The New Kid On The Block:

ANZ, one of Australia’s largest businesses, announced last month plans to integrate social networking via LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube into its global recruitment strategy, starting in 2012.

ANZ claims that using social networking media fits in with the company’s move towards a more centralized recruitment model. However, we’ve all seen companies who put the social networking cart before the recruitment horse, to end up with an ineffective, limp and potentially confusing approach to their recruitment advertising. For the most part, the failed attempts to jump on board didn’t properly address the key question: “Why?”

It takes a shift in attitude to try a new recruitment advertising method, but some companies have enjoyed a smoother transition to effective social networking recruitment than others.

The Win:

In 2009, the global freight & logistics giant UPS sought to reduce its cost per hire figures by revising its recruitment techniques. The company launched a true network of social networking in the US market: Twitter and Facebook pages, as well as text messaging and a mobile-friendly application process, both promoted through tweets and Facebook pages.

By year end, the cost per hire from these social networking sources was lower than from traditional sources, but the numbers coming through were still relatively small. However, the initiative really took off in 2010, when UPS attributed 955 US hires to social media sources. More impressively, the company’s cost per hire dropped from around $1,000 to less than $70. UPS has heavily reduced its spending on TV, radio and print advertising, and is fine-tuning its online and social networking recruitment approach into the future.

The Questionable:

Where UPS integrated social networking into their advertising recruitment strategy, the editor of a regional UK newspaper recently decided to make Twitter his entire strategy.

In September, Alan Greene, editor in chief of the Essex Chronicle Media Group, used Twitter to lay down a new rule for candidates: Apply using a maximum of 140 characters.

“I'm fed up with Dear Sir or Madam and monstrous CVs. From now on reporters must apply for my jobs via Twitter http://t.co/vv6iN1d”

On his blog, Greene clarified he was fed up with receiving vague and dull applications from journalists, and that “I want reporters who can find stories that no-one else has got and write them quickly and accurately.”(1)

The feedback to his approach has been mixed, and there has been no follow up on whether the tactic was successful, so this isn’t necessarily the advisable strategy to follow just yet. Still, it’s an indication of the ways social networking is influencing the way people are think about recruitment, and at the very least, Greene’s madcap tweet has given his small media group more publicity than they could have hoped.

(1) http://storify.com/marcolsilva/editor