Our Blog Isn't Currently Being Updated

Please do get in touch though if there is anything we can help with or if you have any comments on our previous blogs.

Can’t be bothered looking for a job

How much effort does the modern jobseeker make in finding a job I wonder. For the last 50 or so years Recruitment Consultancy has steadily grown alongside both its acceptance in the employment market as well as Candidate and Client desire to streamline their search and selection.

When jobs became easier to find, more people started looking, when more people started looking, more efficient ways of finding the right employment became a necessity and hence this market with its current level of growth will be worth almost £31billion by 2014/15*. Permanent placement are rising massively year on year and the temporary market is back where it was 6 years ago*.

So what’s my point.. With this many people looking for work and with todays electronics allowing swifter access to information, will Social media ever become an effective way to recruit. From my own perspective Facebook has developed into an excellent framework in which people can now apply for jobs as if it were a job board, which is good news for recruiters as these applications can then be sifted by back office software, great. However to generate interest in these jobs you must market your profile. To market any social media profile requires being sociable and that takes effort when you have hundreds of thousands of likes, from my experience there’ll always be one person in the room who wants to talk more than you.., so is it effective?? Does anybody actually know??

Is the aim of social recruiting to cut out unnecessary costs or just to generate a blanket over all avenues in which jobseekers will search, in my opinion the later is a money drain or a sure fire way of losing track of your audience.

LinkedIn, now there is a portal that seems to be working. With viewing figures in line with most job boards (where Tuesday is a peak day and weekends drop off [although only slightly in LinkedIns case]), search, application and selection are back in the game. Twitter and P-Interest are in the game but again, my view is that if there’s a social media channel we’ll whack a recruitment focus on it somehow, twitter case in point or pointless. P-interest, how many people will pin job-focused info on their notice boards I wonder, who knows.

My point? With the quantity of jobseekers out there and the quantity of jobs coming into the market, there always needs to be a stable middle ground of joining the 2 together. In my opinion Social Media is not a stable middle ground (I am of course bias) and therefore recruitment teams are better focused towards getting the jobs filled with the beneficial addition of generating talent pools in social media.

*(Source: The REC Annual Recruitment Industry Trends 2010/11).

We're now mobile-first for recruitment microsites

Yes, we're now fully "mobile-first". All recruitment microsites we build for clients (around 350 each year) now use "responsive" web design and render perfectly on smartphones and tablets.

It was only three months ago I pondered whether it could be realistically accommodated, but the UI design / production challenges have been resolved and we now actively build each site considering the mobile experience first, or at least with equal billing to the desktop version.

We still have the ATS compatibility issue, but hopefully our approach will inspire some of the providers to upgrade their platforms and they'll realise how important this issue is for the recruitment industry. The Hays website is imminently due to be fully mobile configured, which will certainly improve the overall candidate experience.

Each site uses 'Apply with LinkedIn', and we're seeing applicant levels using this are quite strong. We still need to carry out further analysis on what percentage of these are actually 'passive' candidates.

Some of our recent client microsites:

• yellowBird
• Wincanton
• Ministry of Defence
• Barclays
• The Salvation Army
• Metsa

We've still got a lot of work to do upgrading existing sites, but our strategy is clear - all clients we work with receive a mobile compatible site as standard.

For more discussion on mobile and digital trends within the recruitment industry, follow us @digitalHays and join our LinkedIn group.

Introducing Digital Solutions

Hays are pleased to announce the launch of Digital Solutions, an enhanced suite of talent acquisition techniques to meet the challenges of an ever changing recruitment landscape.

Social media, smartphones and always-on connectivity have transformed the way that jobseekers engage with potential employers. A more sophisticated and innovative approach to candidate attraction is now essential.

To reconfigure our product strategy we first looked at the needs of both employers and candidates. The four recurring themes from our clients were time, cost, integration and targeting. The feedback from jobseekers was focused around convenience and providing up-to-date information.

We then used this market research to develop a new product, Digital Plus, consolidated a number of existing products into Digital Premium, and repositioned the overall client proposition as Digital Solutions.

