To recruit top talent, you need to find exciting ways to promote your open roles. Why? Simply because you’ll need relevant candidates to close these positions faster.
Marketing is an important aspect of recruiting and recruiters mustn’t ignore it – primarily because it improves your agency’s presence, helps attract qualified candidates, builds trust and credibility, and helps retain applicants and clients.
The fact is, too many recruiters ignore recruitment marketing. Candidates either don’t get enough information about a job or just aren’t interested and sometimes, you may not even find the right clients too.
So, what can you do to avoid these pitfalls? The first step is to identify the mistakes that are leading you down the rabbit hole.
In this article, we have explained in detail common recruitment marketing mistakes you must avoid.
8 Recruitment Marketing Mistakes That are Holding You Back
1. Writing a Bland Job Description
A bland job description simply won’t cut it.
You need to include key information like a role’s hours, pay, and responsibilities.
If a hiring manager, client, or job applicant sees your job postings for the first time, you don’t want them to be bored.
Think of some ways that you can spice up your advert a little.
Rather than simply describing a role, give the applicant a sense of the company. What does it stand for? How will an applicant fit in within the organization? Are there any fun activities that they should know about, such as quiz nights or office parties?
This will allow the applicants to make a better decision about whether a job is a fit for them.
2. Confusing an Applicant
When applying, people don’t generally want to hang around.
In fact, most people like to send out multiple applications at once. If an applicant can’t figure out how to apply to your position, they’ll probably go elsewhere.
Try to put clarity at the heart of everything you do. Write simple instructions for applying for a job.
If accepting applications through your website, ensure it runs correctly.
This might seem like obvious advice, but organizations often fail to monitor their websites. A certain button might not work, or a page could fail to load, derailing your entire hiring process.
Simplify your hiring process and explain it properly to job seekers. This way, you will get far more applications.
3. Not Utilizing Your Creativity
What will distinguish you from every other job posting that’s out there?
A basic, black-and-white job advertisement won’t do you much good.
A bit of color, images, animations, or graphics certainly won’t hurt anyone and will give your recruitment marketing a lift. It’s not a bad idea to start learning how to draw cartoon characters so that you can create attractive animation to draw in more customers. Ultimately, using an animation maker can also simplify the process and help you craft eye-catching animated content for your marketing campaigns with ease.
Remember, your advert will be going online, giving you huge scope for visualization.
Of course, it’s not all about color. Try to use visualization as a way of informing about the job role.
This could mean using infographics with info about the company.
You could even include a short video explaining the role and introducing applicants to the office environment. Whatever your design choices are, try to keep them interesting!
4. Not Being Active
People are much more likely to apply for a position that seems both credible and trustworthy. But how do you go about building credibility?
A good way is by making sure that a candidate knows who you are. One of the biggest recruitment marketing mistakes is only being active when looking for applicants.
You should have accounts on multiple social media platforms like LinkedIn, Facebook, or Twitter to spice up your social recruiting activities.
Social networking sites provide an easy opportunity to share new job roles and increase the number of applicants.
Not only that, but they provide a great chance to also interact with your audience.
5. Overlooking the Importance of Email
Creating a mailing list is pretty much business 101. It provides a valuable chance for product-led content marketing, builds brand loyalty, and teases new offers.
A mailing list can also be a great way of gaining new job applicants. Even if you aren’t recruiting, think of ways to build up your network of subscribers.
It is a great way to keep in touch and notify them about any new positions that could crop up.
Just make sure you stay on the right side of any data laws when building your mailing list. For instance, businesses in California need to be aware of CCPA, legislation that regulates the information you can collect about customers.
This goes for your reporting too. However, with a Google Analytics 4 setup, you are much less likely to infringe on any GDPR or CCPA legislation.
6. Forgetting SEO
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is crucial for any business online as it is the backbone of digital marketing business plan.
SEO is the process of making your website search engine friendly. The best optimization strategies ensure that websites appear at the top of search lists. Professional agencies that try to get more SEO clients effectively should focus on providing customized solutions and staying updated with the latest SEO trends.
But what can you do to improve SEO? Well, there are numerous steps you’ll need to consider.
Don’t forget that your website’s interface and speed play a small role in optimizing your site.
Pay attention to the mobile users who bring nearly 55% of traffic to your site. If your website isn’t properly optimized for mobile users, you’ll find yourself penalized by Google.
Other important points include:
- The number of keywords you include
- Your backlinking strategy
- The quality of content on your site
To create the best SEO strategy, you’ll also need the right tools. One must definitely know how to use Google Data Studio.
Growth takes time, be it growing your business or improving your SEO. Though growing your SEO can take time and a lot of research, you’ll reap the rewards if you put the time in.
7. Being Slow to Respond to Applications
Sometimes it can be tempting to spend prolonged periods of time looking over CVs and finding the best candidates for an interview. But during this time, other employers could be reaching out to your candidates.
If you aren’t careful, you might find that the best candidate has already gone elsewhere. That’s not to say that it isn’t a good idea to consider each candidate carefully. But if you do need to take a little extra time, it’s a good idea to keep a candidate updated.
8. Not Being Realistic
It should be your goal to find the best possible candidate. But you’ll need to be realistic too.
Too often, employers set unrealistic expectations, cutting themselves off from potential candidates. For instance, if you’re looking for a younger candidate, asking for lots of experience is unreasonable.
You’ll also need to think about pay. If you’re offering a position at minimum wage, it’s unadvisable to search for a candidate with a master’s degree.
Ultimately, you need to be transparent about what you expect from a candidate, but you also need to be realistic.
Don’t Forget to Invest in the Right Tools
Choosing the right candidate can be difficult. Ultimately, you’ll want to be confident that you’ve chosen the best applicant. But there’s no reason that you need to tackle this process alone!
Today’s modern age brings with it a whole range of tools to help make recruitment easier. For example, Applicant Tracking Systems can give a real boost to the selection process.
Be Inventive!
As you’ve probably worked out, recruiting isn’t as easy as it sounds.
Wondering why you’re not getting enough applicants from your recruitment marketing? Well, there’s a good chance that it’s due to some of the recruitment marketing mistakes listed here.
Look over your advert. Are you making any obvious mistakes? If so, you might need to go back to the drawing board.
But don’t fret! As discussed, the solutions to most of these problems are simple. You’ll need to be a little inventive – what can you do to make your advert simply stand out?
Written by-
Phil is an analytics expert, author, and web analyst. He’s also the Analytics Director & Founder of a Google Analytics agency called MeasureMinds Group. Over the past 20+ years, Phil has helped clients improve their analytics and search engine marketing through the introduction of new tools and disruptive techniques.
