![Effectively Messaging Candidates 7
Increase your open rate with one of these types
of subject lines.
Which post? Who’s checking out my portfolio? What do they have to say about it?
These questions will rattle throughout the candidate’s brain and compel
them to open the email. Feel free to plug in any social media outlet, personal
website, or other work with the candidate’s name attached to it. Remember that
here, all posts are not created equal. Be sure to comment on a candidate’s post
that is relevant to their industry or skillset.
EXAMPLE
“Great blog post on upcoming trends for engineers in 2014”
TYPE
Just saw your insert social
media reference here.
How flattering. They like me. They really, really like me.
Getting a candidate to open an email can be as simple as mentioning solely
their company name. A variation on this one is to suggest some sort of
partnership or collaboration by including your company and a candidate’s
current company, for example “Entelo + Twitter.”
EXAMPLE
“Entelo + Twitter”
TYPE
Look at me.
Interesting. I wonder what Josh has been saying about me this time.
If you have a common contact with the candidate, get their name in the mix as
soon as possible. Alternatively, try “Referred from [mutual contact]” or simply
“Referral.”
EXAMPLE
“Josh Hayes referred you for a marketing position”
TYPE
Hey, looks like you’re buddies
with this guy I know!](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/7f8d77b3-71ca-40a3-9f0f-8841485138c4-160722162220/85/Entelo-Effective-Messaging-8-320.jpg)
Entelo Effective Messaging
- 1. Effectively Messaging Candidates TIPS AND TECHNIQUES FOR YOUR TEAM BY
- 2. Effectively Messaging Candidates 1 Every recruiter has been there. You’re reaching out to dozens of candidates a day through LinkedIn and email, yet can’t seem to garner the type of response you need to fill your open positions. What’s the solution? Send more of the same messages that make you sound like a boring recruiting robot? Please tell us you answered no. As you reach out to more talent, it’s common for messaging to become less personalized, making you sound like a careless drone and making your candidates feel like just another face in the crowd. Rubbing talent the wrong way is harmful not only to your recruiting goals, but to your organization’s brand as a whole.
- 3. Effectively Messaging Candidates 2 Effectively Messaging Candidates A primer for rockstar recruiters on how to walk the walk and talk the talk. It’s Proven: Email Rules..................................................... Mindful Messaging Matters.............................................. Awesome Email Examples................................................ Make Outreach a Team Sport......................................... What Candidates Truly Want........................................... Now What?.............................................................................. 5 6 7 9 10 13 Share this ebook
- 4. Effectively Messaging Candidates 3 We decided to find out once and for all the answer to the haunting, age-old question that’s plagued recruiters: How do we make a bona fide connection with candidates? Entelo did its homework and found the vast majority of candidates are open to hearing about new job opportunities just as long as recruiters do so in a manner the talent finds agreeable. Here’s what we learned. Email is king. Specific projects and employee development are paramount. Involving hiring managers and team members goes a long way.
- 5. Effectively Messaging Candidates 4 Getting top talent to respond to your reqs comes down to the channel, timing, and content of your messaging. Stale and overused messaging techniques are flawed at best and at worst, counter-productive. Nearly 80% of candidates are already employed, but are willing to hear more about what your organization has to offer them. Talent is out there, and ready to be recruited. Are you ready to recruit them the way they want?
- 6. Effectively Messaging Candidates 5 It’s Proven: Email Rules Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past 11 years, you are well aware that recruiters live on LinkedIn. This isn’t in and of itself a bad thing. Arguably, it’s the only social media platform people take seriously. The problem starts when hiring professionals come to rely solely on InMails to connect with talent. Entelo’s study found that not only is it rare for candidates to regularly open InMails, it’s also even more unlikely for them to respond to the messages they do read. 26.2% of job holders report never opening LinkedIn-based messages from recruiters, meaning over a quarter of the time, your efforts are falling on deaf ears. Professionals also reported considerable distaste at the notion of being contacted over the phone and through Facebook. It’s best to stick with email when reaching out to candidates. Use everything else as a supplement.
