Due to the new HR industry trends, the way organizations recruit has changed. And in the past several years, the biggest trend in hiring has been the use of the Facebook search tool assisting to attract and even convert talent. This practice is referred to as – “Facebook recruiting”
Even then, the benefits of social media you can enjoy from social recruiting are vast. This has seen Facebook become among the most popular recruiting social platforms among HR professionals.
To get the most from the Facebook search tool, you should use all the features, best practices and follow the newest trends that Facebook recruitment offers.
What Can I Find Using Advanced Facebook Search Tool?
When you launch the advanced Facebook search tool prompt, you’ll get a “Search Facebook” placeholder. This means that this tool lets you search all posts you’ve viewed before on Facebook, all publicly shared content, and all friends among others.
However, to do this, Facebook needs you to use natural language to express your search queries. This is one way it differs from the Google search engine, along with endless bing vs google debate.
When typing a friend’s name or phrase, Facebook will show you automatically generated suggestions and prompts.
Since the suggestions generated are personalized, it means they’ll differ from one user to the next and will vary based on their past activities.
Fortunately, the change Facebook search tool offers tons of options that will help take your recruitment strategy to the next level.
But why is social recruiting so popular? And how can you implement it? Below is a look at some tips to help you run a successful recruitment exercise.
Tips To Consider When Recruiting On Facebook
Social recruitment is more than posting current vacancy ads on the company’s Facebook page. Facebook recruiting does more than that.
You can proactively use this search tool to search for prospective candidates, and build a relationship with them. Also, you can encourage prospective candidates to apply to the existing vacant job positions.
Our guide today will look at how you can recruit on Facebook by following strategic Facebook recruiting actions that include;
1. Find Potential Candidates
The Facebook search tool chrome offers huge, but underutilized opportunities to proactively find candidates. Did you know that Facebook can be used as a sourcing tool?
The thing is, the Facebook search option can help you find potential candidates – and you won’t have to own a company’s Facebook page to do so.
When recruiting, you can use your personal account to find potential candidates. So how do you go about it?
Here’s how it works:
Social recruiting helps you target your ideal prospective candidates. That’s because Facebook, like other different types of social media, uses a built-in powerful search engine known as Graph Search.
Graph Search uses publicly available information accessible from Facebook users’ profiles.
Most Facebook users put up lots of information on their personal profiles, including their education, location, work experience, (past and current) employers, and languages they speak.
With Facebook Graph Search, you can find candidates who fulfill specific criteria by using filters like education, city, company, etc.).
For example:
If your company is based in New Jersey and you want to hire developers.
Visit your Facebook homepage, and on the search bar, type a query: “developer New Jersey”. Next, transmit and you’ll have your results.
Make sure you select the “People” tab to view your Facebook search recruitment results.
After you identify your candidate persona, next use their names and screen them with more details on Google and LinkedIn.
When you find your ideal candidate, you can contact them on LinkedIn or directly on Facebook. Also, you can ask them to like your organization’s LinkedIn or Facebook page.
Next, message them your recruiting job ad posted on Facebook.
2. Create A Facebook Page
You can use your organization’s Corporate page for Facebook recruiting. Alternatively, you can create a new profile or set up a new account as your company Career page.
The purpose, message, and audience you provide on the two pages must be different. The Corporate Facebook page could be used to talk to your clients.
As for the Career Facebook page, you’ll be talking to potential employees. That’s why large companies who’ve succeeded at Facebook recruiting use both Career and Corporate Facebook pages.
Best practice example:
One great example of a company that’s optimizing social recruitment is – HubSpot. When you visit their career page, you’ll note that they don’t call it just “HubSpot Careers” as most companies would.
They instead have named it HubSpot Life because they aim to share with the world how being a HubSpot employee is like.
If your business is too small or you don’t have the resources and time to manage two Corporate Facebook pages, there’s still a way out. You can use the existing company, Facebook Page, to do your social recruiting.
3. Share Your Company Culture
Next, you need to learn how to share your company culture. According to research, companies that have implemented strong Employer Branding strategies tend to successfully attract the right candidates.
By displaying a great culture in your company, then people look forward to joining your team.
Social recruitment is a great opportunity for employers to show potential candidates a peek at what it’s like to be part of your company.
Be sure to use Facebook recruiting and share with potential candidates what your organization looks like and how it operates beyond the flashy brand advertisements.
Best practice
First, introduce your team and share photos and quotes from your employees. For example, Dell uses Facebook recruiting to show off its company.
Also, consider sharing their experiences and testimonials, as Chipotle does. Chipotle is another company that does extremely well at Facebook recruiting.
Another strategy is to celebrate your employees’ success like Disney, who is among Facebook recruiting pioneers.
Most importantly be sure to highlight your teams’ team spirit and share your office with the world.
