A recent Pew research poll found that nearly 80% of online American adults were Facebook users, making it the most popular social network by a massive margin, and also a massive pool of potential recruits. If you have positions that need filling, then now’s the time to start recruiting on Facebook.

The new feature allows business pages to post job openings, track applications, and communicate with applicants using Facebook Messenger. Job postings can appear in the feeds of Facebook users, as well as in the new Jobs Bookmark tool, and users can apply for positions directly through Facebook. The network will even populate application fields automatically with information from the users’ profiles, such as their names and job histories. It’s a quick, convenient way for hiring businesses and job-seeking users to connect with one another.

We’ve spoken a lot about how vast Facebook’s reach is, and that it’s making it easier for recruiters to connect with applicants, but that doesn’t mean you should forget about other social networks. The same survey that found nearly 80% of US adults were on Facebook also found that about 25% were on LinkedIn. That is a significantly smaller number, but 25% of adult American web users is still
a lot of people.

Moreover, LinkedIn users are there for business purposes. Whether it’s to network with other businesses, promote their own, or look for a job, almost every action taken on LinkedIn is done with a business purpose in mind. The user-pool may be smaller than Facebook’s, but it’s also more targeted. If you’re looking for high quality talent it would be a mistake to overlook this network.

LinkedIn Users Represent:

29% of the Global Online Adult Population

50% of Online College Graduates

34% of Online Users Aged 18-29

33% of Online Users Aged 30-4

Remember to complete your brand page so users can gain a complete understanding of your business, and use appropriate filters when searching for job candidates so you only come up with the type of recruits you’re looking for. LinkedIn lets you search by location, job history, years of experience, and other important pieces of information, making it easy to weed out the candidates you’re not interested in and get to the cream of the crop.

Social Media can be a great tool for recruiting talent, but that shouldn’t be the only reason you’re using it. By having an active social media presence, you give yourself the opportunity to re-engage with old customers, answer questions from your target audience, and generally interact with and advertise to the people who are most interested in your brand.

All of this is important in its own right, but it’s also important for you recruitment efforts. If the only thing a potential employee sees when looking at your Facebook page is a bunch of posts asking for job applications, that person may view your company less favorably.

Potential recruits will see that you are not making an effort to interact with your audience, which could in turn make them take your business less seriously. By giving the appearance that you are not handling one facet of your business properly, a quality candidate could be turned off from your business and decide not to pursue a career with you.

Be active. It will help you with other functions of your business, and it wall also build your brand up as being a more attractive employer.

Social Media, regardless of which platform you’re on, is all about instant gratification and what’s happening in the world right now. A recruitment post you made last week isn’t going to get a whole lot of views today, so if you’re trying to recruit on social media you’ll need to take that fact into consideration.

Keep these three best practices in mind when writing and scheduling your posts:

There’s no one-size fits all strategy for how frequently you need to be posting, but based on the reception of your recruitment posts, and your social media strategy independent of recruitment, you should be able to keep your social feed varied, interesting, and effective at reaching all your goals.

You’re not just limited to posting on your own Facebook wall. Social media websites and apps are filled with advertising opportunities, so take advantage of them and supplement your job postings with job advertisements. As long as you have the revenue to spend, and the job you want to fill is worth the investment, you can pay for ads to appear on your social platform of choice, or to have your recruitment posts boosted for higher visibility among users.

Web ads have largely become the new form of newspaper or classified ad. A young recruit may not think to check the classifieds section of a print publication for job openings, but he or she will certainly find them online, because that’s where the recruit is already spending time and seeing content. You can even use geo-targeting features to focus yours ads on candidates who live near your businesses, weeding out potential viewers who live too far away to reasonably commute to your office or place of business.

“Stalk” sounds a bit extreme, but if you’re looking at a candidate’s social media profile you could very easily come across information that should have no bearing on his or her potential to work for you. You can and should reach out to candidates using private or direct messaging, but keep your chats professional and focused on work. Your candidate may feel uncomfortable if you start bringing up unrelated topics you gleaned from his or her profile.

Topics to avoid include:

• Religion
• Family
• Politics
• Hobbies
• Marital Status

Many of these topics can be taboo for any job interview, and going into a recruitment effort by showing you’ve already seen information regarding them through your recruit’s social activity can feel invasive, making the candidate think you’re spending too much time worrying about his or her personal life and not enough about the actual job in question.

You should also avoid messaging a candidate too frequently. It’s okay to check up on someone periodically, but don’t do so hourly or daily if the candidate isn’t responding back. You’ll look overly aggressive, desperate, or both. Unless you’re in a real rush to fill the position and the candidate will lose the opportunity to take it without an immediate response, try to let him or her reply back to you before sending your next message.

The world is hooked into the world wide web, and the world wide web has gone social. You can absolutely use social media to find the right recruit for your business’ open positions, but be smart and go into your recruitment efforts with a real strategy. Doing so can make you look more professional to candidates (as well as customers who may also see your social posts), and it will make your
efforts more effective.