Some recruiters post only a fraction of their opportunities, hoping to fill the rest through sourcing alone. Is this a cost-savings tactic—or will it cost you more in the end?
As the Digital Marketing and Market Research Manager at PracticeLink, I interview a handful of new PracticeLink users each month to learn about their buying processes and early experiences with the site. I love this opportunity to interact with our users and hear about their searches firsthand. Sometimes these clients explain that, in addition to the jobs they have posted on the job board, they have others that they’re hoping to fill just by using the Advanced Candidate Search.
I understand the thought process behind this strategy—it saves time and money on the front end—but the recruiters who get the best responses and results are, consistently, those who post all of their jobs. Here are just a few of the reasons why:
Reaching anonymous and passive candidates
Did you know that 25 percent of job applications on PracticeLink are started by unregistered candidates browsing the site anonymously? It’s true! (To submit their completed applications, candidates must register on PracticeLink, but the No. 1 reason candidates register is to finish these applications.) This means that the audience you reach with a job post is far, far greater than the audience you’ll reach simply by conducting a candidate search.Additionally, part of the way we protect physician privacy is by allowing candidates to opt out of recruiter emails by marking themselves as passive candidates. That means that even some registered PracticeLink users will not show up in your candidate search results but will see your jobs in the job board.
Building your employer brand
Having all your jobs posted gives candidates a glimpse of where your organization is headed. If, for instance, they see that, in addition to hiring a new family medicine physician, you’re also looking for a PA or an NP, they can see that your organization is committed to ensuring that physicians have all the APP support they need.Similarly, posting jobs for multiple specialties or subspecialties demonstrates an organizational commitment to hiring people with the right expertise for your community. Multiple job postings can be indicative of organizational growth, financial stability, reasonable workload expectations and more.
Improving your candidate experience
Let’s say you reach out to a candidate via email about an opportunity and that candidate doesn’t respond right away. It’s not an uncommon scenario. But later on, that candidate remembers your email and wants more information. Many candidates—especially those who are in-demand and receiving the most emails—would rather read a job description than respond to you and start a conversation.If such a candidate tried to find your opportunity online, it would create a break in user experience when the search turned up nothing. This raises questions for the candidate about how serious your organization is about filling the opportunity you mentioned. And it gives the candidate one more reason to move on to the next opportunity in their inbox.
Setting up 24/7 marketing
Physician recruiters work long hours, but no one can work 24/7. Job posts work when you can’t. They’re available any time a candidate conducts a search, and they’re automatically emailed to candidates whose specialties and geographic preferences are a match. Think of your job posts as your robot assistants, explaining your opportunities and enticing candidates to apply even when you’re off the clock.Building a candidate database
In the end, candidates go where the jobs are. This means that if recruiters stop posting their jobs, candidates will also stop joining the database. Without jobs, there are no candidates. Period.In this way, posting your jobs is like tending to a garden. Sure, you might get a few plants to grow from just rain and sunshine, but extra effort like weeding and laying down fertilizer will help your plants and your soil in the end. Similarly, it may be possible initially to hire through sourcing alone, but in the long run, it’s the job posts that will ensure that new candidates continue to join the database. Protect your current crop—and prepare for future ones—by posting all your jobs.
Whether you are a current PracticeLink client or a recruiter looking for a full suite of recruitment solutions, request a demo with a PracticeLink representative to learn more about the benefit to posting all of your opportunities.