4. Use Facebook Recruiting Job Ads
As you create your Facebook job recruiting ads, you must write a description of the job to ensure you attract the most qualified candidates for the job opening. Some tips to writing a compelling Facebook job ad are;
Avoid using stock photos since they come across as artificial and impersonal. If you aren’t able to afford a professional photographer – you can use your Smartphone to take great photos.
Simply choose an interesting subject (like your employees). Also, focus on the lighting and angle. Also, don’t hesitate to use filters or apps. After you take your photos, be sure to crop your photos so they’re framed nicely.
Above all, be sure to add a link that directly leads to your job listing. Note that, when you simplify your application process will increase your chances of receiving more Facebook applications.
Realize that posting a general Facebook job ad that describes all your openings in a single Facebook post will help you save on time and even money.
Despite this, if your company has a specific position that’s a little hard to fill, so consider writing a specialized Facebook job recruiting post for it. In doing so, your recruiting job ad will stand out and help reach more recruits.
And a good example is Disney who uses both options.
5. Free Advertising For Your Facebook Recruitment Ads
Once your Facebook job ad is ready, the next step is to share it. To start with, you can post it on the company Facebook page, however, you need to broaden your reach and search for potential candidates who don’t follow your company Facebook page to perform successful outbound advertising.
Next, let’s explore the 3 important additional channels that you could use when promoting your recruitment job ads on Facebook: Facebook groups and marketplace and referrals. The good part is that all 3 are free to use.
Facebook Groups
These groups are where people with common interests come together and share ideas. The good thing is that Facebook has groups for almost every topic imaginable.
The other 3 main subtypes are interest groups, hiring groups, and alumni or student groups. A good place to start is hiring groups that were aimed at finding and offering vacant jobs.
Also, look for ways to narrow down the search further, by for instance adding criteria like specific location. This can be a city, specific country, and even a college in the Facebook recruitment search.
After joining a preferred group, avoid job posting “bombing” it and then leave. So, be sure to stick around, interact with followers and participate in discussions regularly.
This can be an important talent pool for employers. Plus, this is a resource you can use next time you have an opening in your organization.
Marketplace
This is a convenient place on Facebook where you can discover, sell or buy items from members of your group.
While so far Facebook Marketplace isn’t offering “jobs” as a specialized category, people are still using it to find potential candidates.
This could soon evolve to become big in Facebook recruiting, so it’s important that you keep it in mind.
Now, go to your company Facebook page, after you locate the marketplace button on the left side of your page. Next click on it and once it opens you can create or search job ads with ease.
Referrals
When you’re hiring, using an employee referral program is a great resource for Facebook recruiting. This is the easiest way for employees to share the recruiting ads with their friends, family, and even colleagues in their network on Facebook.
Another reason why referrals are effective is that they’ll improve the quality of the applicants you receive.
If your candidates already know who their future coworkers are and already have a rough idea of what working in your company, you’re likely to attract the best fit for your organization’s culture.
6. Use Facebook Live
With Facebook Live streaming employers can interact with potential candidates via live videos or chats.
What makes this approach highly effective in recruiting is because you won’t have to use extra video editing software or apps. And with a Smartphone, you’re ready to stream live. The best part being this strategy is completely free.
Chat Sessions
This option allows you to organize live “Career Chats” – live sessions on the company’s Facebook page.
To get started, consider creating an event where you host a chat. Of importance is that you post on your event wall.
Also, have your employees and some members of the hiring team answer candidates’ questions and offer useful advice in real-time. Here your teams can talk about how candidates can apply and what’s like being hired in your company.
One company that excels in this is L’Oréal. Their Career page is called L’Oréal Talent and they do both videos and live chat sessions in style. You could hold different sessions like Facebook hiring, Live chat sessions, hiring Facebook video and Live video session
7. Add A Facebook Job Tab
This makes a great strategy and today it’s possible to create a “Jobs tab” on your company or career site.
Recently Facebook for Business rolled out this new feature that lets page administrators add job posts, monitor applications, and even engage with interested candidates.
Post Specialized Recruiting Content
Consider using your company’s Facebook page or the Career page to prep potential job candidates.
This allows you to simplify the process for candidates to learn more about your company, and the hiring process. Also, this allows you to introduce candidates to the hiring team.
Why You Should Share Specialized Content
When candidates know about your expectations and hiring process, it helps them feel relaxed and more confident. This makes candidates have a positive experience with your business.
Also, when you offer them all the information they need in one place then you’ll save their energy and time. As such, you’ll keep them focused on you.
Realize that if they were to research your industry and company through Google, then they could have easily found their way to your competitor’s website and applying for their jobs.
Should You Do Facebook Recruiting?
Facebook search tool has proven to be powerful in recruiting and So far it’s the most effective social recruiting solution.
Today, there are new emerging trends and Facebook is rolling out new features. This makes it easy for recruiters, business owners, HR professionals, and small business CEOs to connect with high-quality candidates on Facebook.
You can, therefore, leverage the different possibilities offered on Facebook recruiting to attract, source, and even hire new employees.
