Ghostbusters for Recruiters: Conjuring Up Strategies to Banish Candidate Ghosting!

Candidate Ghost Blog

It’s Spooky Out There.

Imagine this: You are a recruiter well into the hiring process when suddenly a candidate abruptly stops responding to your emails and texts. It is as if they’ve vanished into thin air, wasting your time and delaying your recruiting efforts.

For many unfortunate employers, this situation is not merely hypothetical, it’s a problem known as candidate ghosting; one of the more frustrating issues facing recruiters today.

Candidate ghosting comes in many forms, ranging from an applicant skipping an interview to the extreme case of a new employee never showing up to work. While this sort of behavior was once largely restricted to unskilled labor, recruiters now report candidate ghosting becoming more prevalent in industries like technology and health care.

How To Avoid Candidate Ghosting.

A recent SHRM article by Roy Maurer outlined strategies to help offset this problem, including reducing the time spent recruiting and simplifying the recruiting process to better maintain candidate interest.

Another more meaningful approach is to promote more transparency and open communication between the hiring organization and the applicant. If a candidate doesn’t have a clear understanding of the job responsibilities, requirements, and, more importantly, your Employer Value Proposition, then the employer runs the risk of the candidate realizing too late in the process that they are not a good fit after investing too much time.

Additionally, if the candidate feels comfortable communicating with a recruiter, then they will be more apt to raise questions, clarify expectations, and be more forthcoming about concerns that could dissuade their decision to ghost a recruiter.

Finally, a hiring organization with a clear and compelling EVP is better equipped to educate candidates about their work environment early in the hiring process ensuring a mutual cultural fit and less chance for ghosting behavior. A strong EVP also highlights the unique benefits and personality of your organization, and when done right, can discourage candidates from shopping your competition.

Who You Gonna Call?

Buyer Advertising, a leader in recruitment and employee communications for close to sixty years, is here to help you bust ghosts with proven strategies to improve your hiring process, better define your Employer Brand, and open up lines of communication between you and your candidates with our Talent Engine Connect CRM. To learn more about our customized recruitment solutions, contact Natasha Cuomo, our VP of Strategic Partnerships, at ncuomo@buyerads.com or visit our website, www.buyerads.com.

About Buyer Advertising

Buyer provides custom talent solutions that deliver the right candidates critical to our client partners’ success. We cultivate unique Employer Brands that set our clients apart from the competition while creating a personal connection with their future employees. Our industry-leading search engine optimized hiring platform, Buyer Talent Engine, empowers recruiters with a smarter way to attract, engage, analyze, and track candidates through the hiring process – backed by a team of industry leaders with a passion for customer service. With a proven history of supporting a diverse mix of organizations for close to sixty years, we are confident we’ll exceed your expectations.

Buyer Talent Engine: Career Site Platform Updates

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Attracting top talent in today’s competitive landscape requires innovative tools to maximize recruiting efficiency while promoting an organization’s unique Employer Value through relationship marketing. For more than two decades, industry leaders have trusted Buyer Talent Engine as the foundation of their tech stack, empowering organizations to achieve their hiring goals.

Never resting on past success, Buyer Advertising continues to invest in our technology culminating in our most recent version of Buyer Talent Engine, which now leverages Artificial Intelligence and greater flexibility to creatively connect with prospective hires through storytelling and employee experiences.

Talent Engine Optimize

More than 25 million job searches take place on Google each month, making Job Search Engine Optimization a vital strategy to compete for talent while reducing overall cost per hire. For more than 20 years, Buyer Talent Engine has provided clients unmatched job SEO, resulting in increased page one job search visibility while unlocking thousands of untapped candidates from Google and Google-For-Jobs.  In fact, one Buyer client experienced an astounding 80% of hires from Job SEO while spending just 10% of their overall recruitment advertising budget.

Talent Engine Attract

Traditional Pay-Per-Click Advertising if not managed independently from the job boards can waste your recruiting budget by attracting excess applicant flow while simultaneously underexposing vital jobs. Buyer Talent Engine Attract, using AI technology combined with hands-on media analysts, efficiently drives candidates to the openings that need the most exposure based on applicant conversion data and goals. This combination of analytics paired with personal insight allows for unprecedented optimization of your advertising budget resulting in a higher ROI.

