Social Business Success

Recruiting for an employee in today’s job market?  It should be a cinch using social media right?  Everyone uses social media.

Recently I was asked by an organization to help them recruit on LinkedIn.  The company was looking to fill a position and knew LinkedIn was an excellent social media network to recruit.  The company even went as far as paying to post a help wanted ad on LinkedIn.  However, they weren’t satisfied with the results the paid ad was getting.

Searching for employees on LinkedIn is really no different that searching for a position.  The first two items the organization needs to have is sharp looking company page and the recruiter or recruiters must have excellent personal profiles.  Just like employers reviewing the applicant’s LinkedIn profile, so will potential employees review the recruiter’s LinkedIn profile.

Networking is the best way to recruit

The next step is to become active in LinkedIn.  The person responsible for recruiting needs to be posting updates and becoming active in groups.  What type of groups should this person join and participate?  I suggest groups in the company’s industry, a group for recruiters, groups having to do with their local area and groups in which their potential candidate is a member.  It’s the philosophy of going where your customers are.  This also includes groups for the job seeker.

Becoming active in LinkedIn means participating in group discussions.  You want to become that group’s subject matter expert.  As you becoming an active member of the LinkedIn community, you are networking.  Who’s to say a hiring manager in one of your groups won’t refer you to a potential candidate?  Job coaches today tell the person looking a new position to “network” and the same goes for the recruiter.

Start your own group.  People start their groups on LinkedIn all the time.  In the case of recruiting, invite people you know to join your group.  The group will consist of people from your organization (employees) and potential employees.  It’s important to get the employees involved in the group, so the potential candidates can get idea of the work environment in your company.

Use the advance search feature.  When using the advance search, search using four to seven keywords.  This feature will bring up people with any the keywords that were used in your search parameter.

Learn how to use LinkedIn signal.  Signal allows you to follow current conversations happening in LinkedIn.  You search conversations by keywords, industry and location.

Another tool that can be used is the Alumni module.  This module will show all of the graduates from a specific school.  The information breaks down the number of alumni by location, where they work, their occupation and what they studied in school.

Don’t forget about your company pages.  Your company page is another important piece when it comes to recruiting.  Companies post job openings on their company page and updates.  If people on LinkedIn are following your company, please make the company page as complete as possible.

The number one piece of advice I can offer is to become active in LinkedIn.  Being active in LinkedIn to me means posting personal and company updates, becoming active in groups and network.  It’s my opinion to become successful professionally; one must be constantly networking in person and virtually.