Recruitment marketing and why social media might be your answer

Read time: 5 min

To be honest with you, as a content marketer, I never thought I’d be writing a blog post about recruitment.

When the first brief came through to help one of our clients with a paid media recruitment campaign I thought it was a fluke, the second time a coincidence, but when the third business turned to us for assistance – I sensed a pattern.

And what a pattern it’s become.

Two years ago, we were wildly marketing to get customers through our client’s doors. Now, what we’re doing is finding staff to service them.

It’s not just our clients who are struggling with this recruitment challenge. A little digging revealed that on 30 June 2022, 91 percent of Australian employers were experiencing skills shortages (Source: Hays Salary Guide Survey).

What’s more, a perfect storm of low unemployment and high demand for workers has meant job adverts hit their highest levels in 25 years in 2022, and yet, you still can’t find anyone to work.

If you’re nodding furiously, can I just ask – what are you doing to stand out?

I can tell you, chipping away at the same old job ads and expecting different results is not going to get there.

We know (firsthand) that businesses can’t afford to get recruitment wrong.

At our recent Feeling Content Event, we shared our top four tips for recruitment marketing through social media.

It’s our view as content marketers that there’s a golden opportunity to be channel diverse in the way you talk to potential employees.

Let me walk you through our recommendations, which are all included in this handy recruitment checklist we built.

Tip 1: Shift your focus to ‘always-on’ recruitment marketing

In our experience, most businesses only hire when they’re in active hiring mode. What we’re recommending to our clients is that they start by bringing recruitment into their weekly social media content.

Shift your focus to always-on recruitment marketing so future employees build that interest in working for you.

It’s not just us who are saying it, stats are pointing to the fact that 75% of active job seekers are likely to apply if the company actively manages its brand.

One of the first places we’re encouraging our clients to start in building an enticing brand is by updating their LinkedIn About section.

This biography gives you 2,000 characters to tap dance in front of your audience to provide them with a real sense of what the business is about.

What we find is most brands’ “About” bio is so boring, no one in their right mind would ever contemplate joining after reading it.

Can I ask – when was the last time you checked yours?

Tip 2: Meet potential recruits on the channels they are playing

What we know for sure is younger generations don’t use conventional job boards like we used to, even if they are in professional services.

TikTok continues to prove itself a valuable recruitment tool, especially for entry-level roles (which in my experience, are often some of the hardest to fill).

While your current workforce might be a little older than the TikTok crowd, did you know Gen Z’ers are expected to make up more than 30% of the workforce in the next decade?

Your key take out: you can run, but can’t hide from these sorts of social media channels and their influence forever.

Beyond silly dances and trending recipe videos, TikTok proves itself a powerful recruitment marketing tool.

According to Forbes,  #jobsearch has 165 million views and #careeradvice racks up over 80 million views per day.

To get started in creating recruitment content for social media channels, we always suggest opting for a low-fi filming technique.

Put down your big cameras, polished ‘meet the team’ video and high-production value, and get started on a face-to-camera to explain the job, what you’re hiring for and what you’re looking for.

Authenticity is a buzzword in social media for a reason and good news for businesses, it’s a whole lot cheaper to create.

Tip 3: Bank roll your own recruitment advertising strategy rather than rely on anyone else

Rather than put all your recruitment dollars into job boards that control how your ads are shown to market, experiment by creating your own recruitment advertising strategy direct.

Use paid social media to meet potential recruits on channels that may surprise, and outperform your competitors.

What’s more, if your competitors aren’t using social media paid at all, the spotlight is yours to talk directly to the talent to give yourself an unfair advantage.

Make the most of social media’s insanely granular targeting and use it to your advantage.

If you were looking for a social media manager, channels like TikTok mean you can target users who engaged with social media tips in the past 14 days.

Even channels like Facebook and Instagram mean you can get laser-focused with your targeting – with demographic information such as age, gender, lifestyle, relationship status, and job role.

The benefit of all this? You control your objectives and dashboard to see how results are performing and can make adjustments to the ads in real-time.

Tip 4: Share your employee’s voice on social

One of the best ways to build advocacy for recruitment in your business is to share your employee’s voice on social media.

No one’s voice is as authentic as the people who work in your business, and we recommend you use social media to not just recruit new employees but retain existing ones.

These are a handful of ideas we’ve been encouraging our clients to explore:

• Letting your employees create their own day in the life series / run an ‘ask me anything’ recruitment Q&A series
• Cross share employees’ posts on your channels – especially growth stories, people love to see then and now success stories
• Think beyond the workplace – are your people doing something special beyond their 9 – 5 to showcase their achievements
• Share your stats – do you have an extraordinary number of females in ELT positions?

If you follow us @mediamortar on Instagram you’ll see our weekly ideas on how to spotlight our people.

With the challenges faced by businesses both large and small, we know there’s nothing to lose with this approach to recruitment marketing.

What we know for sure is that businesses are crying out for staff, and yet, they’re not changing the way they are approaching recruitment.

Humour us, let us know which of these recruitment tips you’re going to apply in your business first.