Talent Engine Engage

Buyer Talent Engine career pages are custom designed to seamlessly integrate with your corporate web pages and adhere to all brand standards including fonts, typefaces, navigation treatment, page styles and color palate.  However, it also provides a level of creativity unmatched by traditional Applicant Tracking Systems including graphic based job postings, embedded job search filters across all career content pages, integrated video, blog and social media content, featured jobs and Google maps on job postings and dynamic user experiences based on candidate website behavior.  Additionally, Buyer Talent Engine provides custom job search options including zip code, proximity, keyword, category, location, type, facility, brand, and Military Occupation Service (MOS) Code job searches.

Talent Engine Analyze

In today’s ever-changing environment, accurate data is crucial to ensuring the success of your recruitment strategy. That’s why Buyer Talent Engine delivers the most comprehensive suite of data analytics available today featuring detailed auto-capture candidate source metrics for paid and organic media including:

  • Applies Started
  • Applies Completed
  • Qualified Applies
  • Offers
  • Hires
  • Media Cost per Apply and Hire
  • Hire Details – Name, Job Title, Date – by Source
  • Influencing Media Source Tracking
  • And More

All metrics can be sorted by date, location/entity, job category, status and viewed comparatively over time periods.

Talent Engine Connect

Buyer Talent Engine makes it easy to cultivate candidates with our full featured CRM providing automated job notifications and other HR related news via text and email.

An integrated, third-party job board “Quick Apply” feature, a selective career site interest-capture form, “drag and drop” resume feature and bulk list upload function allow for easy candidate acquisition while robust candidate management tools provide ranking, filtering, tagging, dispositioning, internal sharing, and communicating with candidates through text and email. Additionally, AI can now automatically rank candidates against published job requirements and displays a rational for each rank.

Talent Engine Promote

Automatically promote content throughout the entire hiring lifecycle and convert more candidates with Buyer Talent Engine. Our communications platform empowers you to create, schedule and send out relationship building content via text and email, increasing candidate hires over time. You can also define unique audiences based on job categories, locations, tags, and pipeline stages and set triggers to send content based on status updates or date and time. Additionally, you can leverage built in AI to help generate fresh content for drip marketing and blog posts and track candidate outreach including campaign content, sent messages, opens, and click throughs.

Talent Engine Spotlight

Showcasing your employees as part of a robust Employer Brand campaign has proven to make organizations more relatable to job seekers. Now you can collect and share authentic employee experiences through videos with Buyer Talent Engine. Encourage employees to submit self-shot videos as part of a campaign to share their success stories.  These videos are stored in an approval queue and, if selected, are posted to a custom branded video wall. The videos are also made available to publish with embedded links on the career site and in email and text marketing at your discretion. An administrative tool allows access to manage the submitted videos, admin users, the video approval process and employee email and text lists for internal marketing.

Set Up & Integration

Setting up Buyer Talent Engine requires minimal IT resources to launch in less than 60 days. This means your organization can be up and running quickly, without presenting a major technical overhaul or compromising your brand integrity.

Buyer provides custom talent solutions that deliver the right candidates critical to our client partners’ success. We cultivate unique Employer Brands that set our clients apart from the competition, while creating a personal connection with their future employees. Our industry leading search engine optimized hiring platform, Buyer Talent Engine, empowers recruiters with a smarter way to attract, engage, analyze and track candidates through the hiring process – backed by a team of industry leaders with a passion for customer service. With a proven history of supporting a diverse mix of organizations for more than fifty years, we’re confident we’ll exceed your staffing expectations.

To learn more about our customized recruitment solutions, contact Natasha Cuomo, our VP of Strategic Partnerships, at ncuomo@buyerads.com or visit our website, www.buyerads.com.

Beating the Great Resignation

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Looking further into your recruitment strategy.

Two years into a global pandemic, and the human resources world is facing a second battle – the Great Resignation. The COVID-19 pandemic has sparked a mass exodus of employees, particularly in the healthcare industry. Despite this, an article from Wbur notes that the number of licensed nurses in Massachusetts alone is up. It’s a head-scratching predicament, the quick-think solution being to keep recruiting – but this alone is not enough.

