How to recruit passive candidates?
Recruiting passive candidates requires a different game plan than recruiting active talent. In most cases, it requires recruiters to showcase an extra veil of salesmanship, marketing, and relationship-building skills. However, when utilizing the right tactics at the right time, recruiters can successfully attract passive candidates to their open positions.
To help you formulate a successful passive recruitment strategy, we’ve outlined our best advice below.
Almost everyone has a social media account these days, making it a terrific and effective means to find and initiate contact with potential talent. For this reason, we advise staying active on all relevant professional media platforms such as Linkedin, Facebook, and Twitter.
After you’ve utilized the obvious social media routes, why not experiment with some lesser-known platforms or forums too? Use your preferred search engine to find networks such as college career centers, online associations, and other sites that are industry-specific and contain relevant resumes or job postings.
Once you've found potential candidates that you think might be the right fit for your organization and open role, don’t just sit tight. Instead, confidently assert yourself as introduce yourself.
Don’t wait for a candidate to set up a meeting, ask about the interview process or your intentions. Instead, be clear about why you are interested in pursuing them.
If you already have a team of inspiring employees, why not ask one of them if they have a potential person in their network who might be interested in joining your company? Referrals can be a fantastic way to secure a dedicated and trusted workforce because the potential employee in question has already been somewhat vetted.
When it comes to recruitment, timing is everything. While it’s important to conduct your outreach process with care and caution, acting quickly is also key. You need to strike the balance between marketing the role attractively and not rushing the candidate.
With this in mind, we advise revolving most if not all of the conversations you have with passive candidates about them, what they will gain by moving to your organization, etc. Don’t center your pitch on the fact that you need someone quickly to fill a role. Make them feel special and show them what they’re missing.