Social media is a key component to any business – start up or established – it is one of the best digital platforms for propelling businesses forward quickly and cost effectively, the only caveat is that social media marketing has to be done right.
Ask yourself these questions:
• How do you know if you are lagging behind with your Social Media?
• Are you confident that it’s working effectively for you?
• When did you last get it sensed checked or gave it an MOT by experts – just like you would your car to make sure it’s running efficiently?
The truth is most businesses don’t know, either citing lack of time or not important enough to invest the resource.
Recruiters listen up:
Did you know that there are around 9,000 recruiters in the UK and that in 2016 is was purported that staggeringly over half were not making social media a key part of their marketing strategy, leaving it to the junior to pick up when they remember! This is astonishing considering social networks are becoming more and more an integral part of people’s everyday lives. Facebook alone is reported by eMarketer’s social network 2016 survey to have over 33.2 million people every day using its platform. By January this year it was the first social network to surpass 1 billion registered accounts worldwide, with Instagram ranking 6th with 600 million users and the blogging service Tumblr clocking up over 550 million active users and this will only increase.
The digital revolution is in full swing making communication easier, faster and non-stop with information relentlessly being sent around the world 24/7. This bombardment underlines the importance of a solid, well planned and multi-layered strategic marketing plan if you want to be seen and heard above the ever increasing ‘noise’. Remember one of the 7 P’s of marketing is ‘Place’ and in today’s digital world that’s not necessarily a physical location, but a digital place like a website, social platform or job board.
So what’s to be done?
Get a digitally integrated marketing strategy in place, because just dipping in and out of it is not enough.
How?
1. This doesn’t mean employing another full time member of staff, or piling on more work to a colleague who is already snowed under. To get it right needs expert advice so spend a bit of time shopping around to find a reputable agency to work with. Following up on a recommendation is always good and remember they do not have to be on your doorstep – this is digital marketing.
2. Working with key members of your team, define clear objectives you want to achieve that are in line with your business plan.
3. Brief your chosen agency. They will then do an audit of your website and existing followers using insights to determine the content that suits each audience and which platforms will work best.
4. Set goals and establish targets; follower growth and number of interactions shares, retweets, likes etc. They’re a good way of measuring engagement alongside recruitment specific metrics like application rates.
5. Agree a regular reporting and review structure plus a weekly view of proposed content for your approval. Remember you are in control but not having to do the doing. Social media is not about just putting up the odd job post it is about sharing a variety of content and building brand awareness and your reputation.
6. Improved SEO is also key in attracting clients to your website and candidates to your jobs. The agency will automatically update and manage this, as it is crucially linked to the content and communications you share in driving traffic.
You want people to stay on your website. Having content pages with useful and interesting information is the way to generate interest in your agency and jobs. Start a blog this demonstrates industry knowledge, while news and testimonial pages build engagement and credibility to both your clients and candidates. Make their journey and how they contact you as easy as possible.
You need to keep people interested. Plenty of activity and up-to-date data. Give candidates and contacts the ability to log-in to your database, with restricted access of course, to keep their own information up-to-date and you to send out regular, relevant email communications and job alerts to both contacts and candidates to keep them active and engaged with your agency.
Summary:
Yes, social media is time consuming but more importantly it needs careful nurturing and managing by digital marketers to help you reap the most benefit.
As a Recruiter you’re competing against a growing, saturated market and though you may believe you’re doing enough, but the reality is that you could do even better. It’s not about moving away from job boards but investing time and money into turning your marketing strategy around, and harnessing the profitability social media and digital marketing can have on your business.
Find out how our Social Media Specialists can help you.
