Why Using Social Media For Recruitment Works

Finding the right talent for your franchise comes with a set of challenges, which is exactly why nine out of ten brands use some form of social media to attract, engage with, and recruit qualified job candidates, otherwise known as social recruiting. Once you have identified your recruitment goals and who your ideal candidate is, you are ready to use the powerful tools social media holds. Over half of the world’s population actively uses social media and 86% of job seekers use social media to search for jobs, apply for roles directly from social media, and engage with job-related content. Social recruiting works extremely well and impressively fast!

Let’s break down four of the most effective ways to use social media for recruitment.

1. Take full advantage of Facebook
2. Prepare each location’s Pages for the spike in visitors
3. Implement the power of employee advocacy on social media
4. Leverage the advanced features social media networks have to offer

1. Take full advantage of Facebook for recruitment

Facebook remains the king of social media and, with nearly two billion daily active users, it’s the perfect place to find your ideal job candidate. Facebook holds a world of marketing opportunities and for franchise businesses looking to recruit new employees, two of the most effective approaches are running paid advertisements and creating an organic job post.

Facebook Ads For Recruitment

What if I told you it’s possible to place a Facebook ad on the feeds of your ideal job candidates and have them apply directly through the platform?

If you’re new to Facebook advertising and how it works, or just want a bit more context around it, then give this blog post a quick read for a helpful overview of the foundation of Facebook ads: How To Get Started With Facebook Ads.

Put a budget behind your approach to recruitment and run Facebook ads to see the most effective results. Create ads using copy and imagery that clearly describe the role and possible benefits. It can be helpful to include imagery of satisfied employees, the job location or environment, and simply any unique elements that make your franchise business a desirable workplace. With lead generation ads, qualified applicants can click the “Apply Now” call-to-action button and fill in their information without ever leaving Facebook. Identify your ideal candidate and take advantage of Facebook’s targeting capabilities (demographics, interests, and online behavior) to reach your audience.

Here’s just a quick glimpse into some of Facebook’s available targeting parameters: 

• Demographics: Age, Location, Languages, Gender, Education Level, etc.
• Interests: Business/Specific Industry, Fitness and Wellness, Entertainment, Food and Drink, etc.
• Online behavior: How Users Interact Online, Engaged Shoppers, Mobile Device Users, etc.

Facebook Job Posting

In a more organic approach, franchises can create a Facebook job post that appears on and links to their business Page, or even on Facebook Marketplace. When creating the post, you will be prompted to provide elements such as:

• Job details
• Work location
• Salary range
• Photo
• Benefits
• Optional screening questions

Did I mention the best part? Creating a job post is free! Although similar to all organic posts on your business Page, you have the opportunity to put a budget behind the post and boost it to maximize the audience reach.

It can be easy to create a job post and forget about it, so remember to track and monitor your post to avoid missing out on any qualified candidates.

Once a job post is published, you can review applications, contact applicants, and schedule interviews all through Facebook Messenger. 

Here are five tips for an effective job post from Facebook themselves:

1. Provide a thorough job description that is clear and easily understood.
2. Include key details such as an accurate job title and location.
3. Respond promptly so that the interested job candidates aren’t left in the dark.
4. Don’t be afraid to ask extra questions so you can learn as much as possible about each candidate.
5. Provide the specifics: Salary, benefits, and expected work hours.

2. Prepare each location’s Pages for the spike in visitors

Would you apply to a job you knew little or nothing about? My guess is probably not. It’s expected that most interested candidates will see your ad and either check out your social media presence first to then apply or submit their information and then explore your social media profiles (if they’re brave). Regardless, it’s safe to count on more visitors peeking through your social media pages and if you want to win over as many qualified potential employees as possible, you’ll need to make sure your social media pages are prepared for incoming traffic.

That means that all of the franchise’s Facebook Pages need to, first, have the basics down:

• Profile photo is the franchise’s logo.
• Cover photo is an on-brand image.
• ‘About’ section is complete and clearly captures the essence of the franchise brand.
• Call-to-action (CTA) button is selected and set up so the desired action is clear.
• The location’s business hours, contact information, etc. are completed.

