Around nine million candidates have been put on the government’s furlough scheme, but the unfortunate reality is, many of these candidates will be looking for a new job soon.
A recent survey showed that one fifth of employers still plan to make redundancies as they struggle to pay salaries as the furlough scheme tapers off.
As a result, we’re going to see a huge influx of active candidates on the market soon, and it’s going to do some pretty crazy things to the job market.
It’s important you’re prepared for it, so start laying the groundwork now so you’re ready for when the post-furlough madness begins. Here’s how to start preparing...
Automate candidate nurturing
Only a few months ago, the market was candidate-short, so an influx of active candidates might sound like a good thing to you. But when there’s so many active candidates, efficiency becomes a problem – how do you keep all these candidates engaged until you find them a job?
Automating your communication with candidate portals and job alerts is a really useful strategy in a candidate-heavy market. Candidate portals allow your candidates to set their own job preferences, leaving you with one less task to do and a tailored experience for the candidate as they’ll only receive alerts to jobs they themselves signed up for.
Since the outbreak started, candidates have started looking at job ads in the morning (8am is the most engaged hour) rather than the afternoon. So to get the most out of your automated nurturing, send out your job alerts first thing in the morning so they reach your candidates at the right time.
Laser-focus on your best candidates
With an influx of candidate activity, the real challenge in this new market is sorting through the hordes of job-ready candidates to reach to the ones you really want to talk to (i.e. the ones you know you can make money from!).
Start using rating systems in your CRM to keep your ‘hot’ candidates at the top of your priority list so you can see who your top candidates are at a glance and create strong talent pools that’ll give you competitive edge when speaking to clients.
Don’t be afraid to ask for these candidates to show some commitment and work with you exclusively. You should be able to do this just by demonstrating that you’re the most knowledgeable recruiter in your niche for them to work with.
Here’s something else you could do in return for exclusivity…
Offer extracurricular services
Use any time you have right now to focus your time and efforts on those really valuable candidates and the clients you want on your side when the market really picks up.
For candidates, this could be offering CV help, interviews tips or advice on sprucing up their LinkedIn profile. And for clients, you need to update your service package for this new market and stay valuable to them even when they’re not hiring.
The market has changed so much over the last few months, so be prepared to help with new challenges like setting up video interviews or creating online onboarding processes for your clients. Think about the new challenges they’ll be facing right now and offer services that address these challenges - this will help boost your sales this new market.
Get Google for Jobs ready
Job ads are receiving 40% more applications now than before Covid-19 – a figure that’ll only increase as more people are made redundant.
The majority of candidates begin their job search on Google, so you need to be visible on Google for Jobs (G4J).
To get the best results from G4J, you need to set up a direct apply option. Direct apply ensures any candidates applying through G4J come to your website instead of being diverted to a job board or a competitor site. This Google for Jobs playbook has all the info you need to make sure you’re visible on the world’s number one job-search platform.
Prepare your clients
It’s not just recruiters who need to get ready for the post-furlough surge in candidates – your clients do too.
You have an opportunity now to prove your value to clients by preparing them for the changes ahead. Be their market informant now and it will pay off later when your predictions come to fruition.
Make your clients aware of how the jobseeker market is changing. With so many candidate applications to wade through, they’re at risk of wasting time and money searching through bad-fit applications and arranging too many interviews with candidates who don’t have the right skills.
In a post-furlough market, your recruitment sales process will need to cater to your clients who stay remote - and 74% plan to keep remote working! Download the eBook below to learn how to move your sales process online, so you can keep winning business from prospects - where ever they're working.
