What Job Candidates Look For Before Applying to Your Company
Have you ever wondered why your company is missing out on the best job candidates?
You have a company website, your human resources team is posting your jobs on various job boards and you even finally gave in and decided to hire someone to write blog posts and run your social media account. That should be enough, right?
Well, depending on what type of content you have on your website, in your blog posts or on your social media pages, you may not actually be doing enough. By taking a look at the below graphic from Candidate Viewpoint, which conducted a study at the end of 2015, there are quite a few “content buckets” your company needs to make sure are easy to find.
Talk about your values
Over 40 percent of the respondents (41.8 percent to be exact) of this study reported that “Company Values were one of the most valuable pieces of marketing content they seek out before applying for a job. That’s pretty incredible, right?
Now, stop and think for a second. Where can you find your company’s values on your website? Do you have a link on your homepage where they can go to read them? Do you have a video with a message from your CEO or President talking about some of these company values? If you cannot answer yes to one of these questions, you need to get with your content and website team as soon as possible.
If you do have a company values section already created, what are you doing to promote these values? You should actively be promoting these values on your social pages, have a quick “Our Values” section on your job posts across the web and even write a blog post once a week to show how your company values were put into action.
Many companies seemingly forget to even create a values section, while others have one and forget to promote it. Since it is the top content sought out by job seekers, you should probably find a way to make yours stand out.
Let your employees tell their story
Another item that stood out on the above graphic was 34.9 percent of job candidates seeking out employee testimonials before applying. Not that it is surprising, but most companies do not realize how powerful the voice of their employees—both current and former—have when it comes to impacting the type of candidates they get in the future.
Websites like Glassdoor provide people the ability to write a review about companies they have worked at. The problem with this is, while the intention of the website is purely informational—generally those who take to writing on these websites do so after something negative happens.
So how can you as a company combat these negative reviews? Let your employees do the talking for you.
Some of the best employee testimonials I have seen come in the form of video. Blog posts with quotes are great, but it really comes to life if you have a video showing the culture of your company and giving them something that “comes to life.” Take the time to have someone on your content team create a nice video. If you do not have a content team, hire a professional video maker or freelancer to come in and do it for you. The one-time expense will be well worth it in the end to help your company’s appearance.
Why people want to work and stay there
Right behind employee testimonials are two huge questions in the minds of potential employees. Not only do people want to know why your employees wanted to work for you (30.8 percent), but they want to know why these employees are staying at your company (23.7 percent).
What does this mean to you as an employer?
First off, it is great to see that so many job seekers want to know not only why your employees wanted to work for you, but why they want to stay there. That means job seekers—despite what some in the market are telling us—are looking at their long-term future.
But what that also means is that it is your team’s responsibility to show them these things. Listing your company’s benefits are great, but what is going to be their incentive to keep working for you long-term? These days, a steady paycheck is no longer the motivator that it once was. Candidates want to see growth potential, both financially and in terms of their job and responsibilities before they work for your company.
Final Note
The results of this survey are just a small portion of the job candidate’s experience today, but they paint a large picture of what your company needs to do to stand out and attract the best talent.
This is something that our recruiting team here at NexGoal realized, and why we have gone the extra mile to leverage technology to find the best candidates possible for our corporate clients. From a revamped web page to testimonials from candidates placed and the companies we have worked with, we want everyone to understand from their first point of contact who we are and what we have to offer.
If your company has not yet taken these steps to standout in the marketplace, the time is now. Revamp that webpage, let your employees speak to your culture and values and take your company to the top of the digital game when it comes to finding candidates for your open positions.
