Getting top talent on board is crucial for the future of your business. Creating a talent pipeline will increase your chances of finding and hiring the best candidates for your future growth. The ideal candidate will result in excellent productivity and lower employee turnover. On the other hand, choosing the incorrect candidate can negatively impact your company culture. It could also waste time and money training someone who will only hold the position temporarily.
This is a challenging issue. To find the best candidates for the job, your recruitment team must be able to engage candidates while also streamlining the application process.
How can top talent be found? You can fill your talent pipeline with qualified candidates using the recruitment sourcing strategies listed below. But first, let’s talk about the definition of sourcing.
What Is Sourcing in Recruitment?
Sourcing actively and proactively looks for candidates instead of analyzing resumes sent to the company.
But why is sourcing important in recruitment? Sourcing is important because it allows your company to be ahead of the game. Through sourcing, you gather a pool of talent that you can refer to for future positions. You have time to analyze the candidates’ profiles and only engage with those interested in the position.
Recruitment Sourcing Techniques
There are different sourcing strategies available in recruitment. And that’s what we’re going to explore next.
Develop a Sourcing Plan
Spend time considering the job’s requirements before developing the ideal candidate profile. Create candidate personas by listing the perfect employee’s qualities, aptitudes, and characteristics. Use this as a guide when looking for candidates.
Follow the Hiring Manager’s Lead
To ensure you and your hiring managers agree about what a strong candidate looks like, align yourself with them frequently and early.
Getting on the same page and improving communication quality can be accomplished in the following ways:
- Organize a kickoff meeting to learn more about the position and agree on necessary and desirable qualifications.
- Ask your hiring manager to assist you in creating a list of sourcing avenues where your ideal applicants might be active, as well as a list of role-specific search terms.
- Conduct a few searches together to discuss why particular candidates might or might not be a good fit for the position.
- Evaluate the talent pool and decide if the requirements need to be tightened or relaxed.
Source Candidates From Your Company’s Applicant Tracking System (ATS).
Finding qualified candidates will result not only in a hire but also in candidates who are qualified to fill additional positions. Another recruitment sourcing method available is through the company’s ATS. Re-engaging candidates, however, represents a missed opportunity for many businesses. Less than half of employers actively re-engage declined candidates, even though nearly all companies believe doing so will help them develop their talent community and safeguard their employer brand.
Utilize the past work of your team by starting each new search with candidates you’ve already determined are qualified to work for your company. You must have a strategy in place for engagement if you want to work effectively with archived candidates.
Talent recruitment strategies that involve candidates during the hiring process are effective. It enhances your professional brand to make you more appealing to potential employers. Additionally, it leaves room for applicants who were passed over.
Candidates who have previously expressed interest in your company run the risk of becoming hostile if you are not actively developing an engagement strategy. This may be a goldmine for your talent pipeline, and keeping those channels of communication open is advantageous.
Increase the Number of Sourcing Channels for Recruitment
Most recruiters have a preferred method for locating candidates. Fifty-two percent of respondents say they go to their professional network first, and 28% say they go to LinkedIn first. Why end there? The most popular methods for finding candidates are popular for a reason—they work!
Consider Adding Some Other, Less Popular Sources Into the Mix
On less traditional websites, candidates may be more receptive to outreach messages. Profiles on such sites can produce unique information that makes good material for individualized outreach. There are endless opportunities on the internet. To better predict where to find your target candidates online, it’s essential to understand who they are.
For job advertising management, check out Talroo. Utilize cutting-edge technology to find the best candidates by focusing on specific audiences.
Incorporate Offline Hiring Techniques
Although online platforms increase your engagement, traditional offline hiring practices are still significant. One excellent way to find new candidates is to go offline and interact with people in person at events.
Attend conferences and events related to your field of work or industry, or organize your own meetups to bring together people you want to get to know. There will be less competition to stand out as an employer. Candidates will be more likely to respond to your follow-up messages after conversing with you in person. If other people in your organization attend events, ask them to stay on the lookout for great candidates.
Use Your Employee’s Networks To Find Candidates
By hiring from the networks of their employees, businesses can significantly increase the size of their talent pool. Conduct candidate sourcing sessions with your team to determine if anyone in your staff members’ networks would be a good fit for one of your open positions. Your staff members can increase response rates from candidates they are familiar with and help you find untapped talent.
Understand the Job Requirements
Make sure you comprehend every detail of the job requirements before you launch a new search. To ensure you’re on the same page, have a conversation with the appropriate hiring manager.
You should also find out if hiring managers would consider applicants who may not be working at the level you’re hiring for but possess the qualifications and abilities to suggest they could advance and perform at a higher level. Your candidate pool will be larger as a result.
