May 7th, 2011 by Clint Smith
Sometimes we have a prospective client ask us if we can do an “email blast” for them. When this happens, I smile and politely tell them that we do not offer that service (but we would be happy to run a “personalized email campaign” for them). Ask our employees, and they will tell you that “email blast” is high on the list of things not to say at CareerPlug (along with “spam” and “solicit”). I am cringing as I write these words…
When I hear the word Blast, I think of an explosion that hits everything in site. Sure, you may be “targeting” your Blast, but it is probably with as much precision as a someone with a grenade launcher would. The general thought behind this being: “well, close is good enough”.
But is it really good enough?
I recently spoke with a recruiting manager at a Fortune 500 company that recruits sales professionals across that country. He told me that their hiring process is very selective, and that candidates must have at least a year of outside sales experience to qualify. He also informed me that they use a software program to “scrape” candidates from the job boards and “blast” thousands of emails each day. When he told about the broad search string that they use (basically “sales” with a few NOTs), it was clear to me that this was a true Email Blast hitting tons of unqualified candidates.
While this approach may save some time on the front end, consider:
- How many unqualified candidates are in these campaigns (retail sales reps/admins for a sales manager/etc)?
- How much time will their recruiters spend following up with unqualified candidates who apply?
- How many bad candidate experiences did they create for people who could be current/potential customers?
- How many legitimately qualified candidates did not apply because they were not enticed by the generic email?
Even though it takes a little more work upfront, CareerPlug believes that the best results happen when you limit the campaign to the qualified candidates that you would want to interview. This allows you to:
- Attract more qualified candidates by focusing your message and truly engaging your target audience.
- Save your recruiters’ time and make it easy for them to identify candidates who are worth additional attention.
- Avoid wasting the time of candidates who are not qualified for this position. Remember, they may be your customers.
In summary, save the blasts for cannons and space shuttles, and please keep them out of your email campaigns.
Posted: Candidate Sourcing, High-Volume Recruiting, Recruiting Best Practices, Recruitment Marketing | No Comments »
March 12th, 2010 by Brian
With all kinds of mobile devises providing e-mail access anywhere you can get cellular reception, job seekers are checking e-mails about job opportunities from just about anywhere. So, if a job seeker is out and gets an e-mail about a new job opportunity, how will you make sure he revisits that e-mail later to apply?
We’ve worked very hard at CareerPlug to come up with a solution to this problem.
Target Qualified Candidates
It may sound obvious, but its important! If a job seeker is looking for an outside, B2B sales job with base salary and commission, sending him an e-mail about a career in customer service isn’t going to encourage him to check back later to apply. But, if we send Joe an e-mail about an outside, B2B sales position with a growing company, he’s more likely to remember!
Concise, Informative e-mails
Even if you’re at a computer you don’t want to ready a wordy e-mail. But, if you’re out and about, why would a job seeker waste his or her time reading a 500 word e-mail? E-mails should be concise. By highlighting why Joe is a good fit and why this is a great opportunity, we’ve both informed him about the job and kept from boring him with a wordy e-mail. He’s informed without being bored and even more encouraged to remember to apply.
Call to action
How would he remember to apply if we didn’t’ ask in the fist place?! A strong call to action in the end of the e-mail will reinforce that he needs to come back to this e-mail later when he can focus on the opportunity and apply directly on his employer-branded microsite.
With the ability to check e-mail almost anywhere, it can be a while between the time somebody receives an e-mail from CareerPlug and when they are finally able to sit behind a computer and apply. Getting them interested and excited about the opportunity and following with a strong call to action makes sure that we don’t lose our mobile-savvy job seekers!
Tags: email, email campaign, sales candidates
Posted: Recruiting Best Practices | No Comments »
February 12th, 2010 by Hillary
When it comes to recruiting there’s an obvious advantage to using several different mediums to attract the right talent. We all use email to reach out quickly and conveniently and hey, if it comes from a real person (no email blasts), with a real job offer, it can even feel really personalized. Social media connects with candidates from another platform. It can come off as less intrusive and more friendly, especially when you share a networking or social group with the candidates you’re reaching out to. Then there’s the old-school recruiting tool- the trusty phone. Recruiters have been using the phone for quite some time now but believe it or not it’s really easy to forget some of the basics that can make you a very successful recruiter over the phone.