Human Capital Institute writes, “Employees need great levels of engagement, empathy, direction and support.” This is a call for companies to re-evaluate the entirety of their recruitment strategy, both internally and externally – everything from the benefits offered, the leadership and resources available, to their overall Employer Brand.

A re-vamped recruitment strategy is a statement to current and future employees that a company is ready and able to meet their needs. Whether it be easier access to leaders, employment incentives, or development opportunities, today’s employees need to know their organization is listening and adapting. Better retention and onboarding of employees will only lead to stronger company performance.

Re-vamping your recruitment strategy is no small feat. With 50+ years of recruitment marketing and communications experience, Buyer Talent Solutions is ready to leverage our resources and industry knowledge to meet your hiring goals. Contact us at info@BuyerAds.com to learn more about our customized recruitment solutions.

The Importance of Employee Retention in 2021

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It’s a strange time in the business world. With COVID restrictions easing, the pressure is on for employers to establish their re-opening plan. The past year spotlighted many issues directly influenced by the workplace—stability, mental and physical health, diversity, opportunity, etc. It has employees reflecting on their own lives and calls for employers to go beyond day-to-day operations and make significant changes.

A recent post by Smarp states more than a third of workers are actively and casually searching for a job, the result being a costly talent war across many industries. The Buyer team is here to offer a solution applicable to current employees and potential applicants that will ensure your organization’s continued success. The key: Proactive employee retention efforts.

Start by reviewing your Employer Brand.

Re-evaluating your Employer Brand is a foolproof way to establish what is/isn’t being communicated to candidates and current employees. It allows you to better promote unique company offerings and build upon areas in need of more—whether it be diversity initiatives, development opportunities, etc. A strong Employer Brand stays with employees beyond the onboarding process and encourages company loyalty.

Encourage company connection, starting from the top.

The Smarp post states that 69% of employees would work harder if they were better appreciated. This is significant insight for employers to reflect on the ways in which their leadership oversees, encourages and challenges employees. Make sure company leadership gives consistent feedback to employees and accept theirs in return. Words of encouragement can be empowering and helpful to understand employee opinions.

Find flexibility where you can.

2020 saw an influx of remote work, and now many employees hope to continue. Remote hiring and the creation of hybrid work models show employees and future candidates that you value flexibility and can significantly expand your candidate pool.

Win the talent war with Buyer. With 50+ years of recruitment marketing experience, Buyer Talent Solutions is ready to leverage our resources and industry knowledge to meet your hiring goals. Contact us at info@BuyerAds.com to learn more about our customized recruitment solutions.

The Reality of Recruiting in 2021

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The after effects of COVID-19 have turned recruitment on its head. What began as mass layoffs has turned into many businesses needing to quickly recruit, hire and train staff. Organizations need to both go back to the basics of recruiting, and get creative to engage with candidates. The best way to do this? Be flexible and committed to passionately sharing your company culture.

Flexibility is key.

Flexibility can be applied to your recruitment strategy in several ways. Firstly, be open to remote work. Organizations can miss out on quality candidates due to geographical limitations. A quality candidate pool should prioritize identifying top performing candidates, regardless of location, if the job can be done remotely.

Another opportunity for flexibility is in the minimum qualifications that you set for your ideal candidate. Gartner research found that 43% of today’s candidates are self-taught in one or more of their role’s requirements. Instead of relying solely on a candidate’s credentials and background, get a sense of their capabilities and willingness to learn. Not only does it grow your candidate pool, it encourages growth and attracts those most in-line with your company goals.

Live and breathe your Employee Value Proposition (EVP).

An EVP is your promise to candidates. It embodies your company culture, work/life balance, goals, and should always be felt by candidates and employees. 2021 presents the challenge of selling your EVP through a virtual hiring process, with strong calls for diversity and inclusion. Think about how your organization promotes these. Consider inclusion initiatives and focus on strengthening career ladders for your team. A clear investment in your employees will set you apart from competitors and maximize candidate interest.

Let’s take on 2021 together. With 50+ years of recruitment marketing experience, Buyer Talent Solutions is ready to leverage our resources and industry knowledge to meet your hiring goals. Contact us at info@BuyerAds.com to learn more about our customized recruitment solutions.

The Rise and Fall of Social Media Platforms

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We live and work in the age of social media, with no end in site. And while it’s a no-brainer to add social media to your digital marketing strategy, timing is everything.

