Sourcing candidates is more than creating job ads and distributing them across varied job boards. In addition to active job seekers who diligently search and apply for jobs, there are passive candidates who, you might not believe, make up to 70% of any workforce, globally. Attracting both active and passive candidates in 2024 requires effective talent-sourcing strategies.
Many seasoned recruiters follow the inbound sourcing playbook that relies solely on job seekers coming to them. Even though they try sometimes to engage in proactive sourcing strategies, falling back to the traditional methods comes easily. Today, recruiters need to realise that more than 85 million jobs can go unfilled by 2030 worldwide. Why? Because of talent shortage. This means discovering skilled candidates for job roles becomes more challenging with time, and one’s approach to sourcing needs a clear revamp.
Read this Skima AI Insight to understand why you need to be leveraging multiple talent-sourcing strategies in 2024, and different approaches to talent sourcing.
Significance of Talent Sourcing Strategies
Attract And Engage Qualified Candidates
The fundamental purpose of preparing a talent sourcing strategy is to develop means and methods to attract and engage qualified candidates for an open position.
From enticing through job ads to convincing via cold calls, sourcing entails a multidimensional approach.
With a sturdy talent sourcing strategy, recruiters and hiring managers open doors to possibilities of creating qualified talent pools and hiring quality talent.
Diversity In Hiring
With a multidimensional sourcing plan, recruiters can discover talent from diverse and underrepresented groups.
Enriched Talent Pool
Also, as part of proactive sourcing strategies, when you try to extend your network, you enhance your ability to find better candidates and enrich your talent pool.
An enriched talent pool means - the ability to quickly close hard-to-fill positions; count this as a benefit of using talent sourcing strategies in talent acquisition. Not every position gets the same level of candidate response.
So, when a role comes that sees fewer active candidates, you can rely on your existing enriched talent pool to produce good options.
Moreover, a solid candidate sourcing strategy also allows you to connect with passive candidates, engage them and develop connections that, when the time comes, can be used to hire them for your company.
Cost-efficiency In Recruiting
There is a cost to everything, including sourcing. The more time you spend mindlessly searching and screening candidates, the more money you will spend.
That being said, a sourcing process can help you save both – time and money.
A proactive sourcing strategy will allow you to quickly engage with the right candidates when new job openings arise.
This will reduce the time-to-hire and overall recruitment expenses.
Talent Sourcing Strategies to Boost Your Candidate Search
What are the ways you can enrich your talent acquisition plan to attract potential candidates faster and more efficiently?
1. Employer Branding For The Pull Effect
What’s seen is sold. A simple idiom that says everything about today’s Gen Z-driven job market. In fact, it’s believed that by 2025, more than 27% of job seekers will belong to Generation Z and attracting them via traditional tactics won’t cut it.
Today, companies need to focus on building better employer brands.
Success, profits and a hefty CTC might attract a few candidates, but the majority of the workforce today wants to see a company’s diverse culture, its office environment and positive cohesion between employees. You can only deliver this with a strong social presence.
- Work with your design and marketing team to ensure sharing more social media posts about company culture and diversity.
- Develop more Gen Z-friendly job descriptions with details about how your company can be a comfortable place for the applicant to work.
With a positive employer brand, you can comfortably attract the right candidates. So, to improve your hiring outcomes, make sure your organizational social accounts often put your company’s culture, values, and mission under the spotlight.
2. Develop Ideal Candidate Personas
Before you begin to put efforts into sourcing, focus on developing ideal candidate personas. No matter what the job role is, you can always define what the right candidate for the role would look like. Now, before you arrange for a professional sketch artist, you don’t need to know their exact appearance but what qualities they hold. It can start from something as basic as their qualification and professional experiences to a bit more complex attributes such as their leadership capabilities, behavioural traits and professional networking skills.
But, how will this practice help your sourcing plans?
For starters, when you prepare a job description based on the candidate’s personas, more candidates who align with the role will apply. Also, it will keep you in spotting the right fits within a large database of potential candidates.
If you haven’t already, prepare a candidate persona for your next hire, today!
3. Try Boolean Search Techniques In Recruiting
Following a diverse search technique is necessary for identifying qualified candidates. Practising methods like Boolean search on platforms like Google and Bing can greatly broaden your playing field and increase the chances of discovering more candidates for your job.