Here are a few tips on successful phone recruiting:
- Get in the right mindset- As recruiters, our approach can sometimes come off as more of a sales pitch than a job offer. Remember to put yourself in the other person’s shoes. You don’t want to feel like you’re being solicited and neither do they. Remember you have a real opportunity to share and open the conversation with that in mind.
- Focus on building a strong rapport first- Mirroring a candidates conversational tone and even the loudness and speed of their speech will help them feel more connected to you. This is a quick way to get someone to open up.
- Remember- As Dale Carnegie will tell you, people love talking about themselves- If you want someone to talk, just listen. Well ask a question first, and then listen. You may lean something that’s not on paper. Getting a candidate to open up and discuss his/her own career objectives can save everyone time. Often the things you learn from simply talking to an individual give you a lot more information than what’s written on their resume.
These tips aren’t going to seal the deal every time, but they sure will help you to open a few more doors and have a few less hang-ups.
Tags: human resources best practices, phone recruiting, recruiting etiquette, recruiting tips, Social Media
Posted: Recruiting Best Practices, Sales Recruiting | No Comments »
January 22nd, 2010 by Hillary
In his Jan 22 post, Lou Adler from ere.net discusses both the financial gain of hiring A-level talent and the difficulty in finding A-Level talent.
Indeed, finding A-level talent is not an easy task, but CareerPlug’s high-volume recruiting model can take that burden away. Rather than typical sales recruiting, CareerPlug sources candidates from multiple outlets. Aside from sourcing active candidate markets, CareerPlug also focuses on all the major Social Media outlets.
Using Twitter, Facebook, Myspace and especially LinkedIn, CareerPlug is able to find A-level candidates who rely more on networking to find job opportunities than job boards.
Once candidates have been sourced by the CareerPlug Talent Specialists, a targeted e-mail campaign sent out to each candidate directs them to a personalized micro-site containing their job posting. As CareerPlug already has the candidate’s resume on file, all candidates have to do is simply double check their contact information and click submit – making career transitions easier and less stressful.
Once candidates express interest, the Talent Specialist team dives significantly deeper into the resumes to confirm that the interested candidates fit not only the requirements set by our clients, but really stand out as A-Level Candidates.
If Adler’s estimation that an A-Level candidate can bring a financial gain of 10-100 times his or her salary, how much money could CareerPlug help make you?
Tags: ere.net, High-Volume Recruiting, Recruiting, Social Media
Posted: Candidate Sourcing, High-Volume Recruiting, Recruiting Best Practices | No Comments »
June 8th, 2009 by Hillary
Jon Picoult, recently wrote an article in the New York Times that caught my attention. Not simply based on the fact that a cookie was mentioned, but more so because he spoke of the current discourteous nature of the recruiting industry. It seems that, despite the growing number of unemployed out there, recruiters and human resource departments are, shall we say, less than communicative with applicants. That goes for job finalists who leave an interview feeling they’ve nailed it and then never hear back from the company again, all the way to candidates who are simply rejected and never receive notification of such a decision. The general absence of follow-up calls, status notifications, or even responses to inquiries, seems to be the M.O these days. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: human resources best practices, job seekers, recruiting etiquette
Posted: Recruiting Best Practices | No Comments »
April 8th, 2009 by Clint Smith
I responded to a post on ERE.net today that asked the group for advice on approaching a high-volume hiring project. Since sourcing candidates for these types of positions is our specialty, I contributed my two cents. Unlike traditional sourcing/research (for passive candidates), this situation calls for more of a recruitment marketing approach (with some logistics and event planning mixed in). Note that I did very little self promotion, unlike some other responses that proclaimed that using their service would solve everything.
Here’s the original post and my response: Read the rest of this entry »
Posted: Candidate Sourcing, High-Volume Recruiting, Recruiting Best Practices, Recruitment Marketing | No Comments »