significant force, more than even a year ago. At the same time we have seen other technological advances in online media: the ability to interrogate candidate CVs via some job portals; the evolution of e-recruitment including candidate management stages; and initiating contact with prospective candidates via business networking sites. These all provide new ways to reach sought-after candidates and generate opportunities for creative “searching”.
Whilst a well managed on-line recruitment campaign will potentially reach more people, there are naturally upsides and downsides for both job seekers and recruiters. With a welter of on-line job websites to pick from it is imperative that recruiters and candidates understand and choose appropriately to deliver the right candidates and roles.
An understanding of the way candidates register, search and use “key word” searches is important. Other choices to be made include the option of posting an enhanced listing and /or other add-ons such as banners to drive traffic. All these matters have an impact on the way copy is written and posted and, ultimately, whether job seekers are able to find the job advert.
One upside is time saving: online advertisements are posted the same day. The ability to review and assess the quality of response is another advantage. However, the consequence of reaching a large number of candidates is that recruiters receive significantly more applications. This can be challenging for two reasons: first, the work involved in acknowledging and managing high numbers of candidates is considerable; second the evaluation and analysis effort needed, given that all online advertisements generate many speculative candidates who are clearly not appropriate for the specific role - it’s all too easy to push a button in response to an e-mail job alert, without taking the time to consider relevance and fit.
In summary in this multi-channel e-media environment, a job seeker must invest more time and effort registering and searching if they are to find roles appropriate to their skills and experience. Selecting appropriate recruitment websites is imperative. In turn recruiters need to cast the net widely and utilise a variety of different recruitment websites to ensure we effectively cover all likely audiences.
Where next? Pundits predict recruitment communications will move to mobile phones and Internet Protocol TV. From our experience of managing recruitment assignments for senior managers and board executives these do not offer an appropriate or desired channel of communication just yet, but tastes may change. So far, the senior management recruitment world has moved with the changes in technology, but also retained a degree of separation or exclusivity. A parallel is that Facebook may be mainstream, but senior executives prefer LinkedIn.
While recognising that online recruitment is continuing to forge ahead, traditional media still has a role to play. Press adverts are now concentrating more on profile-raising and driving traffic to client’s websites. A word of caution to recruiting companies - just ensure it’s your organisation’s profile that is being raised and not that of your appointed Mayfair headhunter who may be seeking the prestige and exposure!
