How to Love your Applicants

The applicant experience is really important in the recruitment process as it will influence their opinion of your company and impact your hiring decisions. So let’s take a bit of time to love and hug our applicants this Valentine’s Day (or any other day of the year).  We have listed some questions that may help you get your thoughts together and consider making some simple changes as you start to work towards a successful and positive applicant experience. Lets go...

The advert

• Does it give all the information an applicant needs to confidently apply for the role? Does it have the right title/salary/location?
• Is it true to you? Does it accurately reflect your company and your values?
• Will it work for you?  Will it make you stand out in a very crowded space and encourage the best applicants to apply?

Application process

• Is your job easy to find? Is it in the right places?
• Have you told applicants how to apply or what happens next?
• What happens when they do apply?  Are you sending them to a lengthy application form?
• Is the apply process mobile friendly?

Helpful service

• Do you have a designated member of the team who can help with any queries?
• Is it clear how applicants can contact this person?

Managing Expectations

• Are you communicating with the applicants?
• Do they know you’ve received their application?
• Do they know what happens next?
• What are your realistic time frames for getting back to them?

Feedback

• Have you let the applicant know the outcome of their application regardless of whether it is positive or negative?
• Did you conduct an interview? If you conducted an interview, have you let them know what you thought (either way)?
• Has the applicant got a good impression of your company and your recruitment process?  Can you check?
• Is there anything you could do different to improve your recruitment process with applicants?

Recruiting is rarely easy, especially when you have multiple roles to recruit for, lack of internal resource or no online recruiting system, but your applicants do matter and they will talk and they may even be your customers.  Many of our customers can demonstrate a big improvement on their employer brand as our recruiting software and personal support have helped lighten the load of their recruitment communications. You may also want to check out tips on good advert writing, the application process and how to effectively manage your communications to help you love your applicants this moth. If you like this post, you may also like:

• Lots of Applicants? - Don't be Scared this Halloween
• Use your Brand to Land Top Talent
• Is your Application Process Killing your Candidates?