Job Hunting — Agencies vs Social Media
Social media has already transformed our lives away from work, but increasingly it looks to be changing the way we recruit as well. An increasing number of employers are cutting out agencies and recruiting directly via social media. This blog will explore the pros and cons of relying on social media for recruitment, and whether there are benefits that only agencies offer.
More and more companies are bypassing established employment steps such as recruitment agencies, and are turning instead to social media to fill job vacancies. According to a survey by the US recruitment software company Jobvite, 73% of recruiters have recruited candidates directly via social media.
There are undoubtedly benefits to using social media to fill vacancies — not least their sheer number of users. LinkedIn, for example, currently has over 20 million UK users. Recruiting via social media can potentially establish a direct line of communication towards a huge number of these users. Tools such as Audiense and Followerwonk can be used to search bios on sites such as Twitter, in order to more readily identify people who have a particular job title or industry in their bio.
Once you have identified potential candidates, social media can also allow you to paint a broader picture of the applicant. Unless they have set their social media account up specifically and exclusively for the purposes of job hunting, you should be able to glean at least an overview of the sort of person you are interviewing. The more informal method of communication can also be useful — how many of us are guilty of checking our Twitter before our work emails in the morning?
However, there are some benefits to using a recruitment agency that simply cannot be ignored. With personality proving a bigger factor in the recruiting process even than experience, the importance of the personal touch that agencies can bring to candidate screening shouldn’t be overlooked. The more direct, face-to-face process of recruitment agencies can ensure that it’s always the most suitable people reaching the job interview stage — carefully filtering out people who don’t live up to their online promise.
As well as candidates actively looking for a new job, agencies will have access to a large pool of passive candidates. They’ll also have expertise in convincing these passive candidates they should be joining the hunt for a new, more exciting job. Using social media as your sole platform for advertising vacancies means that only those already seeking jobs will apply.
Another beneficial factor of agencies is the level of specialisation they can bring to the table. Although it’s possible to search for candidates with relevant backgrounds on social media, specialist agencies can ensure that the applications you receive are tailored to your specific needs. For example, digital agencies like Sumo Creative specialise in finding candidates for digital marketing jobs in London, while employers in the finance sector might find the talent they need through a specialist financial recruiter. This can help to make the recruitment process easier and more efficient, saving employers a great deal of time and resources.
Despite the changing face of recruitment, it seems unlikely that agencies are going away any time soon. There are, without a doubt, plenty of ways in which social media can be used to an employer’s advantage, but the unique qualities of recruitment agencies will ensure that they continue to play a vital part in the way that we advertise and fill vacancies.