Once you have the basics down, be sure to follow social media best practices when it comes to posting organically. For example, get in the habit of a consistent posting frequency so a potential hire doesn’t visit your page and see your most recent post was from months ago. Most people want to see that your brand is active, engaging, and strategic on social media.

While you’re at it, don’t count out company culture content! In your content strategy, implement content posts that highlight the culture of your franchise business, your benefits, and show off happy employees. Company culture actually attracts the top 20% of candidates, according to research from Gallup. Applying to work for a new company comes with some risk, so give potential employees comfort by showing them all the benefits they can expect from working at your business.

3. Implement the power of employee advocacy on social media

People are eight times more likely to engage with content shared by employees. Your employees have a network and connections of their own… leverage that!

Employees don’t even need to necessarily create a post from scratch – Simply sharing a recruitment post from the brand’s page goes a long way. Convincing an interested job candidate to apply for a role is much easier to do when it comes from a current employee. This might take a little more than just simply asking your employees for a favor.

Prepare employees with resources and information necessary before sharing or posting content on social media for recruitment. When executed properly, employee advocacy on social media for recruitment can be one of the quickest ways to acquire qualified recruits. When it comes to social recruiting through employee advocacy, 33% of companies see a decreased time to hire, says Capitol Communicator.

The goal is to make it as easy as possible for your employees to become brand advocates on social media. Here are some of the many ways to increase employee advocacy and improve your social recruiting:

• Keep employees up-to-date: Create the habit or routine of regularly sharing job openings, company news, employee stories, etc. Make sure your employees are given some recommended text or, at the very least, the general information needed for any brand posts they choose to publish. 

• Find creative ways to motivate employees: Send milestone gift packages to employees! This could be an onboarding “welcome to the team” gift package for new hires, “thank you” gift packages for work anniversaries, “welcome home” packages for employees who’ve moved houses, etc. Include a note encouraging them to use the company hashtag if they choose to share a post, Story, or both. 

• Start out with a small group of employees: Depending on the volume of employees you’re working with, you may find much more ease in slowly dipping your toes in the water by working closely with your brand’s “biggest advocates” first. Which employees have generated employee referrals in the past? Who has promoted the brand on social media or continues to do so? Identify who those employees are and begin to work with them to start leveraging social media for recruitment, then grow from there!

4. Leverage the advanced features social media networks have to offer

The audience demographics across each social media network are widely diverse. Each network has unique features to offer and, beyond Facebook, a great place to start exploring advanced features for recruitment is both Twitter and LinkedIn. Once deciding which networks consist of your target demographic, leverage its native advanced features to engage with potential job candidates on a more personal level. 

Twitter 

Let’s talk Twitter. The features are a bit more restrictive than the recruitment tools Facebook has to offer but can be an extremely effective solution when used correctly. Have you ever explored Twitter’s advanced search feature? You can use the advanced search feature to turn Twitter into a search engine (more or less), scanning through billions of tweets. Apply filters from accounts or tweets to even photos, and find job candidates by using specific criteria like location, languages, keywords, and many more selections.

LinkedIn 

A similar advanced search tool is available on LinkedIn but, unlike Twitter, this is a far more business-oriented social network and holds more recruiting power in its available features and LinkedIn Talent Solutions products. 

Here are some of LinkedIn’s hiring tools available in addition to its advanced search feature:

• LinkedIn Recruiter – Find & manage potential job candidates.

• LinkedIn Recruiter Lite – ‘Recruiter’ tool designed for low-volume hiring.

• LinkedIn Jobs – Target your job postings to the ideal candidate.

Final Thoughts

Key takeaway: Don’t underestimate the power of social media marketing, especially when hiring. 

Recruiting new talent doesn’t need to be a long and tiring process. Find your ideal job candidates where they already are: Social media. Follow any (or all) of the strategies we covered and make hiring easy by utilizing social media for recruitment!