Avoid Wasting Too Much Time on Passive Candidates
Proceed with caution and do your research. Do they want to speak with you? Great! Don’t waste your time, however, if they do not. For instance, you shouldn’t be shocked if you find passive candidates’ LinkedIn profiles outdated. People not looking for new opportunities aren’t as motivated to update their profiles and include all relevant experience and skills.
Look for Candidates for Future Roles or Positions
Most candidate sourcing begins with the statement, “I need to find people for X job because I have X job to fill.” The most skilled recruiters become even more proactive in their sourcing strategies and anticipate the roles they will need to fill in the future. Building personas is the first step in an aggressive approach.
Encourage Your Recruiters To Continuously Search for New Applicants
Your staff should be taught to always keep future hiring plans in their mind.
Promote your business to the people in your target market to attract potential talent. Consider employer and company branding when developing your brand to attract customers. Give millennials something to connect to because they are more likely to work for and stay at a company where they feel an emotional connection.
Maintain and Enhance Your Employer Brand
Your brand reputation matters. Always respond to reviews – especially the negative ones. Reviews are essential for your potential talent. Before deciding whether they are interested in a job, more than 60% of applicants read company reviews and ratings. Check review websites like Glassdoor frequently and reply to comments to show people you value their opinions and will take appropriate action when necessary. This helps build goodwill and make your staff members feel heard and involved.
Craft Your Candidate-Sourcing Outreach Messages
Even though you put a lot of effort into finding the right candidates, it won’t matter if they won’t interact with you. This is where outreach can aid in the search for new talent.
Some examples of outreach recruiting include simple advice that helps you focus your message on the right candidates. Because the messaging is similar, think of it as a way to stand out to potential candidates. You should concentrate on their wants and needs. Your message is directed at the candidate’s objectives, not your business’s. It flips the script on conventional hiring practices and puts your talent first. Here are some tips:
- Start your message with a catchy subject line that will entice the candidate to open and read it.
- Personalize the message.
- Describe the position and your company.
- Explain how you believe they could benefit the team.
For a compelling outreach message, you must be aware of your audience. Concentrating on the factors that matter to each candidate type can increase your response rates. Your objective is to give them enough information to pique their curiosity and elicit a response. However, you need to be careful not to overwhelm them. To test different messaging and raise response rates, ask your most recent hires for feedback on your outreach messages.
Use Artificial Intelligence-Powered Databases (AI)
Automation and accuracy are two ways that AI can improve sourcing. Through automated sourcing with Talroo, you can find online job candidates who meet your role’s requirements. This not only boosts your efficiency metrics but also cuts down on hiring costs and time to fill positions.
AI can identify patterns in resumes and candidates who are better fits for a position. AI can also lessen bias by obviating the need for human judgment at the sourcing stage.
Get Social
Another possible recruitment sourcing strategy is to use platforms and social media to build your business’s branding. For example, Instagram is a valuable platform for developing employer branding.
Social media helps search for and identify qualified candidates. You can use the following social media tools and platforms to organize your sourcing:
- LinkedIn – a professional social networking site where users can advertise their accomplishments, discuss industry trends, and connect with recruiters.
- Indeed – a job board that maintains a database of more than 90 million resumes.
- Twitter – a social media site with various features, including search, chat, and lists, that can assist recruiters in finding candidates.
- Facebook- a social media site with potential candidates.
- Slack – a tool for group communication used by businesses and individuals with similar interests in the workplace.
- Meetup – a website that helps people with similar interests get together and form groups.
Follow Up With Candidates Who Don’t Respond
The first cold outreach email you send might result in a few candidates responding. However, you spent too much time gathering information and compiling a list to stop there. Imagine if a salesperson only contacted leads once before giving up; they would never close any sales.
Stay in touch with qualified candidates you found but didn’t hire for other roles and those who weren’t ready to move forward when you first approached them after your initial outreach and follow-ups.
A good guideline for when to contact a candidate again is to wait six months, but there are other circumstances in which it makes sense to do so. You can send job candidates company news, congratulate them on professional achievements, wish them happy birthday, inquire about the success of significant projects, and even wish them luck in their new positions.
Final Thoughts
Lastly, consider that sourcing strategies are like snowflakes in the recruitment industry: no two are exactly alike because your organization’s needs will be very different from what someone else wants.
While some businesses heavily rely on recruiters, others do not. Some rely on online job boards, while others adopt an independent strategy. Decide on an effective type of sourcing early on, measure it, and identify areas for improvement to achieve even better results.
But remember that a next-level recruitment sourcing strategy for hiring is only as effective as the most recent hire.
