Technical recruitment is tough. There are many vacancies to fill. If you want to succeed, you need to be better than others or the perfect candidate for your next top tech talent will join your competitor’s team.
There are many ways to be successful in technical recruitment. One of them is a smart usage of content marketing. Yes, you see it right – content marketing. Why? Your proposal is your investment and you want to invest your resources well in order to get most of it. If you are running IT recruitment campaigns, you are probably doing it because you want to carry out more programming projects, handle more clients in order to develop your company and increase your profits. The better new employee is, the higher advantage you get. A good content marketing strategy helps you attract the best people. Content marketing plays a primary role in building your image, supporting brand awareness, and employee branding. There are countless methods of using content marketing in tech recruiting. Here are some of them:
I. Show yourself
Start with creating content about yourself. Show yourself as you want to be seen not only by your customers but also by your future employees. No one wants to work for a company who is known to nobody. Be meaningful, interesting and credible. Don’t be boring.
1. Let them know how cool you are
Get creative and prepare content which shows your awesomeness. It can be a video presenting your team or the things you are doing. Or photos, memes with your brand in them. Make it remarkable and shareable – with a little effort, you will reach many people in your talent pool.
2. Tell your story
Who are you? Can you and your employees explain it in “elevator pitch”? Take your time and create the best description of you and make it easy to remember. Everything you make public is telling your story, so make sure it’s a good one. The company elevator pitch would be a brilliant explanation of who you are and what you are doing. So next time your employee will be asked about their job, the answer they give will strengthen your public image.
3. Deliver information
Candidates get frustrated and go away with this frustration in mind if there is a lack of information about the position and your company. Sometimes it is hard to say, why you need a tech talent at first glance. That’s why it’s worth to reveal what your company is doing as detailed and as simple as you can. You communicate it on your web page or during the recruitment process. Use infographics, videos, presentations to make it more attractive.
4. Social media, blog
How do you use your social media accounts? Do you have any? Anything you publish is the content that speaks about you. Use this content with care if you don’t want to spoil your image. So think a bit before you hit the publish button. There are many cases of wrong usage of certain photos, memes which were inappropriate for some people. In your content include information relevant to your prospect hires. Share tips and solutions to problems of your target audience. When you decide how often you’ll publish, be consistent and stick to your decision.
5. Your team
Social media means not only your official accounts but your employees’ as well. Encourage your employees to share their opinions, ideas. Ask them what content is appealing to them. Don’t forget they were your job candidates before. If your employees have great hobbies, great ideas, share them and be proud of your team. Make others want to join it.
6. Job proposal
Your job proposal is another content you have to do right and it’s the most important in recruitment. Give all requirements in an appealing and precise manner. Know where to look for tech talents and do it wisely. Don’t overdo it – it makes you look desperate. And don’t become a spammer.
7. Entertainment
What kind of entertainment? Most tech talents are extremely curious. If they are interested in you, they check your code for sure. Your website code is the place you can entertain them. Hide some geeky surprises, messages. Get creative.
II. Go out
You can do everything to show yourself but without an audience, all your efforts will get wasted. Figure out where the tech talents are and be there with your fabulous content to gain credibility.
1. Events, talks, meetups, conferences
As a speaker, it’s your time to shine. Use your time smartly, think about a topic which appeals to tech talents. If you represent your company, you can show what you are doing by case studies or what you have learned. If you are IT recruiter, present behind-the-scene insights of your work, the newest trends, tips. Every tech talent will be involved in technical recruitment process sooner or later so the knowledge from the expert is highly important to them. Don’t talk about yourself, think what your audience is interested in and give it to them in an appealing way.
2. Public challenges, coding contests
Hosting events like coding contests is another opportunity to use content marketing. In this case, your content is literally the content of your contest. Mistakes in the coding tasks, wrong answers, technical issues, unfair results can destroy your brand image in a flash. Be sure you won’t fail the anticipations and get prepared in case something goes wrong.
3. Guest posts, articles, answering questions
Sharing knowledge is one of the best ways to make yourself visible and credible. Post guest articles where you know they reach your target audience. Make them want to know you better. Set some time in a week for helping tech talents. Look for their questions, check what knowledge is important to them and deliver the most helpful answers.
4. Networking
Every time you write an e-mail to tech talent, you are sending them content they may like or not. Put your efforts to make your messages personal, clear and interesting. Always do some research on the person you are about to write to. It takes time, but it’s worth it. It’s better to produce a well-written message and have a great first impression, than spamming people and have nothing but your image destroyed.
5. Internal tools
Cooltechzone expert advises creating and giving a valuable tool. Think what kind of obstacles your team has and try to figure out how to get rid of it. If you create a tool which is helpful to your team, why not sharing it? It’s the most valuable content to tech people.
The content you deliver is often making your first impression and don’t make it the last one. Use it smart and attract the best tech talents to your company.
