Bullhorn Reach recently published the results of a survey of more than 35,000 recruiters in its user network, tracking their use of social media. The survey focused on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter.
The findings are surprising. Only 21% of Bullhorn recruiters are using all three social networks. In fact, 48% are using only LinkedIn! Apparently these recruiters haven’t seen the study from Jobvite that showed that, in 2011, 50% of job-seekers used Facebook to find a job, 25% used Twitter, while only 26% used LinkedIn. Why aren’t recruiters fishing where the fish are?
Of course, the use of social media, by either recruiters or job-seekers, doesn’t necessarily mean success. But in case after case, I’ve found that it does.
For example, in 2010, UPS announced that it received applications from 680 people who arrived via Twitter — and hired 45 of them. Almost 4,000 people applied via Facebook, 226 of whom were hired. Heck, UPS even received 1,000 applications from candidates communicating via text messages. But I bet few recruiters have created a strategy for texting.
We also recommend our clients use YouTube for talent acquisition. Though it’s the world’s second-largest search engine (second to its parent Google), you’d be amazed at how few people actually have a YouTube recruitment strategy in place.
The Jobvite study goes on to state that 18.4 million Americans “say Facebook got them their current job.” Only 10.2 million Americans give LinkedIn that credit, which isn’t much more than the 8 million jobs that were the result of Twitter. Bullhorn’s survey states that “a Twitter follower is almost three times more likely to apply to a job posting than a LinkedIn connection.” So why are less than half of its recruiters using Twitter?
I think I know why. As I told ERE’s Todd Raphael, Twitter can be intimidating to recruiters because of the sheer volume of information. It takes a focused professional, not just a summer intern, to monitor your chosen keywords and engage job-seekers. Twitter can be a time suck and also presents the daunting opportunity to have public conversations with applicants. But conversations can begin on Twitter and then become private, via direct message, email, or even a phone call.
Whatever the reason, recruiters who aren’t using all three major social networks are missing out on millions of applicants. As applications like BranchOut and BeKnown bring more professional searches to Facebook, recruiters who remain exclusively on LinkedIn will be losing the competition for top talent.
