The way you treat candidates can say a lot more about your organization than you think. That brand is commonly called the candidate experience. Whether the hiring process makes them jump through hoops, or you’ve vetted them with an outdated sense of the job market, there are little things you can change to make the recruitment and hiring process a bit more amiable to candidates, and thus make yourself a more attractive employer. And when you speak to candidates, whether it’s with your company’s words or its actions, it’s important to say all the right things.
“Come Back Soon!”
Your candidate experience as a whole can affect long-term hiring initiatives. Nearly 97% of candidates who had a positive experience during the hiring process would apply for that position again or refer someone to do the same. So when your candidate experience is top-notch, the best candidates you didn’t hire will apply time and again, making your subsequent rounds of hiring that much easier.
What’s the best way to ensure candidates come back for more? It’s all about expectations. Companies with great candidate experiences let candidates know how long it would take them to apply for the job, include screening questions that would help to further confirm functional and cultural fit, and ask candidates for feedback. All of these features tell candidates the company they’re applying to actually cares what they think, making them more inclined to apply the next time around.
“Do as You Please!”
The application process also affects your candidate experience. It might seem superficial, but if your career site is dated, slow or doesn’t have the same functionality as your talent competitors, you’ll lose candidates. A dated career site won’t be able to accommodate mobile searches, and this will severely hinder the application process for many candidates. Nine out of 10 job seekers look for jobs on mobile, and your application process needs to cater to these mobile candidates.
Developing a better mobile web presence is about more than embracing the future; it’s about offering your candidates a little more versatility. Candidates want to apply easily (or as soon as they see your job ad), and having a mobile website would put you miles ahead of the competition, only 22% of which have a mobile-ready website. When you offer them this kind of flexibility, they’re more likely relate to your forward-thinking and adaptive company.
“Let’s Talk.”
Earlier, we mentioned how companies with a great candidate experience ask their candidates for feedback. But this point is important enough to cover in detail. Most candidates (94%) want to hear feedback from employers after an interview, yet only 41% of receive such feedback. This is a big issue for candidates who, after having a positive interview experience with you, want to know what’s next in the process (and get the job, of course).
This might be a difficult issue for some employers who don’t want to be the bearers of bad news; but to improve your candidate experience, sometimes you have to be. Even an electronic rejection is better than no response as 65% of candidates want to hear bad news via email. Candidates know not all of them will get the job, and will understand if they didn’t, but don’t leave them wondering.
No matter what kind of business you are, you need to create a positive candidate experience. This means saying all the right things, and with the right expectations, the right amount of flexibility, and feedback at every step, your candidates will be lining up to hear you say they got the job.
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