How Social Media Can Humanize Your Candidate Experience

Last updated on February 15, 2024

Can’t find qualified candidates? Your hiring process might lack the human touch. 

As a result of the big shift in employee attitudes, humanizing the candidate experience today is just as important as recruitment tech investments and automation.

Prospects are suspicious for a variety of reasons, such as negative experiences or biases. So they don’t believe that you’re prioritizing their needs until you convince them that you appreciate their humanity. Before they commit to your company, they want to feel heard and respected — from the first encounter with your employer brand to onboarding. And social media plays a key role here: you can make your candidate experience more human through this medium.

Why is candidate experience important?

By offering an exceptional candidate experience, you can attract best talent and keep them in your pipeline.

78% of applicants claim that candidate experience reflects how an employer values its employees (Talent Adore). When your candidate experience is well-humanized, it can heavily influence candidate decision to apply for your positions and later accept your job offers. And the way it achieves that is by conveying the message of Our company is worth working for. 

What does it mean “to be human” in recruitment?

When hiring companies focus on being human through the entire recruitment process, they can make the greatest impact and boost the ROI for their campaigns.

Boostpoint’s definition of being human in recruitment:

Being human means caring for people and treating them with dignity and respect. Relationships are something we all naturally long for and thrive in, both as in our private life and at work. So for keeping teams healthy and successful, employers must understand the emotions behind employee and candidate decisions. It’s all about finding the human connection.

How can you make your candidate experience more human on social media?

As prospects never see you in person before the first interview, they form an opinion of your company based on what former and current employees say about you, how you demonstrate yourself as an employer online, and how you communicate with them. So the key to influencing their view positively is to demonstrate the human side of your employer brand. Social media is the #1 tool for making your applicants feel that they are having a human-to-human connection with you throughout The Candidate Journey.

Here’s how you can humanize your candidate experience with the power of social media:

Create strong company profiles

Your prospects will certainly check you out. Who wouldn’t be curious about the company culture of their potential future employer? According to LinkedIn, 75% of job seekers research an employer’s brand before applying for a job.

Ensure that your social profiles highlight what work is like at your company and create a compelling employer brand experience both in terms of imagery and copy. The goal here is to capture the attention of your prospects and give them a reason to explore more.

• Make the most out of your bios. Use clear, short descriptions of your company in your Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn About Us sections. Don’t forget to include a Call-to-action everywhere.
• Post often and consistently, so that when prospects land on your grids, they’ll see an active social presence which suggests that you want an audience because you have a purpose. 

Focus on building a community

Build a community that is amazing to be part of, so candidates will feel that there are humans behind your profiles, not robots. 

Prospects will surely discover your social profiles in the first phase of their Journey, so if they find your content valuable, they will follow along. Regardless of whether they apply for a role at your company right then, they will trust you, so they are likely to apply when an opportunity arises.

• Make your brand story memorable, so prospects can identify themselves with it.
• Create content that reflects your mission, core values, and brand personality, so they’ll have a sense of what your attitude toward people is like. 
• Engage your target audience by creating content on topics they care about.

Give faces to your employer brand

What could be more credible than your team? Choose brand ambassadors and feature them, so your candidates will think, “Wow, this could be me!”

Showing the real faces behind your business, your prospects will resonate with your team better, so you can build your reputation on every level:

• The possibilities for content types and categories are endless. Actually, the more diversified, the better. Think of one photo posts, carousels, Reels, stories, and more.
• Share personal stories and career journeys of your employees.
• Ask them to collaborate with the marketing team and create TikTok-style entertaining videos. This will evoke emotions and provoke response.

Network like a real person

Social media allows you to interact with your prospects more effectively than job boards. Trust comes from people, so act like one on social media. Invest at least as much time into building meaningful relationships by networking on social as creating content, so you’ll be able to increase brand awareness:

• Connect with your team members and like their posts.
• Leave meaningful comments under their work-related posts.
• Share their achievements and encourage other team members to do so.

Boostpoint® helps you create a more human-centered candidate experience, optimized around your candidates’ preferences. With hyper-targeted audiences and high-converting Facebook and Instagram ads, you can raise the interest of TOP talent. Then you can facilitate sympathy in them with our short and easy application forms. And through text message automation, you can connect with them instantly, so they will feel appreciated.

Want to hire the best? Let Boostpoint® help you make your candidate experience more effective.