Search engines provide access to multiple individuals across various online channels that you wouldn’t ideally find. With such searches, you can tap into the personal websites, blogs, forums, and social media networks of potential candidates.
“What's a Boolean search?” you ask.
As opposed to your common search engine searches, boolean searches involve using specific keywords to refine your search in a way that meets particular criteria.
For example – with the use of AND, OR and NOT, you can narrow down your search for candidates. This can also help expand your search parameters.
- It’s a precision-driven method, which you can employ to identify skilled, experienced and qualified candidates more efficiently.
4. Personalise Your Outreach Efforts
Mindlessly blasting an email across all your candidate databases can be a waste of time. And, in this AI-frenzy all around, if you’re using AI-generated messages to communicate with candidates, ensure that you add the elements of personalization to make them feel invited.
By the way, are you using AI recruiting tools in your recruiting processes? If not, please read our blog on AI Recruiting Tools to see how AI can turbocharge your recruiting efforts.
Anyway, personalization is even more crucial when reaching out to passive candidates, because you have to soft nurture them and spark an interest in the job opportunity. A personalised message is a testament to the professionalism and shows you are genuinely interested in meeting the candidate. So,
- Spend some time crafting personalized messages that resonate with them.
- Do a bit of research on the candidates and use your established relationship to reach out, and make these communications more effective.
5. Develop Attractive Employee Referral Programs
Whether you want to make your workforce more diverse or hire skilled employees, a referral program can help you achieve your hiring objectives more effectively.
So, take some time and check if your referral programmes encourage your employees to put in effort and attract more capable candidates from their respective circles. Plus, employees who already work in the same position or industry as the one you are hiring in will know the job role in much more detail and subsequently identify the most apt candidates.
Want to make your job a tad bit easier? Improve your employee referral programs. Make it more enticing with additional paid leaves, vouchers, coupons and more. Be creative when designing your referral programs and see the magic happen.
6. Use AI tools to your advantage
Have you not integrated AI into your recruitment process yet? Well, if not, then you might be at a disadvantage. AI can significantly enhance your recruiting team’s efficiency-
- From identifying quality candidates with accuracy to scheduling interviews and tracking applicants, there is a lot you can do with AI-driven recruitment tools.
- While sourcing, you can use Skima AI to quickly screen your candidate pool for the right candidate by simply uploading your candidate database and resume onto the platform.
Moreover, AI-powered applicant tracking software (ATS) can be a one-stop solution to streamline hiring activities. Recruitment has gained leaps and bounds thanks to the precision of AI. Don’t slack behind, take advantage of AI. Start with Skima AI for free.
7. Track Key Metrics
Recruitment in 2024 is complex and you don’t have to make it even more overwhelming by not making data-driven decisions. Tracking sourcing and recruitment key metrics like time to fill, attrition rate and candidate ghosting rate, among others can help you continuously improve your sourcing techniques and refine it every time you start recruiting for a new role.
What Are the Key Challenges of Talent Sourcing?
Even the most tailored talent-sourcing strategies are vulnerable to unmanageable or sometimes ignored challenges. Here are a few key challenges that you can come across when sourcing. Understand them to be able to identify and tackle them.
Sticking To The Plan Isn’t Easy
From managing teams to the pressure of meeting deadlines, even if you set yourself on a mission to follow a new pattern of sourcing that promises better results, going back to the old methods is as easy as one two three.
So, sticking to the plan is a challenge for every recruiter trying to come out of their comfort zone and try something new. Don’t fall into this trap. It might be difficult in the beginning but over time, you will come out a winner. Be consistent.
Creating Tailored Job Descriptions That Deliver
Spending hours perfecting your job description can be daunting. And, let’s face it, with so many details to include, creating job descriptions feels more like an adventure than recruiting.
Don’t break your fingers trying to type the perfect job description. Use Skima AI to create culturally accurate and job-specific JDs with just a few prompts.
Attracting Passive Candidates Is Challenging
Even if you are an expert at identifying the top passive candidates, starting and establishing a line of communication with them can be a hit-and-miss. And, frankly, you can’t control this. However, persistence and maintaining a positive employer brand can make this approach simpler.
End Note
Developing a talent sourcing strategy isn’t a maybe but a must. It can help you develop a database of qualified candidates and put your entire hiring pipeline in place. Start sourcing more effectively by preparing a talent-sourcing strategy. Get started now!
For more recruitment insights, follow the Skima blog.