- 7. Effectively Messaging Candidates 6 Mindful Messaging Matters It’s difficult to overstate the importance of your email’s subject line. You could be working for the most desirable company on the planet and offer an amazing position (with handsome compensation to match), but send an email with a poorly written subject line and it’s likely your message will be sent directly to “Mark as Read” purgatory or worse — the circular file of the virtual world. The first thing to keep in mind when writing your subject line is length. There’s no standard for display width, as candidates could be using a variety of different email clients or mobile devices. As such, the more concise, the better. Next, you’ll need something eye-catching to encourage your candidate to click. Here, a description of the open position is almost universally bad practice. Instead, comment on a project, tweet, blog post, or other work of the candidate to pique their interest. Keep your message short and to the point. Just like this tip.
- 8. Effectively Messaging Candidates 7 Increase your open rate with one of these types of subject lines. Which post? Who’s checking out my portfolio? What do they have to say about it? These questions will rattle throughout the candidate’s brain and compel them to open the email. Feel free to plug in any social media outlet, personal website, or other work with the candidate’s name attached to it. Remember that here, all posts are not created equal. Be sure to comment on a candidate’s post that is relevant to their industry or skillset. EXAMPLE “Great blog post on upcoming trends for engineers in 2014” TYPE Just saw your insert social media reference here. How flattering. They like me. They really, really like me. Getting a candidate to open an email can be as simple as mentioning solely their company name. A variation on this one is to suggest some sort of partnership or collaboration by including your company and a candidate’s current company, for example “Entelo + Twitter.” EXAMPLE “Entelo + Twitter” TYPE Look at me. Interesting. I wonder what Josh has been saying about me this time. If you have a common contact with the candidate, get their name in the mix as soon as possible. Alternatively, try “Referred from [mutual contact]” or simply “Referral.” EXAMPLE “Josh Hayes referred you for a marketing position” TYPE Hey, looks like you’re buddies with this guy I know!
- 9. Effectively Messaging Candidates 8 If you still need help crafting a winning email to a candidate, try this one on for size. Hey Christy, I read your post last week, “How to Speak to Passive Candidates Without Being Creepy” — great piece! I just came across your profile and noticed you have a few mutual connections with our founder, Jon Bischke, and based on your customer success leadership experience and B2B SaaS background, I think you might be a great asset to the Entelo team. We’re a well-funded tech organization that is working on building a powerful search platform incorporating over 300 million social profiles to improve the overall recruiting process, and we’re building out our sales division. We currently have over 90 customers including ESPN, Box, Yelp, Square, and Groupon. Our customer success team is in its infancy, so this is an opportunity to come in at an early stage to lead and develop the customer success division from the ground up. Let me know if you’d be open to having a quick explanatory chat with our team. P.S. We recently announced our Series A round of funding. Read it here on TechCrunch. Best, Loni Spratt E: loni@entelo.com P: 415-727-9003 T: @LoniSpratt/@entelo To : Christy Goodapple Personalized outreach beats out generic text tenfold. Bring up specifics about a candidate’s projects or work experience and you’ll add a human touch to your message. Give a little background on your organization. A candidate may not be familiar with who you are, but a quick summary about what your team does and the position you’re recruiting for makes your intention clear. Be proactive and candid about your interest in meeting with a candidate so there’s no doubt that you have an opportunity for him or her. Throw in some company current affairs to show off achievements, developments, and the fact that your company is Google News-worthy! Subject : Awesome piece on techniques for messaging passive candidates!
