Using Technology to Improve Candidate Interaction

One of the most frustrating aspects of recruitment is being ignored – candidates are being targeted morning, noon and night and they’re simply fed up! Take a look at my tips for using technology to your advantage to help you build relationships without enduring the dreaded voicemail wall...

Video Interviewing

Interviewing candidates before you submit their details to your client is key. You’ll find out more about what they want from a role and whether the roles you have in mind are suitable, but crucially you’ll see how they act in an interview situation. With the majority of candidates still in employment whilst looking for a new role, getting time off to come and meet you can be tricky. Using web services such as Skype to perform video interviews will not only help you, but it will increase the chances of your candidates making time for you. Video interviewing can often be done with much less notice, speeding up the whole process and allowing you to submit your candidate’s details ahead of your competitors too!

Instant Messaging

You’ve got one question to ask a candidate, one role to run by them – if only they’d answer the phone it’d take you a matter of minutes to explain! Use a professional instant messaging service such as Microsoft Lync to your advantage, a service almost like a hybrid of Skype and MSN, allowing you to call, share screens and message people for free. Write candidates a short message explaining what you’d like to speak with them about. This is much more direct than an email that can be lost amongst a hectic inbox, and therefore response rate should be higher. If your candidate is interested or would like to find out more they can then call you when it’s convenient for them, preventing you from bugging them with multiple calls and freeing up your phone line in the process.

Automated Communications

For every job you advertise you’re bound to receive applications from candidates who aren’t quite right for the role. Likelihood is that you’ll need these people one day, so at the very least acknowledge their efforts in applying! Sending out automated emails is one way of doing this – a simple ‘thank you for applying’ template will improve the way your business is viewed in the market. Better still, get in touch with these guys directly and speak to them regardless of whether they are the right fit for the vacancies you have in.

Social Media

Recruiting via social media is a growing area. Facebook and Twitter are free ways for you to increase your candidate base, within just a few retweets you can be in reach of a whole new audience and potentially a star candidate! Tweeting and updating Facebook on a daily basis can be tiresome, so use Tweetdeck, HootSuite or similar to do the work for you – set aside time at the beginning of the week to get all your updates written, and these platforms will do the time consuming work of posting for you!

Candidate Portal

One of the best ways to use technology to your advantage – get the candidates to do your admin for you! Giving candidates a portal through your website will allow them to update their contact details, resubmit a new CV, sign up for job alerts and more, all without effort from you. You’ll be able to track when they last signed in to their portal, giving you a heads up on when they’re on the look out for a new opportunity too, increasing your chances of success on candidate calls.

Do you use technology to your advantage, or has this inspired you to improve your ways of working? Leave us a comment and share your ideas!

 Credit: Images by KROMKRATHOG & Stuart Miles via freedigitalphotos.net