Top 8 Strategies to Attract Passive Job Seekers

“Organizations and recruiters are taking a targeted marketing approach for job openings.”

Every organization wants to attract and acquire the best cultural fit. With increasing competition in the talent market, expert recruiters have started looking beyond their applicant pool. This shift has made the job market candidate-centric, where organizations must evolve strategies to attract the right applicants. Active job seekers refer to who has applied to you, which will usually be a definitive list, but a pool of passive job seekers is not the same; here, you might see only the tip of the iceberg. With more effort, you can unleash a more significant number of them.

According to a study by LinkedIn, 75% of the workforce consists of passive job seekers.

Who is a Passive Job Seeker?

A passive job seeker is a professional who is not actively looking for a new job role. They aren't desperate to get a job but would give it a try if they found an enticing job offer, provided it is suitable for them.

Benefits of choosing a passive job seeker

1. Candidates have strong motivation to apply.
2. It helps you connect with candidates who are passionate about growing.
3. They have chosen your organization over their existing organization.
4. You can build a strong relationship beforehand.
5. Enables you to build strong employer branding.
6. Increased hiring success rate.
7. Enables building and strengthening your talent pool.
8. Strengthens a recruiter’s professional connections.
9. You can leverage the network of your passive candidates.
10. It makes your recruitment competitive enough.

Top 8 ways to attract passive job seekers

#1. Connect via Job Networking Platforms

LinkedIn is the go-to job networking platform for both talent-seeking and job-seeking professionals, most of whom are passive candidates. You can find relevant passive and active candidates when hit with the right keywords. Employers and recruiters can use this platform to acquire new connections with potential job seekers, experienced industry professionals, and fellow recruiters who can potentially serve as your candidate pool and referrals.

#2. Keep yourself Discoverable

When you are set to search for and attract passive candidates, it is equally important to remain searchable. This makes it easier for passive candidates to reach out to you directly. For this you need to add relevant keywords to optimize your profile, website, as well as the job posting. Also, you can keep posting relevant posts with hashtags to engage your potential candidates in niche topics.

#3. Create Attractive Job Postings

Creating a job posting is a crucial step for attracting passive candidates. This is mainly because job advertisements are a potential candidate's first point of contact and the best opportunity to create an impact and develop employer branding.

You can utilize templates for writing job descriptions and creating job posts, while there are tools that enable you to schedule and upload job advertisements on multiple job boards.

#4. Enable CV collection strategies

CV collection is a must-have functionality, especially for organizations looking for passive candidates. This can be enabled by allowing candidates to come and drop their CVs on the career page of the organization's websites which will be linked to an internal database such as an Applicant Tracking System. There can also be a dedicated email address to drop CVs and a job referral system in place to collect CVs.

#5. Keep the application process simple

Most passive candidates are busy professionals who are already caught up in a tight schedule. Therefore, it is better to keep the application process simple and candidate-friendly. Keeping the application to the point saves the applicant and recruiter time. Incorporating prescreening tests and interviews can further help recruiters learn the potential candidates' willingness and suitability beforehand. Generally, complex application processes will dissuade even regular applicants from applying.

#6. Participate in Industry specific events

Conducting training sessions, seminars, and webinars covering niche topics is one of the best ways to attract passive candidates. This is mainly because passive job seekers would be looking for training and skill development programs and new opportunities. At the same time, an organization that offers skill development programs can improve its brand awareness while displaying that they are supportive of its employees' growth.

#7. Utilize social media

In today’s recruitment world, each candidate is as important as your client. Organizations have started utilizing several candidate-centric talent attraction strategies, where social media being one among those. It is used for talent attraction, retention, and engagement. Further, social media allows you to post regularly free of cost, making it a regular platform for public and personalized interactions. It also allows you to conduct campaigns, events, polls, surveys, and so on, using which you can understand the persona of your potential talent pool. And most importantly, organizations can flaunt their company culture and employer benefits and build strong employer branding using social media, which attracts more applicants.

#8. Take the help of a CV sourcing expert

Candidate sourcing is an expert strategy used to locate and acquire quality talent. This is not done just when the applicant pool is insufficient or less relevant but also to access a wider passive applicant pool. Here the recruiter, on behalf of the organization, will locate, attract, and persuade the candidates to apply for the given role. CV sourcing can be accomplished using recruiters of an organization or by leveraging the expertise of independent recruiters specialized in sourcing, placement agencies, or any individual with good niche connections.

Summary

Several studies suggest that passive job seekers are talent repositories that must be explored more. They are known to stick longer with the organization, helping enterprises reduce candidate attrition costs.

Job networking platforms have made finding and creating professional connections with passive candidates easy and efficient. Targeting the right people and groups to make meaningful connections for your future endeavors is essential. Also, there are communities for recruiters, industry professionals, and job seekers where you can leverage relationships and gain job referrals.

Fill this form by populating the Template Name field with 'Passive candidate attraction strategies' to receive a definitive guide on how to get started with attracting passive candidates and optimize a robust approach on how to fix your passive talent attraction strategy within your talent pipeline.