The evolution of social media has brought many platforms, all vying for users by reinventing ways to produce and absorb content. This level of competition brings a life expectancy for every social media platform—and not understanding this jeopardizes the reach of your digital recruitment efforts, resulting in wasted ad dollars, or missed opportunities.

Google recently collected data and created a visual timeline to show the search volume of social media platforms. Some platforms may seem like a distant memory, while others live on your phone right now. Tik Tok is currently a highly sought platform, while big names like Facebook, although long running, sees a steady decline. Tik Tok is a timely example of a social media platform in its prime, and well-fitted companies quick to incorporate it will see the most success in their digital efforts.

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When considering a platform to advertise on, it’s also important to understand its users. After additional research, Buyer’s team found that 18-24 year olds spend 67+ minutes a day on Tik Tok, with 10-19 year olds representing nearly 33% of its users, making Tik Tok an ideal platform to reach teens, new grads, or individuals entering the workforce. Timeliness and an understanding of your audience are keys to social media success. Together they’ll deliver the desired result and establish the versatility of your recruitment marketing capabilities.

Take the guesswork out of your digital marketing strategy. With 50+ years of recruitment marketing experience, Buyer Talent Solutions is ready to leverage our resources and industry knowledge to meet your hiring goals. Contact us at info@BuyerAds.com to learn more about our customized recruitment solutions.

Embracing Pay Transparency in Your Recruitment Strategy

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On January 1st, Colorado’s Equal Pay for Equal Work Act went into effect, requiring all employers to provide formal notice of all promotional job opportunities, with full disclosure of pay rates/ranges. Pay transparency has long been taboo in recruitment efforts, but Colorado’s law is working to combat payment inequities while normalizing discussion of salary throughout the hiring process. Buyer Talent Solutions’ research team dug in to the idea of pay transparency and offers ways to ease it into your recruitment strategy to increase the quality of your candidate pool.

For starters, it’s important to understand the demand for pay transparency isn’t new. A 2018 Glassdoor study found that 67% of employees and job seekers look for salary information in job ads, making the inclusion of salary a no-brainer to engage candidates. Popular job search destinations like LinkedIn allow candidates to search by salary, and Google For Jobs and Indeed both include salaries in search results. Full disclosure of job salaries will increase the number of relevant applicants that your jobs receive, and avoid potential delays in your hiring process due to candidates applying with a false expectation of salary.

In addition to salary, Colorado’s law calls for notice of all promotional job opportunities, which includes all internal and external promotion. This is a great opportunity for companies to ramp up internal hiring efforts and mentor programs. Internal efforts bring awareness to job opportunities within your company that current employees may not have known. This is another way to expedite the recruitment process, encourage and demonstrate a career ladder within your company, and ensure smart hires are being made.

Candidate expectations are always changing, and we want to help our clients stay ahead. With 50+ years of recruitment marketing experience, Buyer Talent Solutions is ready to leverage our resources and industry knowledge to meet your hiring goals. Contact us at info@BuyerAds.com to learn more about our customized recruitment solutions.

Unpacking a Multi-Generation Workforce and How To Recruit Them

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Today’s workforce and candidate pools are more blended than ever. While inspiring, it comes with recruitment challenges. Executing a multi-generational recruitment strategy is no small feat, and it must start with understanding each group individually. Buyer Talent Solutions’ research team has analyzed these three prevalent groups in today’s workforce—Gen X, Millennials, and Gen Z. Understanding the characteristics of each group is essential to building successful recruitment strategies.

Pew Research defines Gen X as those ages 39-54. They grew up during the computer generation and worked their way through the rise of the Internet, which changed the professional world forever. Glassdoor describes this group as being in the thick of their careers, having significant responsibilities both personally and professionally. When recruiting Gen X candidates, benefits and development opportunities should be the center of your messaging. This group values growth and chances to step into leadership, but has little room for risk when it comes to healthcare, 401k, and other stakes.

Then comes Millennials, Pew deeming these individuals ages 23-38. Millennials remember a time before the Internet, but grew up as it took off and were able to adapt to its innovations as they came about. Social issues and a work/life balance are extremely important to this group. This is a great opportunity for organizations to revamp their Employer Brand to highlight diversity, inclusion, and work flexibility. Workplace culture should be at the forefront—any lack of one could make or break application numbers.

