Five ways the best staffing agencies utilize LinkedIn for local recruiting

While social media has proven to be an important tool for recruitment, LinkedIn may be the most crucial social media platform of all. It’s considered by some to be the “Facebook” of business-minded individuals because the number of members who utilize the platform is so vast. LinkedIn has become a network where jobseekers can find employment options and learn about the companies they’re interested in working for, as well as for companies to learn about their prospective employees.

This trend has opened up a great opportunity for recruiters and businesses, especially when looking to find local talent in particular. With tools like LinkedIn Recruiter and the ability for localized searches, the odds of finding an appropriate candidate and highlighting available jobs to local candidates have grown.

There are several ways the best staffing agencies use LinkedIn to recruit local talent. And anyone attempting to strengthen recruiting, staffing, and hiring efforts can benefit from them.

 Use the search capabilities to your advantage

LinkedIn has a search engine platform built within it much like many other networks. Knowing how to optimize your search on specific platforms, like LinkedIn, will help you narrow the results you’re looking for. The best candidates available to you will also – theoretically – know how the LinkedIn search is optimized as well, so their profiles will be full of the keywords recruiters are looking for.

LinkedIn offers filters so users can categorize searches into specific categories. Those filters include searching under four main category groups:

• People
• Jobs
• Content
• Schools
• Groups

From those filters, you can narrow your results even further by specifying limits in the following areas:

• Location – your current location or any you specify
• Connections – separated by first, second, or third degree of a connection point
• Companies – choose to see results from specific companies or leave blank to view all

This is extremely helpful and efficient for staffing agencies and businesses looking to focus only on local talent, or talent from any given area. The best staffing agencies know that detailed data will provide a roadmap for finding the best candidates, and in just a few clicks, LinkedIn is able to offer that roadmap for free.

Post paid job ads

Having a paid ad for an available job on LinkedIn has similar effects to sending out a press release. When you post a paid job ad, LinkedIn will disseminate your post throughout its full network, which will make it visible to all LinkedIn members. Even though it’s going to be seen by so many professionals, this is still positive for local recruiting as LinkedIn will directly connect you with candidates that match details in that ad like location and skill level needed. Those candidates will also receive an email from LinkedIn notifying them of the available position. This is achieved through a feature called “jobs you may be interested in.”

From here, you’ll receive a list of profiles that may suit the job you’re advertising and allows you to send a message to up to five individuals who are outside of your connections network. Not only will your job posting get a boost of PR, but the return on your investment will be high.

Look for similar profiles to your top performers

LinkedIn is also a great way to connect with your employees – and to view the profiles of their talented connections. The best staffing agencies often refer to their client’s top performers’ profiles to find similar candidates. This is why connections are such a crucial data point for LinkedIn recruitment. This strategy is part of something larger, referred to by industry insiders as social recruiting. This form of recruiting suggests looking at all LinkedIn members as job seekers, even if they haven’t indicated that they’re searching for a job.

Another aspect of social recruiting is to take a look at the subset of LinkedIn members that follow or “like” your company page. From there, you can compile the list of members within that subset that are local. Because these individuals have already shown interest in your company, hiring managers and staffing agencies can more easily break the ice. And with other features like alumni mapping available as well, all social networking features can easily convert to active recruitment.

Invest in LinkedIn Recruiter

While it’s true that LinkedIn offers many benefits to recruit local talent for free, there is an expanded version of the free services that elevate the hiring process further. LinkedIn Recruiter is a paid tool that gives hiring managers a larger search capability and a way to funnel that information into an organized outreach plan or workflow. Members can even organize the profiles of the candidates they’re interested in within different project folders to keep the recruitment process on track. With a unique interface and access to the entire LinkedIn membership database, recruiting becomes even more targeted and localized.

LinkedIn Recruiter offers members the InMail program, which allows users to message an unlimited number of candidates, including those outside of their business’ personal connections list. This has been shown to have a higher response rate than cold calling local candidates or reaching out through email.

The Recruiter package comes with a high price tag of nearly nine thousand dollars a year, but can make a great difference in recruiting efforts.

Connect with your candidates

LinkedIn, with all of its search capabilities and data analytics, is a social network first and foremost. The best staffing agencies understand this and will use the message system built-in to the platform to connect with potential and current candidates. This is where recruiters can humanize their brand and talk to candidates one on one, inviting them to local recruiting events or other local business-related events. The messaging system is also a great way to inform potential candidates about business culture or to answer questions about daily responsibilities. Job searches can be intimidating for both employer and employee, so adding a personal touch to your outreach like utilizing LinkedIn’s messaging system can make the process more comfortable for both parties.

In terms of when the best time to send a message to candidates is, there are no rules other than to only message candidates during professional working hours. However, the best time to message a candidate is immediately after you find them. In doing this, you lower the risk of losing track of their profile and you can speak with them while they are top of mind to you.

TriStarr understands all of the intricacies of LinkedIn and uses these strategies to help find a great match. In today’s media-driven culture, recruiters, staffing agencies, and small businesses are stronger if they expand hiring efforts on social platforms. LinkedIn is an excellent way to start collecting data on talent pools and to look into local talent on a consistent basis.

If you would like to learn how TriStarr can assist you in temp staffing in Lancaster, PA, or your recruiting efforts in administrative staffing or professional and IT staffing, visit our website for more information. If you are a candidate looking for a temporary or permanent position, you can apply online on our site as well.

TriStarr is a Lancaster recruitment, staffing, and consulting agency providing temporary and permanent staffing solutions for clients in Lebanon, Harrisburg, Hershey, York, and Reading. Contact us online or call us at (717) 560-2111.