Which social media site is most commonly used for recruitment?

LinkedIn . Facebook . Reddit . Instagram. X formerly known as Twitter.

How do you recruit using social media?

Create social media accounts specifically to recruit with. Get employees involved in sharing posts on social media. Use LinkedIn to find potential recruits. Share your employer brand with photos on Instagram. Use Facebook insights to study your audience.

Why is social media good for recruiting?

Reaches a wider audience. Opens up a channel of interaction. Promotes the employee value proposition . Promotes the employer brand . Enables data analytics and learning.

Do you have any social recruiting tools that you recommend?

Bullhorn . Jobvite . Trakstar Hire . Skillfuel . CareerArc . Freshteam . Zoho Recruit . Manatal .

Social Recruiting Tips

Learn how to implement a social media recruiting strategy in your business.

By Toni Ross, Dec 19, 2023

Toni Ross is the Senior Editor of Betterteam. Her interests include developing resources that help build and grow value-oriented, connected teams, both personal and professional.

A media tool with the names of social media networks.

Social recruiting, also known as social hiring and social media recruitment, is a method of using social media platforms such as X formerly known as Twitter and LinkedIn to advertise jobs, find talent, and communicate with potential recruits about company culture.

We’ve reached the point where social recruiting isn’t just a novelty — it’s a must-have for any successful recruiting strategy. According to a CareerArc study, over 90% of employers use social media and professional networks for recruitment, and more than 80% of job seekers use social media to find jobs.

Our step-by-step guide below will help you learn how to use social media as a recruiting tool, making it easier to bring in high-quality applicants that stay in their positions longer, and improve your hiring process. We’ve also got tips to help you improve employer branding and social recruiting examples.

1. Host a live Q&A via Instagram to meet applicants.

Instagram allows you to set up a live video stream from your phone anywhere you can connect, and give others access to that live stream. Besides Q&As, you could also use Instagram to share your company culture with potential applicants by broadcasting company events or a live video stream of your workplace.

Download Instagram on your phone.
Promote your Instagram Q&A on other platforms, such as your company's careers, LinkedIn, and Facebook pages.
Make sure you’re set up properly on launch day.
Get familiar with the controls — you’ll want to set these to make it easy for the widest audience to participate, so share location, allow anyone to view and comment, and share to X formerly known as Twitter.
Do a practice run.
Broadcast! Watch for questions to appear toward the bottom of your screen, select the ones you want to appear and answer them.

2. Optimize your LinkedIn company page for a search.

LinkedIn uses the text you write when you create your account to help people find you, and Google uses text from LinkedIn pages to decide where they’ll show in search results.

Write a brief main message — when your company page shows up in search, Google only shows the first 156 characters, so focus on what you want your message to be.
Fill out your description — all of this is searchable text for Google, so you’ll want to include keywords people would use to find your company in a search. You may need to balance it out with social media marketing needs — not just recruiting.
Lastly, fill out the “Company Specialties” section.

Check out our article on how to post a job to LinkedIn.

The people who form your company are in the best place to share company culture authentically on social media. To help them get comfortable talking about your brand, create a social media policy. Here are some tips for creating a social media policy.

Once you’ve got a company social media policy in place, it’s time to use the most authentic social recruiting resource tool you have — your team. Encourage them to share honestly on social media about what your workplace culture is like.

There are several tools out there that can help you monitor your social media presence for opportunities to connect with employees and potential employees. Look for relevant content to share and look out for problems.

Social monitoring tools allow employers to track hashtags, keywords, mentions, and sentiment. This can provide insightful information about a brand's audience and what is being said about the brand on social platforms. Leading platforms include:

If you spend any time checking out social media branding for large enterprises, you’ll notice they have a lot of videos. This probably sounds like something you need to hire a professional to do, right?

Turns out that the powerful little cameras on our phones, combined with the right light and sound, can produce surprising results. Watch this short video from Wistia — you’ll be amazed at what you can accomplish with just a phone and the right techniques.

If you’re using social media to recruit, you’re going to end up with a lot of passive candidates, people who weren’t actively looking for a job. There’s considerable research that says passive candidates don’t fare as well as active ones.

So, if you’re considering a passive candidate, try to find out what is motivating them to consider your position. Are they passionate about the work? To avoid hiring candidates that don’t adapt, present them with an accurate picture of what it’s like. Don’t sugarcoat the job.

7. Attract candidates to your employer brand with Instagram.

When it comes to user engagement and return on investment, Instagram is a marketer's favorite, according to HubSpot. With more than 2 billion monthly users, of which 90% follow at least one business account, and 50% of users showing more interest in brands after seeing ads on Instagram, the platform can be an effective tool for employer branding.

8. Learn about your Facebook audience to improve.

You can use Facebook’s built-in insight tools to learn what content is getting traction on your Facebook page. If you created a Facebook page just for employer branding, this will give you data specific to people interested in employment, rather than your company’s general followers.

Sometimes the easiest way to streamline all of the recruiting that you do through social media is to make use of a software program that can simplify the process.

You can use social recruiting software to sync all of your company's social media accounts, schedule posts, automate responses, and more. Popular social recruiting software platforms include:

Network and engage with your audience — if you respond to a potential candidate, be personable and start an engaging conversation. You will need to earn their trust and respect, especially if they're a passive job seeker.
Highlight your company culture — showcase your company at its best by sharing employer branding content, celebratory events, milestones reached, and charitable activities in the community. You'll want to give candidates an idea of what it would be like to work for you.
Share the right mix of posts — if you talk about your company all the time, you might come off as superior or boring. Mix it up by sharing job openings in the form of "We Are Hiring" images, humorous posts, local news, industry trends, and topics that your audience may be interested in.
Get your staff involved — ask your employees to share job posts and other content on their social media networks.
Use the appropriate social media platforms — you'll need to understand your candidate persona to determine the best platforms on which to post your job openings. Refer to your employer branding strategy and spend some time on unfamiliar platforms to gauge if they fit in with your culture.

Next Steps:

See our complete guide to recruitment to learn about more ways to source candidates and the next steps in the recruitment process.

FAQs:

A social media recruitment strategy looks at your goals and the big picture. The main goal is hiring through social media, so plan out each step — from how applicants will first hear about your company via social media to how they find an open position and apply. It's very similar to a sales funnel.

LinkedIn.
Facebook.
Reddit.
Instagram.
X formerly known as Twitter.

Social media allows access to a wider audience. The various social platforms help with identifying, attracting, engaging, and hiring both active and passive job seekers.

Create social media accounts specifically to recruit with.
Get employees involved in sharing posts on social media.
Use LinkedIn to find potential recruits.
Share your employer brand with photos on Instagram.
Use Facebook insights to study your audience.

Reaches a wider audience.
Opens up a channel of interaction.
Promotes the employee value proposition.
Promotes the employer brand.
Enables data analytics and learning.

Social media should form a part of a modern company's overall recruitment strategy.

Social recruiting companies are recruitment firms that specialize in social recruiting. These companies take the legwork out of social recruiting by using social media on your behalf to find the best candidates for your open positions.

Yes! It's not just for popular tech companies or big corporations. As the starting price is free, it's often a good way for small companies to try and reach potential candidates on a budget.

Social Recruiting Tips