- 10. Effectively Messaging Candidates 9 Make Outreach a Team Sport Although the responsibilities lie with the recruiter to coordinate early messaging and get the candidate’s attention, bringing the hiring manager into the equation as early as possible is a great way to get your candidate interested and engaged with your company. Our research indicates talent prefer to be in communication with the hiring manager early in the hiring cycle, because a hiring manager: • Knows the role, projects, and management style. • Can answer specific technical questions about the role. • Has the ultimate say in whether the candidate is offered the job. While it may not always be practical to get your organization’s hiring manager involved in the early stages of messaging, you can always make it known that you’re working in close coordination with them. Try including examples of the projects they’ve completed and links to their Github or LinkedIn profile. Also, working in the phrase, “My hiring manager and I feel you would be a good fit,” suggests a deeper understanding of the candidate’s skills and value to the team. Candidates prefer to be contacted by: Hiring Manager 46% In-house Recruiter 24% Relevant Team Member 13% Recruiting Agency 11% CEO 6% Engage a candidate with the person they care most about — their future boss.
- 11. Effectively Messaging Candidates 10 What Candidates Truly Want When it comes to pitching the open position and your organization, there are several different areas that are important to cover. Although compensation and information about projects were unsurprisingly high in candidates’ reported levels of importance, there proved to be a lack of emphasis by recruiters on other areas the candidates deemed important, such as culture and employee development. Candidates are generally averse to taking on a new role that isn’t much different from their current position. If they’re going to change organizations, the move typically needs to represent a promotion, additional compensation, or added responsibilities. If your open req wouldn’t be a promotion for your candidate, stress in your outreach what the position offers above and beyond their current job, whether it’s salary, close-knit culture, or the opportunity to work on particularly interesting problems, which tends to be the sweet spot for engineers. Highlight your company’s best of the best: perks, potential for growth, and company culture.
- 12. Effectively Messaging Candidates 11 Beyond promotions and pay, company culture proved to be of crucial importance to professionals. We broke culture down into several categories and had respondents rank them in accordance with how highly they value each aspect. Both the close-knit nature of the team and the sense of mission rank as the most important items surrounding company culture. Even though talent high values company culture, many recruiters often forget to emphasize this aspect of a new job opportunity, focusing more on nitty-gritty details like daily tasks, projects, and compensation. Providing examples of collaboration within your organization, like a company video or an online photo album of a team bonding event, is a great way to showcase cohesiveness. Also, you can be sure your team radiates a sense of mission by being on the same page when it comes to illustrating company values, vision, and goals. Many candidates also indicated location as a detail understressed by recruiters surrounding new job opportunities. Determining if a candidate would be open to a big move, could save you a great deal of time. No surprises: Poor company culture is a likely dealbreaker. Importance of company culture Not at all important 2% Somewhat important 13% Moderately important 19% Very important 66%
- 13. Effectively Messaging Candidates 12 In addition, emphasis on employee development ranks highly in the minds of potential candidates, so give examples of upward movement amongst your current team to demonstrate the potential for a future at your organization. When it comes to making the big decision of joining a company, candidates said small conveniences like office amenities and catered lunches aren’t all that important either, although we do admit they are nice to have. Candidates want to work for a company that has a plan. Most Significant Aspect of Company Culture Sense of mission 37% Tight-knit team 33% Emphasis on employee development 25% Office Amenities 4% Catered meals 1%
- 14. Effectively Messaging Candidates 13 Now What? The days of the Rolodex are long gone and if you’re still posting and praying, you should probably catch up on what the rest of the recruiting world is currently up to. Reaching out to candidates is much like striking up a conversation with someone new. In both cases the formula for success isn’t complicated: Mind your manners and be genuine. Don’t forget that candidates are, well, humans, and people inherently enjoy interacting with others. (Remember Maslow’s hierarchy of needs?) They’ll love you for your honesty and will be more likely to respond to outreach. Source top talent all while building your company’s foundation, brand, and hiring strategy. It’s possible.
- 15. About Entelo Entelo is an organization focused on solving modern recruiting’s biggest challenges. Founded in 2011 and based in San Francisco, Entelo’s technology organizes professional data from the social web to help recruiters and hiring managers find top talent more quickly and effectively, sourcing only the most relevant, qualified candidates. To learn more about how Entelo can work for your team, visit us at entelo.com or get in touch to schedule a personalized demo with one of our industry professionals. Share this ebook