Gen Z is next, these individuals being ages 7-22, the oldest just entering the workforce. This generation has grown up on technology, therefore a focus on technology is important for recruitment. As of 2018, Pew notes that Gen Z is the most educated (58% enrolled in 2 and 4-year colleges) and racially/ethnically diverse (52% being non-white) generation ever. Like Millennials, diversity and inclusion are essential to Gen Zers when choosing an employer. IN addition to ensuring your messaging aligns with the needs of Gen Zers, it’s important to also re-evaluate the media channels that you use to reach this group. As digital natives, Gen Zers prefer platforms like Twitter, TikTok, and Twitch to traditional media. Investing media dollars into digital advertising will expand your reach to Gen Z.

While little research is available, it is important to acknowledge Gen N. This group will follow Gen Z into the workforce as products of a post-COVID world, with full immersion in technology and the Internet from youth. The organizational changes companies make today will be strongly felt by the upcoming generation.

Generational changes are inevitable in the workforce, and recruitment efforts must be nimble and adjusted to align with candidate expectations. With 50+ years of recruitment marketing experience, Buyer Talent Solutions is ready to leverage our resources and industry knowledge to meet your hiring goals. Contact us at info@BuyerAds.com to learn more about our customized recruitment solutions.

Is Your 2021 Hiring Strategy in Place?

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After a year like 2020, everyone is looking forward to a fresh start—and the opportunities that come with it. As companies continue to re-open, we anticipate a significant need for talent. Going into 2021, it’s important that you incorporate a strategic and purposeful hiring strategy to secure the best candidates. To do this, consider these guiding questions from our recruitment experts:

First, think about your re-opening strategy. A successful onboarding process has to be in-line with your company’s current situation. Come the New Year, will you be remote or in-office? How are you planning to onboard new employees and engage them?

Next, try to project what you’ll need for talent in the New Year. What do you anticipate your hiring needs to be in Q1 and Q2 of 2021? What type of budget will you have, and how flexible does your strategy need to be to accommodate changes to your anticipated hiring needs?

Stand out from competitors. This year has seen a significant shift in the way companies operate. To connect with talent, have you considered virtual hiring events, utilizing AI, or other COVID-conscious methods of screening candidates? If your company has evolved over the past year, how are you promoting these changes? Redefining your employer brand will allow you to emphasize your unique company culture while directly addressing timely subjects such as inclusion and diversity hiring. Using these tactics demonstrates your company’s ability to adapt and shows resilience during uncertain times.

Start planning and get excited for the year ahead. With 50+ years of recruitment experience, we’re ready to leverage our resources and industry knowledge to meet your hiring goals. Contact us at 857-404-0864 or info@BuyerAds.com to learn more about our customized recruitment solutions.

The Benefits of an Employee Referral Program

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Never underestimate the power of word-of-mouth. Employee Referral Programs have proven to be a beneficial recruitment method, no matter the scope of your hiring strategy.

For one, they streamline the hiring process. Referral programs tap into an exclusive talent source—your current employees. Rather than solely relying on traditional marketing efforts, employee referrals are a unique communication strategy that directly links candidates to your organization, establishing a common connection that separates you from industry competitors.

Employee Referral Programs test the strength of your Employer Brand. The individuals your employees refer are typically those they see as a good fit for the organization. A current employee’s view of your company culture is valuable feedback regarding Employer Brand perception and allows you to adjust or re-evaluate your branding efforts accordingly.

For optimal success, it’s all about the process. Referral programs have an important criterion crucial to identifying quality candidates—the candidate and referring employee relationship. Harvard Business Review conducted a study and found that while 70% of “better candidates” were received from referrals, the true quality of the candidate depended on how well they knew the referring employee. Your referral program should have participants clearly indicate their relationship with each other so you can properly screen and assess individual qualifications in order to make the best hiring decisions.

Buyer’s team has developed and executed many client Employee Referral Programs with great success. With 50+ years of recruitment experience, we’re ready to leverage our resources and industry knowledge to meet your hiring goals. Contact us at 857-404-0864 or info@BuyerAds.com to learn more about our customized recruitment solutions.