Time to market

Over the past five years, recruitment has become a more cut-throat environment. Clients need a highly responsive approach that isn’t going to take weeks to deliver. The continued development of long term relationships with clients is critical, but this needs to be balanced with a time efficient and targeted campaign to get the best of both worlds. Immediate results have become a pre-requisite.

Our new product Digital Plus is specifically designed to be quickly launched, in most cases on the same day. With new jobs uploaded every minute, this also helps satisfy the demands of modern jobseekers.

Cost effectiveness and ROI

Return on Investment (ROI) has never been more important than in today’s economic climate. For single roles placed exclusively with Hays, our new product, Digital Plus is available for an upfront cost, and fully reimbursed when the candidate has been placed with an employer.

Long gone are the days of relying on classified print advertising, and standalone job board postings can no longer guarantee any return on investment. All our products use an integrated approach to minimise the risk, create an engaging campaign and ultimately maximise the ROI.

More integration and mobile as standard

Smartphone use has changed the dynamics of advertising. To provide an integrated campaign there is a need to position communications in a mobile-friendly way, but this is not a luxury or something we charge clients for, it should be a given.

Researching the market, browsing job boards, and applying to a job advert has always been something rather covert, not best done in front of colleagues. Smartphones enable this during the working week, whether on the morning commute, during lunch in the park, or even between meetings while on the go. Jobseekers demand the convenience of this communication revolution.

Our response is to make all microsites mobile-enabled as standard by deploying a “responsive” approach to web design. There is no need to duplicate content or create a mobile version or app, our microsites will scale on any device.

We’ve also introduced an effective mechanism for applying for jobs by utilising the ‘Apply with LinkedIn’ API. This is a good start for now, but look out for further integration when we launch a new Hays wide mobile application later this summer.

Targeting the passive

There’s never been a more important time to attract passive candidates. While a central database remains vital, the current market conditions dictate that many great candidates are simply not looking to move jobs. Registering with an agency takes a conscious effort and many working professionals prefer to simply keep an eye on the jobs market, rather than fully commit.

Social media advertising is a growing response to this challenge, while the ‘Apply with LinkedIn’ feature also allows an interested candidate to apply for a role without needing an up-to-date CV.

Find out more

Digital Solutions are now available to UK clients. Speak to your usual Hays Consultant, or one of our regional Business Development Managers for more information. Connect with us on LinkedIn or Twitter.

Mobile-first for recruitment advertising?

We've talked a lot about the impact of smart phones on the recruitment industry and it's now two years since our first mobile enabled recruitment microsite.

Since then we've moved to something approaching a "mobile-first" strategy for our bigger client accounts, or at least we'd like to. The use of HTML5, jQuery and responsive CSS make this a viable approach, removing the need to cater for several native languages (such as Android or iOS) and duplication of content.

However, the biggest challenge is the lack of mobile compliance from the various ATS vendors. It's all well and good building a slick looking mobile recruitment site, but as soon as an engaged candidate clicks on apply... they're presented with a clunky application process, and frustrated, they're likely to give up beyond there.

I know that some of the ATS providers have solutions in place (or they're working on it), but we're yet to see many clients implement them and it could be some time before this filters through. In the meantime, this certainly undermines the whole point of a mobile-first strategy.

The other big challenge is configuring a workflow which doesn't require a candidate to attach their CV, at least at the first hurdle of showing their interest in the role. Many application systems (including that of hays.co.uk) have this as a mandatory part of the process. This is something that will evolve with time and our use of the LinkedIn apply button is certainly a step in the right direction, although of course not every candidate uses LinkedIn.

There's still a long way to go before the recruitment industry is fully mobile enabled, but the covert nature of job hunting make it a natural partner. It may be a small percentage at the moment (mooted to be around 10%), but in the not too distant future we'll see the majority of candidate applications via mobile.

Some of our mobile enabled client microsites:

• Bank of America Merrill Lynch (UK)
• Salva Resources (Australia)
• Euroclear (Poland)
• Micro-P (UK)
• DNV (UK)
• Lloyds Register (UK)
• Golden Gates Housing Trust (UK)
• University of Oxford (UK)

What are your thoughts? Is a mobile-first strategy realistic for recruitment advertising? Who should be pioneering this and how long will it take?