Social Media Recruiting and Why It’s Important

For the past several decades the recruitment industry has used what people would call traditional recruiting methods when trying to find candidates to fill open jobs.  Over the past 10 years, the advancement in technology has changed some of those traditional methods to make it easier for employment agencies to find some of the best candidates available.  This has included posting open positions to a recruitment agency website and to online job boards such as Monster.com, Careerbuilder.com and Indeed.com among many others.  This makes it easier for potential candidates to find the right job for them, and likewise, recruiters can use the resume databases those sites offer to find the right candidate. 

More recently there has been another shift within the recruitment industry.  Social Media.  People every day, and sometimes all day, connect and communicate with each other through social media websites like LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter.  People from all over the world can now communicate with each other, instantly, even if there are thousands of miles between them and they can do it all for free.  They don’t even have to know each other to do so in most cases. 

Facebook is used by 1.35 billion people in the world right now, which is an astounding amount, and it allows people to connect with old friends, find new loves and more recently, are exposed to available job opportunities that they may be interested in pursuing. 

Twitter has become the go to place for all things news.  Major news happenings will be on Twitter anywhere from 5 minutes to hours before a major news website reports it.  With nearly 300 million users worldwide, Twitter is continuing to grow every day.  From getting updates on sports scores to hearing what a favorite celebrity recently said to the breaking news of major events, Twitter is sky rocketing in popularity.  

LinkedIn has been popular with professionals in the workforce since it launched in 2003.  As more and more people started to build their online profile, which is basically a resume, it has grown to more than 300 million users worldwide.  Most use LinkedIn to make connections in the business world to sell or buy services, or recruiting agencies and Human Resources professionals will use it to help identify and ultimately contact potential candidates for new positions they are trying to fill. 

Once you realize the amount of people that are using social media websites on a day to day basis, you realize that there is an undeniable opportunity for recruitment firms and corporate recruiters to find more, and even better, candidates than through traditional methods.  The trend seems unstoppable right now that social media sites will continue to be used to help locate and reach an audience that previously was not available.  As Google+, Pinterest and other newer social media sites continue gain in popularity, with the addition of any new sites that people flock to, the time is now to get on board with social media recruiting or you’ll be left behind.

About ARC Group© 

ARC Group©, the parent company of Recruitment Intelligence™, has been an industry leader for over 25 years in the full time, contract and temp-to-hire recruiting and consulting sectors.  Named to the South Florida, Jacksonville and Minnesota’s Business Journal’s list of “Top 25 Executive Search & Consulting Firms” we have a national footprint, and service locations throughout the US, including Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Palm Beach, Jacksonville, Minnesota, Chicago and Washington. Learn more at www.ARCGonline.com