6 Recruiting Strategies for Growth Companies [Tips and Tools]

Growth companies cannot afford to wait three months to fill a key position. They need young talent, lots of it - and as quickly as possible, so that they can drive growth. These talents should have the right skills, be committed and, of course, fit into the company culture. Not an easy task.

Recruiting has changed a lot in recent years. In today's applicant market, top talent decides for themselves which company they would like to work for - not the other way around. You won't get very far with traditional recruiting methods such as job advertisements in the major job boards. The young generations Y and Z in particular need more to become aware of your company.  

Today I will show you six alternative recruiting strategies that will help you efficiently and precisely attract the talents for your company that will drive your growth company forward.

Recruiting strategy #1: Recruit mobile-first!
Millennials and Generation Z organize their entire lives via smartphone. Take advantage of this behavior and make your recruiting process mobile-friendly. This not only makes it easier for talented people to apply to you. Mobile-optimized websites and career pages are also rated better by search engines. This means that your career page will end up higher in Google search results and will receive more attention from potential applicants.

A few tips that will help you get started with mobile recruiting: 

• Learned interactions: Don't just copy your recruiting process for smartphones. Use the interaction patterns that young people know from other social media apps for your mobile recruiting.
• Seamless process: Make sure every step of your recruiting process works seamlessly on a mobile device. If you force candidates to switch from smartphone to laptop at one point, you lose valuable talent.
• Short attention span: The smaller the screen, the shorter the attention span. Therefore, structure your information in small chunks that your applicants can quickly grasp and scroll through.
• Easy contact: Make it easy for your applicants to get in touch with you. Chat bots, for example, are available around the clock and answer simple questions from your applicants quickly and independently. 
• High transparency: Make your application process transparent. Inform your applicants about the status of their application with automated SMS messages.

Recruiting strategy #2: Retain talent before they enter the job market.
Don't wait until young talent enters the job market and you have to compete with hundreds of other companies for their attention. Build trusting relationships with your future employees before they even start looking for a job. 

Student job portals such as jobvalley , connecticum or studentjob are good platforms for getting to know your employees of tomorrow early and without obligation. If you have found someone who convinces you, continue to cultivate the relationship even after the temporary job ends and make this talent an offer they can't refuse at the right time. 

Recruiting strategy #3: Use smart recruiting technologies. 
Many HR processes can be improved or automated using artificial intelligence. Self-learning algorithms like these offer great opportunities, especially in recruiting - for companies and applicants. AI applications have the potential to speed up and simplify your application process and also increase the chances of a "perfect match". 

Helpful AI applications in recruiting are:

• AI-optimized job advertisements: Intelligently optimizing job advertisements is no longer a problem today. AI-supported software analyzes the texts of your job advertisements at lightning speed. These programs give you a score that tells you how your job advertisements would perform and make concrete suggestions on how you can most effectively increase the score. Such programs include BetterAds and HeyJobs.
• CV parsing: Parsing programs help recruiters to screen and select applicants. These digital selection systems automatically read applicant data from CVs and digital profiles and compare them with the job profile. The programs work partly with artificial intelligence, partly with keywords to make a targeted pre-selection among the applicants. Providers include TextKernel with the CV parser Extract!, Softgarden , BITE and rexx systems.
• Matching: Job portals such as LinkedIn and ZipRecruiter successfully use such matching technologies. These smart algorithms suggest suitable candidates from a database, rank incoming applications and even make suggestions to recruiters about what they should ask which candidates in the job interview.  
• HR chatbots: Chatbots are used around the clock for your company. They respond independently to attempts by your applicants to contact you, can answer simple and common questions and automatically forward specific inquiries to the right employees. HR chatbots are available from Paradox , Eightfold , Humanly and Brazen , for example. 

Recruiting strategy #4: Offer video and voice applications.
Since COVID-19, companies have become more video-savvy than ever. Video is also an excellent additional opportunity in recruiting to get to know applicants personally. According to a Bitkom survey,  three out of four companies are already using digital job interviews via video call. Most companies have so far used classic video providers such as Microsoft Teams, Skype or Zoom. 

If you want to take your video and voice recruiting to the next level, you should look at video recruiting tools like Talentcube or voice-controlled chat application tools like Talk'n'Job .

Recruiting strategy #5: Activate passive applicants.
Instead of placing job advertisements and hoping for suitable talent, actively search for suitable candidates and contact them directly. 85 percent of all employed professionals worldwide would be willing to change jobs. Use this passive talent pool as a source for your recruiting.

On LinkedIn, for example, you can create a recruiter profile and use it to search for candidates who match your exact requirements - without your name appearing in the search results. This way, you can send direct messages to suitable candidates who currently have a job but might be willing to change companies. 

Tips for contacting us: 

• Write a short, personal message introducing your company and explaining why you think the person would be a perfect fit for the open position. 
• Try to keep the conversation going and offer to organize a short phone call or meeting to discuss possible collaboration.

Recruiting strategy #6: Search specifically in niche job boards.
You don't always have to use the big job boards to find suitable applicants. Niche job boards are an excellent tool for segmenting the employee market. These platforms may not be as busy as big job boards, but they are great for hiring experts in specific fields. An added bonus: they are also more affordable. 

• You can find top developers, programmers and freelancers on Stackoverflow , Honeypot or Gulp , for example . 
• You can find experts in marketing and communication specifically on t3n , HorizontJobs or w&v .
• Niche job boards in the healthcare sector are MediJobs , the job portal of the Deutsches Ärzteblatt and the job board of SpringerMedizin .

With niche job boards, you'll probably have to put in a little more effort and you'll reach fewer applicants than on the big platforms - but they'll be the right ones. 

Conclusion
You have 5, 10 or even 50 vacancies to fill – preferably today rather than tomorrow. As a growth company, you can no longer make progress with conventional recruiting methods.

• Therefore, take advantage of the smartphone affinity of your young target group and make your recruiting process mobile-friendly.
• Retain young talent during their training, before they enter the job market.
• Use intelligent recruiting technologies to make your application process quick and easy.
• Offer video and voice recruiting and use the appropriate technologies.
• Don't wait for the right talent to respond to your job advertisement. Turn the tables and speak to suitable candidates directly.
• Reach experts in specific fields in niche job boards. 

If used correctly, you will not only speed up your recruiting, you will also get more qualified candidates with less effort and thus increase your chances of a perfect match.

​https://justgrow.eu/blog/​

If you're interested in reading more of Olaf articles please visit the website link above. (Please note that Olaf's site is in German but Google translate does an excellent job of instantly translating it to English.)
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