Catching candidates’ attention, reaching out to them, and getting them to actually respond to you is a tricky process. Therefore, it’s time for recruiters to start viewing themselves as an individual business that is in need of some branding. Each recruiter should be creating his or her very own brand image that is related and recognizable to potential job candidates. Content marketing is a growing concept in successful brand management and can benefit recruiters who market their content right to catch any candidate’s attention.

The divide between recruiting and marketing is starting to diminish as recruiters are adopting marketing strategies to increase their leads. Content marketing typically generates about three times as many leads as traditional marketing. Check out these simple steps you can take to build your recruiting brand through content marketing to gain more leads.

Curate content.

Social media sites and blogs reach 80 percent of all Internet users according to InboundWriter. What should you as a recruiter do with all of that opportunity to reach candidates? Share, share, share! Don’t just share mindless job opening posts with your followers. Engage followers with newsworthy content related to your mission. Share articles that relate to the career industry, profession, and culture you’re recruiting for. Give your followers a reason to view your page or join your talent pool. Posting credible, interesting content that isn’t all about the job you’re trying to fill is a great way to reach all (even passive) candidates. This is also going to benefit you when you reach out to candidates. Think about it. If a recruiter reached out to you and only talked about the certain position he or she was recruiting for, you’d be a bit bored. However, if you had seen this person posting daily relevant and exciting content you’d probably be more interested in what the recruiter has to say. Take a look at how this recruiter engages his followers on Twitter. @RecruiterMurrel successfully mixes up his tweets with recruiting content from various sources, fun photos of his daily life as a recruiter and various social recruiting tactics! Check out his twitter here for some inspiration!

Unleash your creativity.

Social Media Today shares that “visual content is processed by the brain 60,000 times faster than text.” Therefore, use visuals in your social strategy. Instead of posting a plain job description on your Facebook try adding the text to an interesting picture. Haiku Deck and Canva are free programs you can use to create images with text. Experiment with your creativity and see if you can develop a new way of sharing career opportunities. This is especially popular for Facebook, but it can even be used on Twitter! This brings me to the next tactic, because it is a great way to bring attention to your blog or talent pool.

Start a blog or online TalentPool.

If B2B companies that blog generate 67 percent more leads than those that don’t (Social Media Today), then the same can most likely be said about recruiters. Creating a blog or using the Hire Lab’s candidate dashboard which allows you to display your content, career opportunities and contact information to job candidates in your talent pool. This lets your voice be heard. Sharing your personal recruiting experiences and expertise to a talent pool gives candidates a better perception of who you are as a recruiter and an employer. They need trust in you in order to come work for your organization. Share content from the company you are recruiting for as well as your own original work. Don’t know what to write about? Check out the 10 commandments of Content Marketing to learn more about how to create your own content marketing strategy. There has been so much talk about recruiters using marketing tactics to attract more talent.

Share your success stories.

Did you just place the perfect candidate in the perfect position? Share it! Ask the candidate if he or she would like to be featured as a testimonial on your career site, blog or through your social media network. Write up a fun snippet of how you found the candidate, how the person got the job, or how well he or she is doing in the position now. You can do this for new hires, or even take a look back at candidates you placed years ago who are now successful. Ever heard of #ThrowbackThursday? It’s a trending hashtag on social media every week. Start your own #ThrowbackThursday that features your past hiring success stories. Check out what HRCultureClub shared on its Instagram here for inspiration.

All four of these tactics can be used daily to build your personal brand across social networks and the entire web. Share interesting content, get creative with your posts, write about your experiences in a blog, and share your personal success stories and you’ll be seen as a more credible and engaging recruiter.

By: Shaley McKeever

Shaley McKeever is a digital and social media representative at Red Branch Media, a full-service B2B marketing agency, primarily focused on human resources and global workforce vendors.

The Hire Lab is a next generation hiring platform that automates the hiring & onboarding process delivering considerable cost savings, faster recruitment and a better calibre hire whilst enabling positive brand experiences for candidates and hiring managers.